Robert Rotenberg on second book blues
by eatonhamilton
I concur with Robert Rotenberg here. Second book blues really suck. Putting out a second book is not enviable. They are often rushed, often self-conscious, often inferior. Novelists like Harper Lee and Arundhati Roy may have it right in declining.
Writing is fraught, anyhow, at its best. It is a hard, hard slog–something like walking through quicksand with a noose around your neck. If you can do anything else with your life, do it. Because getting sucked into the quagmire isn’t all kinds of fun. It isn’t fun at all. But if you have to, you have to. And if you have to do it again for a second book, you have to:
Eaton Hamilton 