Part II: The Metanovel

If at first you don’t succeed, declare success. Self-Referential Metanovel Writing for D*mmies Epilogue 1:It’s Done! It’s done! Finally, my novel is done! I didn’t think I could do it, but I did. It was hard. In fact it was nearly impossible for me. The odds against it were enormous. But it was done. And I was a different person for having written it.

Or I hope I will be. Once I finish writing it. Which won’t happen until I’ve started. Which is what I’m doing right now. Starting. I mean right now, while I’m writing this, not right now while I’m editing it. Or now while you’re reading it. The six paragraphs that you see at the top were in the first draft of the metanovel. They were among the first words I wrote. I haven’t edited them because they are historically significant, and for another reason that I’ve now forgotten. But one reason is enough. It’s true that I changed the number of asterisks. Originally there were ten, but when I edited the first draft I realized that ten was or were too many depending on dialect. But isn’t that what editing is for? I changed it to five. Five asterisks have held up through many subsequent edits, but I’m willing to change the number if someone makes a convincing argument. “You are an idiot,” said my inner critic. I ignored it. “Keep going,” said the metanovel. “Finish me.” Now I’m writing a draft version of this nearly complete paragraph. Or I had written it when I was writing the first draft. Now I’m editing it. And editing it again. And again. And now you’re reading it, of course. It’s not much. Or it wasn’t. But it’s a start! Or was. And I can’t hope to finish, which I still haven’t done—in this draft, anyway—unless I start. So I’m starting. Or I was starting, back when I started. “I think I’ve said this before,” said my inner critic, later, “but it deserves repeating: this is stupid.” I ignored it. “Keep going,” said the metanovel. I don’t have a plot, or characters, or a setting, or a theme. I don’t know what to call my nov­ el. Right now, as I’m writing this first draft, my working title is “The World’s Stupidest Novel.” It serves as a placeholder. I’ll change it when I know what I’m writing about. It also serves as a reminder of my deliberately low expectations. You might ask: why am I writing the epilogue first? Or rather, if you were asking it, you’d ask “Why are you writing the epilogue first.” If you had asked, which at this point I’m not saying you’ve done, I would have answered: “I have no idea what else to write. So I’m going to imagine success and declare victory. Why not?” Really, why not? Not knowing what this book will be about hasn’t stopped me from starting it. Not knowing what this sentence will be about hasn’t stopped me from starting it either. And not knowing won’t stop me from starting and then eventually finishing this sentence, as I am Self-Referential Metanovel Writing for Dmmies confident that I will, sooner or later, even though it’s a convoluted self-referential sentence, and full of subordinate clauses, like that one, and these others, and this one. And it won’t stop me from starting this next sentence, or finishing it. Or starting and finishing a fragment like this. Or this. Or writing this fragment and calling it a paragraph. “Writing crap like this won’t get the job done,” says my inner critic. “Writing crap like that is getting the job done,” says the metanovel. “Look at me! I’m a three pages longer. Go me! Go you!” Self-Referential Metanovel Writing for Dmmies Epilogues Go At the End “Read this definition of epilogue,” says my inner critic after it had had time to make a new, more reasoned assault. “Which definition?” I ask. “The one right below this line,” says my inner critic. “An epilogue or epilog is a piece of writing at the end of a work of literature or drama, usually used to bring closure to the work.” “That’s from Wikipedia,” my inner critic says. “So it’s right. Your so-called epilogue is at the beginning. So it’s wrong.” “Maybe it is,” I say to my inner critic. “But it’s historically correct. That epilogue really was one of the first things I wrote. I don’t know why. It just happened that way.” Technically, I wrote the epilogue after I wrote Chapter 1, but it seemed wrong to leave it there. I moved it to the beginning not long after I finished Chapter 2. “But now you’re editing” says my inner critic during one of my editing passes. “You can now put that stupid epilogue at the end of your stupid book. Or better yet, you can delete it en­ tirely. Or even better yet still, you can delete the entire stupid book.” “I like it where it is,” I say. “I won’t delete it.” “So do I,” says the metanovel. “I don’t want it, or the rest of me to be deleted.” “As things have evolved,” I say to my inner critic after I finish the first draft. “having the epilogue at the front turns out to be more than historically important. It belongs in the front. That’s the reason I forgot. It was a factor in my success. It helped me imagine what I wanted to do. I did get my first draft done in thirty days. Now I’m going to finish my edits in thirty more.” “You’re way past thirty more days.” says my inner critic, way past thirty days later. “When did you finish your draft? November? What month is it now?” “February.” “And Now?” “April.” “And now?” asks my inner critic, sneering. “I won’t say,” I say, to avoid endlessly adding and answering ‘And now?’ I didn’t need the word count any more. “Keep working on your metanovel,” God says. “Yes,” says the metanovel. “Finish me.” I listen to the voice of God and the voice of the metanovel, and not the voice of my inner critic. I keep going. Retroactively, in a later draft, I decide to include a table of contents. “Where?” Asks my inner critic. “I don’t see a stupid table of contents.” “Oh look!” Says the metanovel. “It starts on my next page! And I’m not just 20 pages long. I’m 216! I can hardly wait to find out what I’m about!” Self-Referential Metanovel Writing for Dmmies Retroactive Contents The World’s Stupidest Novel 1 Part I: Before The Beginning…2 God’s Will 4 The Author’s Apology 5 God’s Apology 6 Publisher’s Disclaimer 7 These Apologies Are Stupid 8 Improbability 9 Probability Zero 11 And God Said: “Let There Be Light! Dammit!” 12 Blasphemy! 16 Part II: The Metanovel…18 It’s Done! 19 Epilogues Go At the End 21 It’s Really Done! 29 Starting Out: The First Chapter 30 70 Pages! 31 What Is NaNoWriMo?…32 Is That It?…33 The Worst Day Of My Life…34 An Idea!…35 A Talking Idea?…36 A Metanovel…37 So That’s The Big Idea?…39 Test Marketing The Concept…40 Ego Amok…42 Who’s In The Metanovel?…43 What About Publishing?…45 Publishing Before You Finish?…46 Finding a Publisher…47 The Not Quite Omniscient Narrator…48 Redundant!…49 The Greatest Publisher In The Metauniverse…50 He’s Right, You Know…52 A Necessary Sex Scene…53 Enough Sex For Publication…55 Part III: Memories…56 Mom 57 Your Mother? 59 In the Beginning 60 Self-Referential Metanovel Writing for Dmmies Mom 61 Literary Near-Immortality 62 Mom, Continued 63 Can I Help You Darling? 65 Part IV: The Adversary…67 Stop That Book! 68 It’s Obvious…70 The Rise Of The Adversary 71 Idiocy!…72 Reality And The Flow Of Time 73 The Antimuse 74 Antimuse Redux 75 A Small Plot Change 76 Bad Feelings 78 Part V: The Muse…79 How To Create A Muse Without A Muse 80 It’s A Trap!…81 Sorry. You Burn In Hell. 82 Criticism: Burning In Hell?…83 Evolving A Muse 84 I’m In! 85 The Evolved Muse 86 The Plan 87 The Muse Reviews 88 The Heat Death of The Universe 89 It’s All Crap! 90 Finally!…92 Good News From the antimuse 93 Please Finish Me! 94 Part VI: Fear and Procrastination…95 Procrastination 96 The Boy On The Diving Board 97 The Wheel Of Terror 98 Misery 100 Chronic Metastupidity 101 Part VII: Imagination…103 The Third Classic Blunder 104 Most Of Reality Is Imagined 105 Unblundering 106 The Most Powerful Forces In The Universe 108 Unreality And Imagination 110 Did You Understand? 111 Self-Referential Metanovel Writing for Dmmies Part VIII: Practice! Practice! Practice!…112 Who Is This Fucking Narrator? 113 Something’s Wrong 114 Practice! Practice! Practice! 115 Practice Chapters…117 The Problem 118 Get To Work! Please…119 Tranformative 120 Imagining The Metanovel 122 Good News! You’re Forgiven! 123 God’s Will 124 Evolving The Metanovel 127 More Editing…128 I Could Lie! 129 Success In The Interchapter Break…131 Metapractice 101…132 Lying 101…134 Part IX: A New Beginning…135 A New Beginning 136 He Didn’t Show Up 137 I Give Up! 138 He Gave Up 139 An Accomplished Liar 140 Arrival At Last 141 The Second Step 143 Writers I Admire 144 The End Is In Sight…145 The Imagined Meeting 146 The Third Step…149 The List 150 Get To The Meeting…151 Brainstorming Meeting 152 Reorganization…153 God’s In The Meeting!…155 The Authors Arrive 156 Part X: Lessons From The Masters…158 Faith 159 Paradox Lost 163 End of Meeting 165 Enjoy Life! 166 Realize Where You Really Are 167 The Center of The Universe 169 Self-Referential Metanovel Writing for Dmmies I Know Where I Am! 171 What Are You? 172 What’s Around Me? 174 The Tree Of Life 175 Enlightenment 178 Half The Story 179 Work! Practice! 180 Part XI: Hard Times…181 Snap! 182 The Worst Day Of My Life 183 Outside Space And Time 185 The Days That Never End 188 Practicing Safety…189 Part XII: Metapractice…190 Practice! 192 What The Doorknob Said 193 Help Arrives 194 Practice, practice, practice. 195 More Practice, practice, practice. 196 Practicing Imagination 197 Practice Interruptus 198 How To Practice 199 How To Practice 201 A Decision 202 Finishing 204 Part XIII: Endgame…205 Done At Last! Almost. 206 Metanovel Writing 208 Omniscience At Last! 209 Interchapter Narration Break 210 Retroactive Legal Details 211 It’s Really Done! 212 No It’s Not! 213 Catch-11 214 It’s Actually Not Bad 216 Postlude 217 The Last Chapter and Page 219 Self-Referential Metanovel Writing for Dmmies Epilogue 2:It’s Really Done! It worked! I think to myself. Look at those Retroactive Contents! I remember how I had written my first draft. I had put down whatever came to mind, trying to get my word count up—and trying to encourage myself. En-courage myself. Giving myself the courage to start, and the courage to keep going and most of all, the courage to finish. If I keep imagining that I’m succeeding before I fail, and if I keep imagining that I’m finished before I start, then maybe I’ll actually succeed and finish, I think I thought. “Stupid then, stupid now” says my inner critic. “Ignore the critic,” say God and the metanovel together. Whatever it was, it worked! I think. I didn’t care what was in the book. I wasn’t trying to produce a great book. Not even a good book. Not even a lousy book. A total, utter, complete piece-of-shit book would have been fine as long as it was a complete, 50,000 word book. “You seem be having trouble producing even a 50,000 word piece of shit,” says my inner critic, later in my first draft. I was struggling, trying to get the word count up to 50,000 before time ran out. “I did have trouble, but I got it done,” I say still later, after I’d written 51,321 words. “And it was 51,321 words when it was done.” “A 51,321 word piece of shit is still a piece of shit,” says my inner critic. “And it’s not done.” “What do you mean it’s not done?” I ask. “You haven’t finished editing,” says my inner critic. “It’s getting better,” I say much later, as I struggle with my edits. “Improved shit is still shit,” my inner critic says, over and over. And over. And over. Now it’s nearly time to stop writing this first draft of the epilogue, I remembered that I had thought, as I had nearly finished writing the first draft of this epilogue. And next it will be time to write the first word in the first sentence in the first draft of the first chapter. “It’s going to be a stupid chapter,” my inner critic complained. “Just like this epilogue. I can tell.” Self-Referential Metanovel Writing for Dmmies