I had all sorts of great plans for the rest of the A-Z Challenge. But April vacation finally arrived – even though it still feels like February. And with that, the winds are blowing me to Nashville to visit my sister for a few days.
Without having the time to visit your blogs because I’ll be building play-doh sculptures with my niece and watching my nephew ride his bike, I’m going to take the rest of this week off.
But I’ll leave you with a story that will hopefully leave you encouraged in that you aren’t alone in this crazy journey.
It was my first manuscript. I think I’d been working on it for like two years. #iwasaslowlearner I should’ve moved on it with way earlier than I did instead of trying to incorporate all I was learning.
I joined an online critique site where I critiqued other writers’ work and they critiqued mine. About halfway through my story, one critiquer left me a pretty harsh crit. With out mincing words, he said that basically my story’s plotline was a disaster.
I was devastated. For about two weeks I couldn’t work on my story. Yes. I eventually overcame it, got my confidence back and kept writing. Looking back, I’m not sure if he was right or wrong, but I’m pretty sure he didn’t go about it the right way.
So, I’ve been there. If you’re writing your first story and get harsh feedback, consider it like breaking in those molar teeth. Rejection is part of it. And we need to learn from it and try and glean from it. Even if we don’t look at that crit for a few months, when we’re ready.
Maybe you’ve been getting rejections on fulls. Still be thankful that you got the requests. That means you had a great idea, wrote a good query, and had decent opening pages! That’s awesome.
Maybe you haven’t been able to get any requests off your query. That can be extremely discouraging. Relook at your query letter. Get feedback. If need be, relook at your story idea and your voice. This might not be the story that gets published but keep learning and know that it is possible.
Or maybe you have had an agent for a while but haven’t been able to land a book deal. I can’t imagine what that’s like. But obviously your writing has lots of potential. So keep trying! We’re behind you.
So try and celebrate the small victories, the small advances. And realize discouragement is a part of the writer’s journey. Except it as that and know it won’t last.
Feel free to share your most discouraging writing moment. Or share the small victories you’ve celebrated along the way.