The Book of…Mike?

It’s been two years since I started writing more seriously. What began as an homage to a long-lost friend, turned into a deep dive into myself in the form of more short stories and poetry. Most of these short stories have been seen only by my old friend and elementary school classmate, Lisa, likely never to be published on this current platform. She has become my de facto confidant when it comes to all things writing and I can’t thank her enough for all she’s done.

Shortly after pouring my heart out about Malaika, I got the idea to write a story based on my own life. I feverishly began to churn out page after page, starting back when I was but a child in first grade. I was droning on and on about all of the things that made a difference in my life. After getting to the 40+ page mark, I stopped. I started to re-read all that I’d written up to that point, and it was just utter nonsense. There simply was NO real story there. It was more like a long, drawn out diary entry…nothing that would catch the eye of a prospective reader.

After coming to that realization, I set that “work” aside and kind of abandoned writing at that point. Sure, I was still churning out the occasional poem or “song”, but writing anything of any length or substance just was not there anymore. That was until early 2022.

I knew I needed help with my writing, so I enrolled in an online creative writing course. It felt good to stretch my legs a bit with the assignments, although I nearly quit the class after the instructor’s answer to one of my questions left me wondering if I had what it took to be a writer. Thankfully, I pressed on and the last assignment (which I never actually submitted) allowed me to, instead, share the story I wrote about Malaika. The instructor read it and told me that it was “the work of a professional”. That kind of praise greatly boosted my confidence.

I planned on taking another course by the same instructor upon returning from my epic cross-country road trip, but that just never panned out. Frankly, I was still kind of stuck with a very generic idea for a story and not really any sense of direction. Yes, the class helped out a bit with some things, but it wasn’t quite the spark I needed.

Many more months went by and an idea popped into my head…an alteration to my static story that just might get me back on the horse once again. During those months of sabbatical from writing, my friend Lindsay (who is trying to write her OWN novel), mentioned to me a book she got about actually writing books called Save the Cat! Writes a Novel: The Last Book On Novel Writing You'll Ever Need by Jessica Brody. It sounded kind of hokey, so it kind of got filed away in the back of my head. I DID put it on my Amazon wish list for future reference, but I just sort of left it there.

Then, in March of 2023, I was on Amazon buying a couple of small plumbing parts for our bathroom faucets and was a few dollars short in order to get free shipping. I checked my wish list to see if I had anything that would put me over and, sure enough, there was Save the Cat! staring me right in the face. It must have been a sign. I added the book to my cart, got my free shipping and awaited my package’s arrival.

I finally cracked open Save the Cat! a couple of weeks later and, right away, I was flooded with so much useful information. I was beginning to see where I was going wrong with my first story and that my second idea might actually have some legs. It still needed quite a bit of work, but there was definitely something there.

Now, I’m not going to lie, but I absolutely DETEST reading books. It stems from the many years of forced reading assignments from elementary all the way through middle and high school. With the vast majority of those books, I had absolutely ZERO interest in reading them and, thus, I hated them. I read just enough to do the assignments and pass the tests on them (or I went the CliffsNotes route). When I was actually afforded the opportunity to CHOOSE my own books to read in school, I was much more engaged, as they were topics about which I had interest.

Let me say that, once I started getting into Save the Cat!, I was absolutely ENGROSSED in this book. Not for over 20 years have I been THIS into reading a book. I loved reading it so much that I actually read it AGAIN! I was continuing to learn more and more about the story-writing process, picking up little bits and pieces along the way with each read.

My story was constantly going through changes the more I read this book, and all changes for the better…but I wanted more. It just so happened that the author, Jessica Brody, was going to be hosting a three-session webinar on the entire Save the Cat! process, as discussed in her own book. I could not sign up for that fast enough.

Obviously, I cannot get into everything discussed in her book or webinars, but suffice it to say that I learned so much more with the webinars than I did with the book, and I learned A LOT from the book. Once it was all said and done, I have never been so excited to write in my life.

When I was in the middle of taking a shower, a new thought for my story would come up…had to write that down as soon as I dried off. Many times, while out for my morning walks, I’d start going over some of the plot points in my head, trying to work out details I’d gotten stuck on before…just HAVE to write those down once I’m back home.

I’ve still got a VERY long way to go with my story. I have the beginning and the ending (mostly) figured out, but I still have A LOT of stuff in between to work out in the meanwhile. It may still be a number of years before I get this story completely put together but, despite that daunting of a timeline, I’m so much closer than I EVER was before to having something I might one day wish to publish, and that is a prospect I NEVER could have imagined in my wildest dreams.