Today is my last day alone with this book, and I'm procrastinating getting started.

You hear a lot of "the job of the first draft is to suck," and that's both true and emotionally healthy. But the first draft is also the only time when the book is 100% no question MINE.

I write for me. I revise for you. And sometimes I make some questionable choices when it's just for me, which is why I have editors and do revisions. But my relationship to draft two is not my relationship to draft one, and my relationship to draft one is the purest.

When I type THE END today, I will mail this draft off to my agent and the Machete Squad, and they will start telling me everything that's wrong with it. Everything I need to correct and change. And I'll do it.

And what comes out the other end will be a better book than draft one could ever dream of being. They'll make me better. But this special time won't come back, not for this book, ever again.

Finishing a book breaks my heart, every time.