Thief of Joy, Kicker of Pants

I recently finished reading The Ministry of Time by Kaliane Bradley, on the strong recommendation of the inimitable C.R. Kellogg. In her May 2024 newsletter, she opened her thoughts on the book:

Comparison is the thief of joy, they say. But I love closing a book and thinking to myself, “I will never write something this good.”

And damn if she isn't right about thieving joy (I fully believe she will write something as good as this book). What stood out to me the most were Bradley's descriptions of the natural and man-made world. They are lush, and every word is weighty. She often starts scenes this way, and it slaps every single time. It's gorgeous, and I despair of ever writing something this good. (Oh, right. I get it now, C.)

After wallowing in writerly misery for an appropriate amount of time, I've climbed back out of the hole and am now sitting adjacent to it. Because even though I can't do what Bradley does with those descriptions, I can observe them. I read them, and I enjoyed them a great deal, in a very successful traditionally published novel. Her prose pushes the edges of lilacs, it flirts with periwinkle, and it works.

If I had written one or two of those lines, I'm certain that I would have immediately deleted them for being Too Much. Before even an editing pass! While drafting! But seeing prose like that out in the wild, I want write something that my gut tells me is Too Much and not delete it. At least let it live long enough to send to my crit group, so that C. can tell me it's Too Much.

I can't write what Bradley did, because I'm not her. But I can't write something that pushes my own boundaries if I don't try.