Devaluing the Valuable

I have spent the last few weeks devaluing Book 1 (AUC) in light of how much better Book B seems to be going. So much so, in fact, that I’d whittled my experience and the resulting work down to nearly worthless.

It was only when I went back to proofread parts of AUC (because a friend requested to read it) that I remembered how much I like the story. There are flaws in it, certainly, but as I laughed at the idiosyncrasy of the characters or the ways the events wind, I realized my merriment might be shared by others.

Yet even without that, the learning process that came with AUC should not be devalued. No, never that. Because without a first book, there cannot be a second or third. Without a beginning, there can be no progression.

I’d gotten to the point where I thought that AUC was only worth the lessons and practice I garnered from it, viewing it as something that would never graze the fingertips of a potential agent, much less see print.

But I’ve renewed hope.

Although I am unsure as to which direction I need to take AUC in order to fix the problems I see in it (mostly because I’m not sure I have the right perspective to say for certain what the problems really are), I now see the value and potential in the story as I saw it while writing.

I don’t think myself a writing genius by any stretch of the imagination, but sometimes when I reread a scene, I’ll find it hard to believe I actually wrote it because it seems beyond my capabilities.

Have any of you found yourselves in similar predicaments – having written something, and then forgotten its worth, only to find it later as a lost treasure?

PS: If my diction or syntax seems unusual today, it’s because I’m writing this blog while watching Interview With a Vampire. :-)