Ten Pages a Day or Die

Author Nancy Martin talks about the importance of making deadlines in the book biz.

Sure, I had excuses when I was late. Death in the family. Moving
twice in twelve months. Sick kids. Husband’s midlife crisis. The dog
didn’t eat my homework, she died in a slow, messy, heart-breaking way.
And did I mention I broke a tooth, had a lump in my breast and
developed shingles all in the same month last year?!?

But publishing waits for no woman’s mammogram.

I know how she feels. Even with two broken arms and a TV series to write/produce, I worried about delivering my book on time  — but some how met my deadline.  The problem is, I’ve made it  impossible for myself to ever miss a deadline. What excuse could possibily top two broken arms?

6 thoughts on “Ten Pages a Day or Die”

  1. Well it doesn’t top two broken arms, but I once moved to NYC in the space of one week, and started a new job and still made my deadline — by waking up two hours early every morning.

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  2. Thanks for sharing the backstory, Lee.
    The irony of becoming temporarily disabled by tripping over a handicap ramp is pretty rich.
    My mother did the same thing while out Christmas shopping. Rushing back to her car with an armload of packages, she tripped over one of those speed bump things meant to protect pedestrians from zooming cars. She broke her shoulder (luckily only on one side). The ambulance crew that came to retrieve her complained that they were called to this particular shopping mall far more often for trip-and-fall shoppers since the speed bumps were installed than they ever had been for cars vs. pedestrians in the same lot.
    My grandfather tripped in the same parking lot 2 years later.
    So I guess the moral of the story is to watch your step in parking lots, especially if you are a distracted writer and likely to smash up BOTH sides.

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