I received some pretty harsh reviews of my books the other day. And by harsh, I mean crushing. These people did NOT like my books. Being a perfectionist, and one who has spent years investing in these stories, my heart flung itself outside of my chest and into a hole in the backyard and I came thiiiiiis close to hanging up my apron. The typewriter was in the garbage. But as they say, the truth will set you free. I went seeking. My inner voice said all those nasty deviled egg phrases about how I lacked any talent and I should give up and everything is pointless and what the heck have I been doing if I can’t get people to like me or my books…..or… me. Byron Katie came up with some questions to use in situations where The Things don’t seem to be going your way and your thoughts are running away. 1) Is this thought true? 2) How do I feel when I have this thought? 3) Who would I be without this thought? Still after working through these questions, I felt doubtful. What if the critics were right? What if my books were unbelievable, boring, “dragging on and on,” and confusing? Ah! The answers came in various forms, and one big answer came from the show Arrow. Because a lot of great answers come from superhero shows (They do!): WHY are you doing what you’re doing? A lot of problems can be solved with that question. I’ve sorted through why I write for years and haven’t always known my answer. I write because I can’t stop. It makes me so much more than happy. And my books are not really, "me." They aren't all I have to give. A person does not have children in order to receive praise. So then the same applies to books. Friends, I came to these conclusions about critics and books. I think they’ll apply to you, regardless of your goals or projects: 1) If you ask for criticism, you’ll receive it. As I started out with my publishing process, I was told to get reviews, get reviews, get reviews. Send it out, pay for reviews, enter contests; the more people who read it, the more people will see it. If it doesn’t say ‘best-seller’ or ‘award-winning’ then no one will read it. This is in part true. However, any person who reads any string of words can criticize them and how they are put together. There is no perfect book. As a writer, as a creator, you are not perfect. And try as you might, your best work will not be good enough. The truth hurts, but that is what it is. You’re not perfect, your work is not perfect, and someone better climbs the rope ahead of you. This does not mean you don’t do your best. If you read my books, you’re reading my best shot. I give my readers my 2000% best. I spend hours plotting, replotting, editing, sharpening, revising, and revisiting. What you see is my 100. Maybe they're not perfect, but my books got heart. Look at the challenge as a chance for gratitude. What can you learn? Who can you be now? Once the rafters have fallen, what can you build? Use the fear, the criticism, and the hate to see how you can be better. The trick is to know that criticism will come. Expect it. Take the facts and use them to make you stronger. Expect people to ignore you and walk away. Expect the worst, and prepare for the storm. Be someone who can get hit and stand up straighter. Getting hit hurts. You’ve got to lift heavy and scrape away the blood. Be someone who can get rejected and still has self-respect, self-love, and fortitude. Be the hero who takes the hits others cannot. 2) There will always be someone out there who won’t like you. a. If you want a template romance, you’ll hate my books. b. If you want light-hearted, easy fiction, you’ll hate my books. c. If you want predictable plotlines and characters, you’ll hate my books. d. If you love adventures, you’ll enjoy my books. e. If you like twisty plots, relish unpredictable storylines, and totally dig characters who have to go through hard decisions and rough landings, you’ll love my books. f. If you are willing to grow with my writing and my characters, you’ll love my books. g. If you want characters who inspire you to be better, if you want characters who make some poor choices, if you want characters who are not perfect, you’ll love my books. h. If you like a good moment of BEING, a moment where you feel and taste and see and hear and experience the essence of LIFE, and can accept that in the middle of any scene or location, then you’ll love my books. 3) It’s my freaking story! My circus, my monkeys. If I decided to kill a character, I had a good reason. I won’t write the same story as you, and that’s the magic of stories. My characters needed me to tell it this way. I did right by them. a. If you don’t like it, are confused by it, or wanted it to go a different way, let’s talk about it. But you didn’t write this story. I did. Did I make you think? Fabulous. That's the win. b. I want to hear your opinion. And hopefully you’ll hear mine. This is the fun part of stories. c. If my stories inspire you to write it a different way or to add to it, then I did my job. 4) The critics may not be your audience. Find your tribe. Find your village. Your village will love you regardless. The people who stick with you, those are the hearts and minds who really count. Because they see the truth of what you have to offer, and they love it. So appreciate it, love it, thrive in it. Tell them thank you. Name (hero) characters after them. 5) Your Why Is Your Why. a. I am not writing for the critics or the naysayers. b. I do not write for applause or for people to talk about my abilities, good or bad. c. I do not write books because I want to be a bestseller and make a million dollars. (Although I like eating and wearing clothing.) d. I write because I love playing with words. I use a lot of them. It’s my passion. e. I write because I love stories. I love characters and their abilities to be more and to inspire us. f. I write to make you think. g. I write because I feel most alive when I can put my creative thoughts on paper. Something about the process of creating a situation in my head, the challenge of putting it down on paper, the ordering of words makes me feel like I’m solving a riddle only I can unlock. h. I write because I’ve learned some hard lessons and I think others can benefit from them. Jesus used stories to help teach. So he’s my example. The “why” can change over time, and the why can be hard to pinpoint. But it’s vital to your survival in this task you’ve got to do. Find it and keep it ahead of you. The why keeps you on track when the critics wave their torches. 6) Readers’ opinions show where they are as people. Sometimes they aren’t ready for a certain book. Sometimes it’s just not their style. Sometimes it wasn’t what they thought they would be reading, and perspective changes everything. Don’t rely on someone else’s opinion. 7) Good and bad are subjective in terms of writing and storytelling. There are levels to it, but ultimately, one critic will disagree with another. If multiple readers have similar issues, then take that and use it as a lesson in how to write better or improve. But you can’t get better if you just give up. 8) Awards Are Stupid. Art Is Not. Amy Poehler attended numerous award ceremonies for her roles in “Parks and Recreation,” one of my favorite TV shows that I have been watching and re-watching lately. Her character Leslie Knope is one of the most inspirational to me. TO ME. To tiny ol’ me. Do I matter? YES. Does an award matter? NO. It’s a symbol of someone’s opinion. Stupid! Leonardo DiCaprio had my heart and always will for his roles in various movies. He’s forevermore my Romeo. When did he finally win an award? Once he was in some really gray, dramatic survival-bear-eats-him-or-something movie. Ugh. Stephanie Meyer and her ridiculous Twilight story. “I wrote down this dream I had and then it was a blockbuster and then yay it’s a whole franchise of movies. I wasn’t even trying all that hard.” Just crazy. Good for you, Mrs. Meyer. But I LOVED reading those books the first time around. She captured the feeling of a first love. There’s something huge to that gift. Fast and Furious movies, superhero movies, the Step Up dancing movies, those are movies I can watch any time and they inspire me. They don’t win awards, the writing and acting isn’t always top-notch, but WHO CARES. I prefer the movie I like, and I usually don’t prefer an Oscar winner. Those Oscar winners are depressing and you know you don’t like watching that either when you’ve had a stupid day. Art is for entertainment. If it entertains, then it is doing its job. 9) Critics Can Be Bought. Anyone can pay for a review. Anyone can pay to buy copies of their books and become a best-seller (well, the rich people can. Now accepting sponsors.). Anyone can pay for this or that or bribe or buy. Who. Freaking. Cares. About. The. Numbers. Numbers can be bought or bribed. Again, the numbers go back to who has the resources or the scandal or the ability to straight-up lie. 10) Who Really Counts? Does each reader count? Yes. Does one review and one opinion count more than another? Not really. If a person likes a book, then yay! My biggest excitement about books is talking about them with people. If my books get your attention enough so that you want to tell someone about it or ask me a question, then that is the most validation I want. I really just want to share these stories with friends so we can sit over coffee and chat about them. Why did she do that? Why didn’t she do this other thing? What if that other guy was better for her? What if this other thing happened instead of that other thing? THAT is why I write. For the up-late-at-nighters. For the lonely. For those needing a win. For the seekers. For the desperate. For the lost. For the coffee dates. For the questions. For the readers’ investment. For the thrill of the story. For the happy endings. For the entertainment. ***** You are valid. Your opinion is valid. If we differ, okay, but let’s appreciate that about each other. I’ll always offer you an extra serving of grace if you need one. Even if you don’t return the favor, okay. This whole ‘life’ thing we’re doing requires a sword and a shield. I got those. Hopefully we can share them today. Don’t listen to the critics. Don’t listen to the whispers of despair. You do you, and you rockin’ it.
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Let's face it, agents and publishers get thousands of manuscripts submitted to them every single year. The two things they tend to look at are story and writing. But how can you make your writing better and more attractive and how important is writing versus story? A while back I had the pleasure of chatting with Lieze Neven, blogger and podcaster of The Write Way. We talked about making your writing memorable and she put out the interview on her 2/26/17 episode of The Write Way. Listen to the free thirty-minute episode here: https://itunes.apple.com/us/podcast/the-write-way/id1109877627?mt=2 You'll get a few laughs, some ideas on how to incorporate your unique voice into your writing, and fresh facts about the Insurrection series. You'll want to check it out! The podcast is free and Lieze was such an enjoyable host. Share it with your writer friends! We always need some good tips and tricks, and Lieze has some great interviews on her podcast. Tune in and subscribe! "That's the way things come clear. All of a sudden. And then you realize how obvious they've been all along." - Madeleine L'Engle Mrs. L’Engle is my favorite author. She has a way of turning phrases, turning pages, and inspiring my deepest breaths. Her writing packs a punch, if you will. What writing do you remember? Why do you remember it? No matter what you write, use all those glorious tools in our writing tool boxes to create your best writing possible. I’ve provided a checklist, which will help you quite a bit, but I want to extend this thought to you: Make your writing memorable. How do you do this? One way to make writing interesting is to move up a level from the basic sentence. Re-think ideas and make them personal to you. **** How do we identify “basic sentences”? In my own writing adventures and self-editing, I have found some tricky words that make me stumble, stutter, and fall into lame sentence writing. Here is my list of Boring Words: It Is As That Are Were Was The Make your own list! What words do you use too much? What words do you use incorrectly? Sometimes these words are helpful. See right there? But I am aware that I used ‘are’ and know that possibly I could use something more effective. What is a more effective word than ‘are’? **** Question your writing. Each sentence offers possibility or boredom. **** Avoid cliché and instead create your own word pictures. Here is an example of a way to make your writing interesting: Example: Having my sister come for a visit was heaven on earth. Example: I like when my sister visits. Those sentences are okay and whatnot. Sure, they convey a basic idea. How can they be more interesting, detailed, intrinsic, and thought-provoking? Revised Example: Having my sister show up on my doorstep, one bright smile and hearty hug, greeting me with her unique flair and cinnamon scent brought tears to my eyes. Her presence was chocolate cupcakes. Her hug crammed the room full of sunlight. Her smile filled my soul with bubbly, pink sweater fuzzies. See how that helps you experience the sister? You would write this sentence completely different from me. How would you get to your version of this revised sentence? Start by re-thinking what is your ‘heaven on earth’? What makes you happy? If you are inclined to write, “I liked doing that,” instead explore the why and what behind what you were doing. What did ‘like’ feel like? Your ‘like’ is different than mine, and isn’t language the beautiful tool to explore how it compares? This is where imagery meets metaphor. This place is fun. This is one reason I love writing. Example 2: Have a good day! Revised Example 2: May your day be sunny, life-affirming, and lined with laughter! Example 3: The baby cried, looking so sad. There were no words to capture his wail. Revised Example 3: Shadows shimmied away from the wailing toddler, his bald head wrinkled red with frustration and hunger. Tears dripped in large droplets down his scrunched up cheeks, pooling with sighs and hopelessness in the gnarled blankets by his feet. Paci had disappeared. **** Give life to inanimate objects. If one object seems too difficult to explain, then illustrate objects or people’s reactions. Give an object personality. Is it warm? Soft? Cheerful? Threatening? Prideful? Scornful? Lonely? **** I hope you can take these ideas and carry them with you into all of your writing. Pack these ideas up, put them in your wallet, and take out as often as you need. Warning: Be careful, as this, if taken to heart, will change your communications forever. People will suddenly pay attention because you wrote or said something interesting. Be memorable. Use those gifts God has given you to communicate light, power, and passion to the darkness. |
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