On Writing: Back to the Whiteboard

Used to be, I’d hear authors talk about how this book took three years to write, this one took four, and I’d wonder what was wrong with them. How could they possibly be going that slowly? Even at a page-a-day pace, any hack can have 365 pages at year’s end.
     Then I wrote a book in earnest, and I’m beginning to understand.  Leaving Home, the manuscript that earned me an MFA and a raise at my day job, started with a short story in the spring of 2010 … and still isn’t finished.