As an aspiring author, I'm curious: how much writing, or how many years of writing, do you think it took for you to produce something you were truly proud of? I have a hard time with writing because I'm too hard on myself and often avoid it as a result. I'm reading Strange the Dreamer now and only 30 pages in, I already love it. I adored DOSAB. You're a fantastic writer and a huge inspiration, so thank you!

Laini Taylor Hi Cristina! I struggle hugely with perfectionism, and it made me stop writing for YEARS. I just never could break through it, and just rewrote the same page or chapter, plus I hadn't figured out how to figure out "what happens next." It's HARD. Finally though this desperate yearning to just do it built up in me and I committed to finishing a novel. The important thing for me is that I can't listen to the advice you hear so much: "Write a fast first draft and make it better." This doesn't work with the brain I have. I've learned by now that I have to let myself edit as I go, and I don't move on from one chapter to the next until i love it and it feels right. It's slow, but I can manage it. It's always hard though (*almost* always, there are rare periods of flow). Anyway, how many years until I wrote something I was proud of? I don't know. I've always loved language, and I'm sure I wrote paragraphs and sentences I was proud of, but I didn't finish anything or ever get very far in, so that wasn't much use! My advice is to develop a habit of completion, even if you're writing short pieces first, to get used to finishing things, to having a beginning, middle, and end, so that you know you can do it. If you need to revise a lot to make it better, do it. Just do whatever needs to be done. I wasted a lot of time wishing it were easier. It isn't (for me at least!), so now I just try to do the work instead :-) GOOD LUCK!!!

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