Perhaps that is an obvious statement to some of you, but I’ve come across people who are completely unaware of the time, dedication, frustration, and drive that goes into writing a book. About five years ago I set out to write a novel, and I finished the latest (fourth, as it were) draft of it just about two hours ago. I feel accomplished, relieved, and proud of my work. I have written something substantial, with a storyline that I am satisfied with.

My characters are developed and relatable, my enemies are realistic, and my world is something different. I have written a novel. I can’t explain this feeling to anybody else who hasn’t written novel-length fiction. I have written a freaking novel. Since I decided that writing was the path I wanted to pursue in my life, I have written the first ten chapters or so of about six books, every story petering out after that because of a lack of interest on my part. Now, I found something that drove me to write it, that practically wrote itself for much of the story.

As I said, I’ve been writing this book for over four years, rounding on five coming this summer, starting when I was nineteen. I turn twenty-four this August, and I hope to have my book fully edited, polished, and ready to send to literary agents in hope of securing a contract. While finding an agent and getting published is surely going to be a long and arduous process, I don’t think that it will be as taxing as writing has been.

Writing isn’t as easy as some people would have you think. On multiple occasions I have taken calls from family while in the middle of a chapter, explained to them why I was busy, and basically was told, “Screw your writing! That’s not real work! Now listen to how intuitive my cat is.” Because what could potentially be the beginning of my life as a writer isn’t as interesting as how your cat immediately understood that it was supposed to chase the fluffy thing on a stick?

While I love writing and it’s what I want to do with the rest of my life, writing a novel while working full time, going to school full time, working a second part-time job, and being involved in loads of student organizations is difficult. This difficulty didn’t necessarily come as a surprise to me, but in some ways I expected the words to come as easily to me as the idea behind them did. I have always respected writers like J.R.R. Tolkien, Neil Gaiman, J.K. Rowling, and Suzanne Collins, but I now have a new-found respect for writers that I don’t particularly enjoy. I may not like the stories of some writers, but I have to admire them to some extent for writing at all.