The rough draft is done. After three years, even I had begun to believe that I truly had poured my heart and soul into this book. On the re-read, however, it became apparently obvious that it just wasn't all that good. How could this be? I believe in it. Now, more than ever, I know I am meant to be doing this. This book is my purpose, the reason for my life. I was born to do this.
So why does it still suck? Why the casual, but repetitive flirtation with 'Delete All?'
It's not that I can't do it. No. The flashes of brilliance are frequent and startling enough to convince even my insecure mind that I can.
The answer is that I didn't pour my whole soul into the book. I'd only put in the good parts. I censored out what has been scaring me. The anger that has been building up inside me, a lifetimes worth, that, that has to go in. That has to finally rip its way out of the prison of my tortured brain and pour itself out onto the page. I have to show the world what I spent a lifetime terrified it would find out. Every dirty little secret, every hidden quirk, every nasty thought, all the filthy little harmless fetishes. All of it needs to come out, because once I have nothing to hide, only then will I have nothing to fear.
Stories aren't written about heroes. A hero is nothing without an antagonist. Without a villain, at best, he's a well developed character who's already living his happily ever after. No one over the age of four will ever want to read that. No one reads books to see what happens to the hero. We read to see what the villain is going to do next. What new treachery, what new horror, what new pain can he inflict on our long suffering loyal hero to satiate our lust for conflict and feed our quenchless desire for empathetic righteous indignation?
We are not hero worshipers. We're rubbernecking ambulance chasers. We are the chronically morbidly curious.
We are human, so we follow the monster.
And we're right.
For without him, there is no story.
On a completely unrelated note, if there is a heaven, I think God looks like Francisco Lachowski and we just get to sit there all day and watch him smile. (For the record, I've always liked that shirt. Nordstrom. Good stuff.)
