There are days when writing even a single paragraph seems as a unacomplishable task. There are days, when I think I’m just starting to learn how and what to write, structure a sentence, then a scene, or a dialogue, word by word, forming it into a narrative. There are days, when I am at the dead end, with absolutely no idea what to write next and how to move forward with a growing self-doubt eating me, almost torturing, with all the “what if’s”  and the  “no” s.

In those days, I wonder how I managed to write my first book, trying to remember what motivated me, what made me sit and write untill I was happy with the result. Wanting to write and thinking you have the whole story in your head that only needs to be put  down on paper is one thing, and writing it is the whole other.

You think you know what the opening should be, and who your characters are, how they act in given circumstances, what are the challenges or life-changing choices they make and encounter, but characters have their own quirks and within the process of brewing up in your head to coming into your story they change, often dramatically, or they vanish at all.  You loose those small parts of mosaic that looked so perfectly matched and fitted in your head. The plot twists that you were hoping would develop the story, all of a sudden, seem artificial.

Writing my second book is more demanding, more difficult, more excruciating and panicky. The experience I’ve gained through the entire journey of writing to the publication of my debut novel Friday Evening, Eight O’Clock,  makes me more responsible and to a certain extent less free. Although I’m writing a different story now, it’s about women again, and I want them to be as believable, as alive, and as multi-dimensional as I can.  My mind is cleraly playing evil games with me. I start to visualize. I’m seeing my future book cover,almost touching it with my fingers, feeling the pages as I flip through, inhaling the smell of a freshly printed proofs…   ironically though I’m hardly past 100 pages of my manuscript. What if I’m never going to finish writing it? What if I’m going to be stuck forever? What if I'll end up sitting in front of my computer without moving further with the story I planned to tell, ever?

Well, the good thing probably is, that all the wonderful stories start with the “what if” don’t they?