I think it’s there. I think you KNOW it’s there.
Hidden. Secretive. Maybe even scary. But it’s there.

I think every author–possibly every person–has one.
THE FORBIDDEN BOOK.

I have three of them, tucked very quietly, very carefully away.
They are the books I don’t write. The books WE don’t write.

They’re not the demanding stories. They’re not the children who throw tantrums, or insist on misbehaving when you’re busy with other things.

They’re the children who sit quietly in the corner. You feel their eyes. Large. Wide. Infinite. Watching you.

The Forbidden Book. It’s the one you don’t write because you know it won’t sell, even if you like the premise. It’s the one that’s so brutally honest it silently hurts. The one that’s not quite politically correct, and you know New York won’t touch it. The one that’s so fringe, you’re afraid nobody else will ‘get it’. The one that makes you shift uncomfortably in your seat. The one you already know the words to, but you’ve deliberately put them out of your mind, like a song you’re trying to forget.

Maybe we all have good reasons for not writing The Forbidden Book. Maybe your book is all about you, the REAL you, and it’s too painful. Too personal. Maybe it’s the one you’re sure your editor/agent/family wouldn’t like, or it’s in a genre you’re embarrassed to approach. Maybe it’s too fantastic. Too real. Too dream-like. Too raw. Maybe it’s about love, or hate, or disappointment. Or death.

But you have a forbidden book. You know you do.

There are bits and pieces of it in the things we DO write–diaries, blogs, novels, memoirs. But barely a touch, an occasional nibble at the edge. We’re aware of it even as we avoid it, tell ourselves we can’t quite get there. There’s just a taste, a brief scent of it as we gladly hurry away.
But we know it’s there. KNOW it.

Should that book ever be written?

It could become a best seller. Because it’s genuine. Real.
Or, it might explain the hidden ‘you’ to those who mistakenly think they know you. (This may or may not be a good thing!). :poof:
Or, you could write it, thinking you’ll get it out of your system, and leave it to rot in a drawer.

Don’t fool yourself.
It won’t go away. Can’t. It will haunt you forever, like the shadow you cast on the wall.

I intend to write my three books–one day. Hopefully one day soon.

How about you?