Hello precious internets. Last night I came up with a sweet idea for a novel for adults. It’s a sad literary novel: sorry sci-fi / fantasy enthusiasts. It’ll probably fall apart in a few days, or like most of my novels-for-older-adults it’ll end up not being very good, but I suppose it’s something to divert me.

Recently I was about to argue with somebody on Facebook and I had a weird realization. “What does this sound like to the person I’m writing to?” Like…it was so strange. Here I was living out a psycho-drama in my own head, and I suddenly became aware that there was another person involved in this exchange. Ultimately the insight hasn’t had much of an effect on my own life (I still have to live it inside my own head, after all!) but I did forgo posting the comment. And it has made me think a little bit about my novels. What would this sound like to somebody who isn’t me? Why would anyone read this if they didn’t have to? What is there in this that enriches other people’s lives?

Ultimately these are very difficult questions to answer. I think it’s hard to write for anybody except yourself. Just like I post FB comments that amuse me, I also write books that amuse me. One can only hope that one’s own tastes mirror, in some way, the tastes of the population. And yet…one still wonders. How does this all sound to somebody who isn’t me?