Finishing a book is a strangely quiet event. No bell rings and nobody arrives with flowers. You type the last sentence, save the file and sit back. Often you celebrate alone, or not at all, and the next morning the laundry still needs doing.
If you are in the middle of a long project, you can arrange a better ending now. Write a letter today to the person who will type that last line, and have it emailed to them on a date you choose. It will be waiting with your own voice on it.
Why finishers need a letter waiting
Long projects are lonely in the middle. The excitement of the idea is gone, the end is not in sight, and every chapter feels worse than the last. That is when most drafts stop.
A letter from the person you were at the start does two things. It reminds the later you why this story picked you. And it gives the finish line a witness, someone who knew what it cost.
Writers have long used month-long November challenges to force a finish, and plenty of writers' groups still run their own. Whether you are racing through a 50,000-word sprint in thirty days or inching through a manuscript over five years, the same idea applies.
What to put in the letter
You can write it at the very beginning or in the swamp of chapter three. Either works. Here are some things to include:
- Why this story, and why you.
- What you are reading or listening to while you write it.
- The scene you are most afraid to write.
- Who you told about the idea, and what they said.
- A character you already love.
- What you hope the last page feels like.
Be specific. Name the coffee shop where you write on Saturdays. Say what the main character's kitchen looks like. These are the things that will make the finished you smile, because they pin the draft to a real week of your life.
Write the swamp-chapter confession
If you are writing from the middle, put the doubt in the letter. Say that the middle is a mess, that you have stopped believing in the ending, and that you are not sure why you started. Date it.
When you finish and read the confession, you will see that the doubt was part of the process. It was not a verdict on the book. That lesson is hard to learn while you are in it, and easy to forget afterward.
The questions for the day you type the end
The letter should hand the finished you some questions only they can answer. Try these:
- What turned out to be the ending?
- Is it anything like the one I planned?
- Which character surprised you?
- Who did you tell first that it was done?
- What do you want to do with the draft now?
- What did the middle teach you?
The first draft is not the end of the work, and you may want to leave a note about what to do next, such as resting for a month before you read it.
What not to write
Do not promise that the draft will be good. A first draft has one job, which is to exist. If the letter says “I know it will be brilliant,” the finished you may feel they have failed a test.
Leave out deadlines you cannot keep. And keep your letter short enough to read in one go, about a page. This is a postcard from the start of the road, not a plan.
One practical limit: the letter is a letter, not the manuscript. The writing form takes up to 30,000 characters, which is plenty for your reasons and far too little for your chapters.
Choose a date you can live with
The tricky question is when to send it. If you choose a date that is too close, the letter will arrive before you finish, and its questions will sit unanswered. If you pick one that is too far, the finish may long since have passed.
Be honest about your pace. If you have written 20,000 words in a year, do not set a date three months away. You can choose any date up to 20 years ahead, and a date a little further out than you hope is usually the realistic one. If you finish early, the letter will still come on its date, which can make a good second celebration.
We email the letter on the day you pick, between 8:00 and noon in your time zone. A saved letter cannot be edited or cancelled, so write it as you are, with your doubts in. If you want your own copy, paste the text into a document, since nothing is emailed when you write.
If you finish before the letter arrives
It happens. You wrap the draft in March and the letter is due in June. You can still treat the day it arrives as a landmark: read it, answer its questions and write a short reply.
You can also write a second letter on the day you finish, addressed to the person who will start the first revision. Every letter email carries an unsubscribe link, and using it stops all the letters still scheduled for that address, so be careful with that link if you have more than one waiting.
It works for other long projects too
Nothing here is only for novels. A thesis, a screenplay, a memoir, an album, a quilt or a software project all have the same quiet finish.
If the project has more than one stage, write one letter for each. A short letter for the first full draft and another for the final version can turn a long, lonely stretch into a set of small landmarks.
A sample letter
Dear future me,
I am writing this on my lunch break between night shifts, in chapter three, convinced the book is a mess. I named the nurse in the story after my coworker and I have not told her. I am afraid of the hospital scene in chapter nine. If you are reading this, you got to the end. Did the nurse keep her name? Who did you tell first? Whatever the draft looks like, I am proud that it exists.
[your name]
Write it now
Take twenty minutes today, wherever you are in the project. Write about why this story chose you, the scene you fear and one question for the person who finishes. Pick a date you believe in, and send it.
