I wrote a book

Sat, 28 Mar 2026 13:08:08 +0000

A novel. My third.

The first one was about five years ago. It has every problem you’d expect from someone who’d never written fiction. Flat dialogue, scenes that wander, characters that exist to serve the plot instead of the other way around. The bones are good, though. There’s a real story in there. I just didn’t know how to tell it yet.

The second was last November. Twenty-nine days, start to finish. Better, but the middle act drags, the villain is a cardboard cutout, and the romantic thread pays off too early, robbing the ending of the tension it needs. I learned more about pacing from writing that book than from anything I’ve read about writing.

Reading on Michael Doornbos

I wrote a book