What it's like to write on deadline

By *an author* who had a small meltdown yesterday

Today I want to talk about how different writing can feel when, instead of doing it at your own pace, you’re on deadline.

Because—surprise—I’m on deadline for *secret book project* that I just sold on proposal (yay, and more soon!)—and it’s tight. September 1st tight.

Before jumping in to the tough parts, let me take a moment to acknowledge the huge positive in writing on deadline—the book is sold. You’re not writing in a space of ‘will this book ever be in the world or not’ uncertainty. You’re writing with the full knowledge that this will be on shelves within X amount of time. (Which has its own challenges heh heh—but I digress.) So that’s pretty cool.

However, since this will be on shelves within X amount of time, there is a firm date when it needs to be turned into the editor so that the gears of publishing can turn appropriately.

Technically, from mid-ish June when we accepted the offer post negotiations, to September 1st, is 10 weeks. Okay, not technically—it IS ten weeks (I counted at the time 😂). And traditionally, I draft that fast anyway. I wrote Made for You in something like 7 weeks. I wrote Beach Bodies/A Killer Getaway in something like… 8 or 9 weeks? So it shouldn’t be a stretch.

“It’s no problemo!” I cheerfully told my editor.

After all, this is my natural rhythm anyway… right?

Well, there were a few factors I blissfully ignored in the first flush of joy that is a New Book Deal Moment. Namely, 1) I’m agenting full time now. When I finished drafting Beach Bodies, technically I was also agenting, but I had just opened to queries and didn’t have the workload I have now. In other words, though I have written and revised and so forth, I have not drafted a full novel from scratch since I started agenting full time. So this would be a ‘hi hello’ make it or break it ‘can you really agent and write books fast’ moment. And 2) it’s summer. I have three school-age children. Which means it’s the era of pool days and amusement park trips and vacations and such. We have plans with family. A 20th wedding anniversary vacation (our first vacation away from kids since having kids almost 13 years ago!). Ehem, a book launch in August! Not to mention other author/agent responsibilities such as a conference, author events, pass pages for the UK edition of my fall book (cannot wait to share the cover, it is everything), and many other things that are too numerous to list out and would really just be annoying to read.

Hilariously, my literal author bio (and you can verify this right now on freaking Goodreads and Amazon, among other sites) specifically says I do not write novels in the summer. Even more specifically, I forget how novels are written during the summer. Here. I’ll show you.

This is one of those ‘much truth is said in jest’ things. Like, yes, very funny—but I actually kinda meant it, too, people.

And unfortunately, this summer I am not allowed to forget how to write a novel, because people are literally paying me cash money to do so.

😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭😭

(how many crying emojis is too many?)

I know. Very self-pitying. And I’m very aware of how whiny this might sound to those in the query trenches, or languishing on submission. I know!!! I’ve been there, boo!!! (for 8 1/2 years, let the record show—4 1/2 years of query trenches and 4 years dying on sub repeatedly) Unfortunately, one person’s hard thing doesn’t make another person’s hard thing not hard. And… this is hard.

I’m struggling. Yep. I said it.

Working my day job (The First Job) and agenting job (The Second Job) all day, and coming home, and knowing that I need to as soon as possible jump into The Third Job (aka authoring), and that unless I’m literally out of town riding an amusement park ride with my kids, I have to write pretty much every evening in order to meet this deadline is… well… torture.

It’s strange times over here. I’ve struggled during the writing process before. Notably, the book I have on sub right now under my real name (the dark thrillery thing that got turned down as my option book with one of my current publishers but that we are 100% hoping to sell elsewhere) was miserable to write. It was great to revise! But that first draft… it really did feel like torture to sit down with it. I don’t know why. It’s just my Strugglebus book, and we all need one.*

(*I just made that up to make myself feel better)

And the book I’m currently drafting, though it seems like it should be so much fun to draft, due to the circumstances (*SUMMER* / *TOO MANY JOBS*) is making me cry, erm, a lot more than any other book I’ve written.

I’m tired.

I’m not discouraged; that’s different. I feel great from an intellectual POV about what’s going on—another book in the world summer 2026!—my 4th published book!—guys I’m going to have FOUR BOOKS in the world!! This is great news!…

… but the reality of making that happen is me changing into PJs, sitting in my bed, opening the laptop with literal tears in my eyes, and giving myself pep talks like, ‘come on, let’s go, you got this.’ It’s a game of willpower.

Anyway. As is often the case with my posts, there is no real point to this—just a slice of life into this phase of my publishing career. In the past, I wrote books on my own timeline; when I was good and ready, I’d shoot them off to my agent, and things would happen. And this—selling on proposal and writing on tight deadlines—is a really different animal.

I should clarify this is not my first ‘writing on deadline’ experience. I wrote Beach Bodies on deadline, but I had more time as my disposal before I started agenting—and that happened over the dead of winter when nothing fun is happening anyway except Christmas! Perfect timing to hole up inside a story and type my brains out! It was an incredibly fun writing experience, I turned it in ridiculously ahead of deadline, and that was that.

So yeah. Deadlines. They’re a part of publishing. Sometimes, it’s fine. Sometimes, it’s kinda not. You can’t always control when a book deal will be offered and what the time crunch will be—and let’s be honest, though you could say ‘no’ to the book deal with the deadline that doesn’t suit you, it’s a bit hard to say no to a book deal. Know what I mean? They’re not exactly hanging off trees. So we push ahead. And hope we can survive until Sept 1st and maybe also go to the pool once or twice because the kids are growing so fast and we don’t want to completely miss out.

Yeah.

How has this affected my agenting, you may wonder? Easy. It’s taken a big hit on query and full MS response times. I used to work more than 8 hours a day at agenting. I’d do all the client stuff during the day, and then in the evenings I’d binge-read queries or fulls. Now, I have to take back those evenings for writing stuff. So agenting is still very much getting my full time attention, and I don’t expect to fall behind with client work. But the extra bit I used to rely on to stay on top of queries? It is very gone. Extremely gone. Dead as a doornail. Slaughtered, in fact. (can you tell I’m writing another murdery book?)

Anyway, hope you enjoyed (????) this sad sack slice of life moment of the Suffering Author on Deadline. It’s real. It’s hard. I don’t want to be wishing the summer away—but you’d better believe I have my eye on September 1st. And then, dear heavens, I need a multiple-month break before I start the next book—and a stiff drink. And sushi, on repeat. Please and thank you.