Novel Vomit

I subscribe to Del Rey's online newsletter.

These types of newsletters are often filled with useful information and review of new releases. But with Del Rey - a subsidiary of Random House - there's an interesting sidebar: Analogy Overkill.

This month, author Kirsten Imani Kasai (whose book Ice Song is out this month) writes a small piece for Analogy Overkill called "I love you - you make me sick."

And, because the item isn't on the Del Rey website, I'm copying this from the e-mail. Better yet, Del Rey has given me permission to share, word for word, as long as I post this, too:

"The following material is being reprinted from the Del Rey Internet Newsletter. To subscribe to this free, monthly e-newsletter, visit http://www.delreybooks.com."

Job done, and now to the article:

"Writing a novel is like vomiting. Long before the event, you sense that something profound is about to happen. The story curdles within you until you are forced to expel it, in great splashing gouts, upon the page. It gushes out, astonishing you with its power. It's noxious, mesmerizing, horrifying and fascinating. You feel revulsion and relief (“I'm brilliant! I suck!”). You don't remember eating carrots. Why is it always pink? Why must you always repeat the same errors, time and again? You know better. You should remember what happened last time. The soreness, the sickness and gruesome aftermath. It's a disaster, but then a pattern emerges from your effluvia — you can detach and objectify, see it for what it is. There is some twisted beauty in the whole event. Even if you are traumatized, it's finally over. You can think again. You are wonderfully empty and clean inside, if only for the moment.

Now, just as you'd grab a bucket and sponge, your finger hovers over the delete key, and you begin to clean up the mess.

When I upchucked Ice Song there was simply too much to be contained within the covers of a single book. Spillover was poured in a second novel, Tattoo, and so it continues.

I'm in the midst of a protracted viral infection. Sorykah's story will continue to infect me until it's been purged or jumps parasitically, via print and e-reader vectors, to a multitude of new hosts. Once transferred, you too will share my delusions and dream of forests teeming with monsters and mutants, black oceans choked with ice, hear the cry of a lost and wounded Wood Beast and feel a mother's urgency to reclaim what has been stolen."

Now, don't you feel better knowing your novel is the result of explosive, projectile imagination? snicker, snicker.