Yesterday I asked this question: Have you ever—since studying the craft of writing—read a novel where you didn’t want to change a single thing about it? Not a word, a comma, a reaction by a character?
Then we tackled the hunger that produced the drive to write for publishing, suggesting that the hunger should first be to write to please the Lord. We think we do, but when we come closer to examining our ambitions, sometimes we discover the objective to write for His pleasure falls to a secondary position in our priorities.
Today we look at the thirst for publishing. The question I asked in the opening paragraph plays a role in all of this disjointed posting. Here’s why. No matter how well you write— and let’s be honest here, some of us rise to the upper echelon of the writing hierarchy and some of us fade to the lower rungs of the writing ladder—there will be those who think you’re a hack. Maybe if you’re in the upper portion of the field, your detractors will be fewer, but there will always be those who say: “I don’t get what people see in this writer. I hate their stuff!”
You study the craft, you find your voice, you improve with every effort, and you stick with your project(s) until you decide it’s just about your best (being unable to determine what “best” truly looks like). You submit it, you get rejections, you get interest, you get an agent and/or a contract. You’re on your way. That thirst is temporarily quenched.
And what comes next? Changes. Maybe just a few, and not to say they aren’t needed, necessary, or negligible, but they are changes after all. You make them, question them, discuss them, or refuse them. Most will do the first three. If only a few are required, the odds are you’ll find them meaningful. If there are enough to merit wondering what in the heck the acquisitions editor thought he saw in your story, your heartfelt efforts to do revisions might produce a new kind of dry-mouth and reacquaint you with a different kind of thirst.
Then eventually on to the reader. Let’s say 85% respond favorably to your novel. You’re feelin’ it now. Sated. Satisfied. Sensational. Then the 15% begin to trickle in with their rants or disses or take-it or leave-it, blasé attitudes toward this book you worked so diligently and with dedication to perfect. Is it enough to tell yourself you can’t please everyone, and they aren’t your target audience anyway? Are you placated by your clichés? Some of you developed your alligator hide or injected the ice water that runs through your veins and can answer “Yeah, okay.” Others will sneak off to remote locations and ponder what went wrong admitting to themselves “I really am a hack!”
You look in the mirror and realize you’re a reader too. You’ve read hundreds of novels and felt about some of them the way those detractors feel about yours. You know the feelings well. Odd twinges occur in your gut. You realize you’re planted dead center in the circle of writing/publishing. You’ve watched the line curve all around you through the course of your writing endeavors and now here you are in the midst of all that it is. For a moment you wonder how you could’ve hungered for this and why your throat is a bit parched. But then an email comes or a new positive review appears on Amazon thanking you for this, that, and the other about your story, and the swallowing returns to normal. You don’t have to head to the sink, the fridge, or the water cooler quite so fast. Yeah, baby. I’m published!
Truth is you can’t please everyone. No matter what you write. And changes might be for the better but they could be for the worse. Ultimately it’s your decision how you write and what you write, who you choose to please and what your goals might be.
Through it all, just remember this:
“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for righteousness, for they will be filled.”
Matthew 5:6 (NIV)
God in heaven, we’re desperate for you. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.