I Want to Try New Things

This one is very personal, and I don’t think it’s really going to be of interest to anyone else, but I couldn’t think of a writing problem to get snobbish about, so here we go.

I may have mentioned this when I started posting it, but The Ferryman’s Apprentice was a big plunge for me. Not just because it was the first piece of work I’d ever really put up for public appraisal. Sure, that was worrying – it was always going to be – but when you got right down to it, that was really the least of my problems.

Without getting into all the backstory, I started to release The Ferryman’s Apprentice as a big test for myself. First, it was marketing practice. I knew that even if I wasn’t going to self-publish (and honestly, at the time I first released The Ferryman’s Apprentice, I was very certain that I wasn’t), I was going to need to know how to market. Second, it was something I could point to and say “That. I did that.” Useful both for writing, and for the freelancing business that I was, at that point, just starting to figure out.

But it represented several things I’d never done before. I would need to know how to edit a WordPress site, for a start. I’d also need to figure out how I was going to spread the word. I started up a couple of social media sites that I’d never used in a professional capacity before.

Most significantly, it was the first time I’d ever written anything in serial format. My whole life, I’ve written long-form fiction intended to be read as a unit, not long-form fiction intended to be read with gaps between sections. And that was the foot I was leading with.

Possibly not the wisest move, but then, I’ve always been the sort of person who either never does things for fear of doing them wrong, or dives in without enough planning and just sort of keeps going in the hopes that nothing goes significantly wrong. There’s not really a middle ground of adequate preparation.

I swear there’s a point, and I’m getting to it.

See, I’m corrupted by my English degree, I have an overactive imagination, and I love narratives across media. This is a Bad Combination, at least when it comes to me actually getting things done. When it comes to being a creator, I feel like it will at least lead some interesting places.

I wanted to write this post because I feel like it’s sort of important for people to know in advance. I want to try new things. I want to mess with structure, with chronological order, with characters. I already have a few “wouldn’t it be cool if” ideas knocking around, but unfortunately some of them won’t be out for a while.

Saying things feels a bit like a warning, in some ways. “Warning: Pretentiousness incoming!” And yeah, I’m not going to try and deny that there will probably be some. I mean, if you’ve been reading The Ferryman’s Apprentice, you know already that I love adding unnecessary symbolism. But I will at least try to make sure that my flair for the pretentious doesn’t get in the way of enjoying the stories.

Now – why should this matter to you?

Well, mainly it means that I’m going to be trying a lot of new things.

It means that I’m going to be trying a lot of things that aren’t going to work. But I’m also going to be trying a lot of things that will. And I won’t necessarily know which they are going in. It means I’m going to be calling in other people on a lot of projects, to provide the skills I don’t have.

Hopefully, it means that you’ll have a steady stream of new and interesting content to consume. Hopefully, it means that you won’t be bored.

And hopefully, it will at least mean that my failures are memorable.