Yes I am! Only someone who is stupid would keep doing this to herself. What is this?
I am a freelance Ghostwriter. I get jobs from Elance.com, Guru.com and oDesk.com. My favorite of the three is Guru.com.
Last December I took a job on Guru.com which I thought was going to be a walk through because the client provided a list of characters, story-line and setting. All I had to do was make the characters come alive and make the story real.
In the end the story seemed great, to everyone except for me. The challenge, however, was getting inside the characters’ heads. I found it quite difficult to relate to the main female because she wasn’t my idea. I just couldn’t connect with her so I ended up centering the story around the male POV, mostly.
It took me well over three months to complete a 30,000 word novella. Luckily the client was very patient and understood writers. Still, I was not happy about my performance because, though I liked the story idea, it was difficult to pen because of the limited creative freedom.
I was doing fine until the client started asking me to change stuff. I felt stifled and that’s where it went downhill. I lost that thing which makes a story click with me. Did I tell you I have two other books to do in this trilogy? Yes, woe is me!
I told myself I will only take jobs where the characters are totally my own, or at least 90%. But, here I am on a 30,000 word novella from Elance, where the client provides me everything, even a template to type into.
To me this kind of writing is too restrictive. I am a free style writer. It took me years to develop my own outline where I can work from, so it is quite difficult to work from someone else’s ideas.
This client even gave me a sample of a “writing style” that they think I should use, of course I ignored that because I gave then five work samples for them to get an idea of my own writing style. Apparently this client is not a writer and has no idea what creative writing is all about. No real writer would restrict another writer this way.
I don’t feel like I’m creating. I feel like a zombie, just going with whatever!
I feel stupid!
Luckily I am a determined and resilient person who don’t believe in giving up. I completed the first one with great reviews (see it on Amazon.com), and I intend to also complete this.