Category Archives: Starting a Career

So, today’s post was supposed to be about the terrors of planning the second launch party. Will people show up again? Will the hype of “I finally got a book out” turn into the flop of “been there, done that, who cares” from my friends and fans? But it turns out there are other concerns that take precedent, like where the %&+@# do I have my launch party and can I even make it happen?

I started out wondering if I should have the launch at the same place as last time, even though it’s on the very outskirts of the city in which I live or if I should choose a more central location. I’m giving out candy, maybe I should have the launch near a candy store in the mall. Or maybe I should find an independent bookstore and coerce them into letting me in with a table for a couple of hours. Between making that choice and getting managers to return my calls, I still don’t have a location. And then I start to wonder if I’m going to be able to make it happen at all.

These kinds of dilemmas relate to the fears that can really get to me as an author; do I even have the slightest clue what I’m doing? We post on social media, enjoy engaging with people at conventions, do some launches and book signings, win awards, but when it comes down to it, is any of this resulting in greater awareness and sales? And that’s the real fear that often gnaws at my insides. Am I destined to go down in the silent flames of obscurity? This is the question we have to put behind us so we can find courage and move on.

So what if I don’t have a launch party; my first book in the Mankind’s Redemption series just won the Howey award. So what if sales aren’t high; I’m just getting started. So what if my fans are few; they’re giving my book five-star reviews. We look at the bright side so the scary parts don’t overwhelm us. Making writing into a career can take a lot of time, a lot of effort, and a fair amount of time going unnoticed. But if we keep working, Kevin J. Anderson’s popcorn method of success is bound to happen. The more kernels in the pan, the more opportunity for something to POP. So good luck to all and enjoy the popcorn.

My Computer is Trying to Destroy Me (And Other Writing Fears)

October 28, 2014

fictorians

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Guest Post by Megan Grey

With Halloween only a few days away, this is perfect time of year to explore the fears we writers often face. And if my own experience is any indication, we writers have lots of things that can strike terror into our neurotic little hearts: Rejections. Pitch sessions. Criticism. Rewrites. More rewrites. Our laptops deciding to drunk-query our dream agents.

Maybe I should explain that last one.

With my first novel (at least, my first submission-worthy novel) written and rewritten and rewritten again, I faced the much-dreaded next step. It was time to query agents. I spent weeks crafting the perfect query, and researching which agents would (in my estimation) be the best fit. Then I spent a few extra weeks procrastinating sending it, for a host of what seemed like perfectly reasonable excuses at the time, but really boiled down to one: fear.

Late one night, after bolstering my courage with approximately 8.3 pounds of dark chocolate M&Ms (as a Mormon, I don’t drink alcohol or smoke, so I heavily abuse chocolate instead), I readied this perfect query email to one of my top agents, took a deep breath, and hit send.

I was pleased with myself for conquering my fear, and yet something—writers intuition? An extra power of foresight granted me by obscene over-consumption of chocolate?—made me check my sent folder to make sure the email went through.

A quick scan revealed it had indeed sent, and seemed to be formatted fine. I was just about to close it and ease my paranoia with a few extra M&Ms when something horrible caught my eye. At the end of my query, where I could have sworn I had written “Thank you so much for your time“, this email read “Thank yo.”

Thank YO?!? After about a millisecond of debating whether I had the street cred to pull that sort of nonchalance off (I don’t), I quickly decided to send another one. Surely if agents see two of the same queries in their inbox, they’d only read the most recent, right?This seemed my only option. I re-pasted my query into another email, read it through about a dozen times to verify that each and every word was in place, and sent it again.

This time, when I checked the sent folder, my horror doubled. Not only did this one also end with “Thank yo“, but my computer had somehow deleted the latter half of several of my sentences. So now I had two queries to one of the top agents in publishing, both of which made me appear that I was querying while intoxicated. Or a complete idiot. Or, most likely, both.

Full-on panic set in. In between planning the destruction of my laptop, which I was convinced was turning all Skynet for the sole purpose of ruining my writing career, Ienvisioned being blacklisted by every agent and editor in the business. Being unable to show my face at any writing conference, ever. Having to enter the witness protection program just to lead a normal life again.

After a fit of weeping and swearing off both computers and M&Ms forever (obviously not in a sane frame of mind), I crawled into bed next to my peacefully sleeping husband,who was frustratingly unaware that every hope and dream I’d had of a writing career was shattered. As I lay there in bed, it occurred to me to try one last desperate ploy to salvage things. I would send my query again, rewritten from scratch (no copying and pasting) on our desktop computer, one that I could only hope didn’t have some vendetta against me.

So I did. In the subject line of this email, I wrote “Query (please disregard my previous emails, my computer was having issues)”. I sent it. And, lo and behold, after checking thesent folder, this email appeared to have sent exactly as I wrote it. No sentences that mysteriously lead to nowhere. No awkward and ungrammatical uses of slang. Now I could only hope. (And totally run my laptop over with my car in the morning. That was still happening, regardless of the outcome.)

The most I felt I could hope for from this was that the agent would have enough pity forme to not put me on some industry watch list. So I was completely shocked when, only a couple days later, I actually got a partial request from this agent. And though I was eventually rejected, it was a very nice rejection, and didn’t include any kind of restraining order. Since then, my query (my actual query, not the one my laptop decided to send on my behalf) has gotten me several partial and full requests, so I think it’s safe to assume I’m not on an agent blacklist somewhere.

The moral of this cautionary tale (besides never trusting computers) is this: my career didn’t end because of a computer mistake. It didn’t end on my first rejection, or my twentieth. It won’t end if I flub a pitch session, or if some reviewer hates my work. My career will only end if I give in to my dozens of fears about writing. It will only end if I give up.

And the same goes for you.

Guest Writer Bio:

Megan Grey’s fiction has appeared in Fireside, Sybil’s Scriptorium, and One Horn to Rule Them All: A Purple UnicornAnthology. You can find out more about Megan by visiting her website at www.megangrey.com.

Juggling Personal and Professional Lives – Never Drop the Ball

October 20, 2014

Nathan Barra

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A year has passed since I wrote my post on how we spend our time being a value statement, but I still find that my time is my most precious resource. By the necessity of my choices, I have become very skilled a juggling large workloads. Between extraordinarily long professional workweeks, maintaining my personal relationships, and the every day effluvia of keeping food on my table and a roof over my head, I somehow find the time to regularly blog and write fiction. It is a juggling act that I suspect that many aspiring writers will empathize with.

However, some of those balls, those commitments, have come disturbingly close to hitting the ground recently. I was able to recover, but as I grow older, the number and weight of my obligations grows ever larger. I fear that one day I will accidentally and irrecoverably sacrifice something important to me to feed my ambitions.

I have been pondering this possibility a great deal recently, as both my personal and professional lives gain momentum. For me, personal and professional progress is both exhilarating and terrifying. You see, once you start getting what you want, you have something to lose. As we chase accomplishment, we often put on blinders to what else is important in our lives. As an example, I was fortunate enough to be invited to dinner with an extremely successful author in her field at a convention I recently attended. During the meal, one of the diners asked the author what her greatest professional regret was. I can still remember the broken sound of her voice as she told our group that she was afraid that her daughter would never forgive her for the years she spent locked in her office.

Despite the trepidation that such examples inspire, I am unwilling to give up my writing and my dreams of professional authorship. After all, in biological terms, the fear response serves to both identify potential hazards and prepare us to face them. If I want to accomplish my personal and professional goals, I must use my fear, not be ruled by it. My unease reminds me that I have things that I value outside of my accomplishments, and in so doing, allows me to keep my other priorities in focus. I must choose what I sacrifice, not let circumstances decide for me. As an example, for the past couple of years, I have rarely played video games or watched television. By cutting out these activities, I have made more room in my schedule for writing. I have talked to many authors who have done the same thing. Compared to the rest of my life, that particular sacrifice was well worth the cost.

Throughout my life, I have found that accomplishment is almost always paired with sacrifice. It is up to me live deliberately and choose how I spend my time wisely so that I may both achieve my goals and retain what is important to me. To live is to risk pain. To fear is to be aware of that risk and to manage it appropriately.

Of Lightning and Umbrellas

October 20, 2014

Quincy J. Allen

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Imagine that fool on the hill dreamed up by the Beatles. Now, imagine him sitting up there in the rain, with storm clouds rolling over, thunder pressing down, and the ominous flash of lightning a strobe in the black tumult above.

He’s tired and alone, the rest of the world pointing fingers laughing at what they believe are hopeless dreams. Now imagine him atop that hill, in the rain and lightning, surrounded by a forest of steel-shafted umbrellas stuck in the ground and as many as he can hold clutched tightly in each hand.

He plants another umbrella and stares at the sky. And another. And another… hoping that lightning will strike.

That is what it’s like to be a writer, to be that hopeful soul chasing his or her dream regardless of the scorn, the derision, the laughter… and the torrent of rain that comes in the form of rejection after rejection.

And those umbrellas?

Each one is a tale—a short story or novel crafted in solitude—raised from the limitless depths of imagination in hopes that more than our loved ones will find some sort of connection within the words. It’s the very definition of madness. Truly. Doing the same thing over and over in hopes that there will eventually be a different result.

It was Lord Byron who wrote, “If I Don’t Write to Empty My Mind I Go Mad.” He understood. Most writers understand. Those who aren’t possessed with the compulsion to pour out our words couldn’t possibly comprehend what it’s like to have an army of characters, a galaxy of worlds, all crammed together inside one’s skull. And yet, the ones who can’t write are often the ones who, every once in a while, crave the creative fruits of those who can. And those of us who can, love it.

Perhaps part of it is ego. Every writer wants his or her writing to be savored and then craved, to have an audience that hangs on the next word, the next story, desperate for more. Writers hunger for such adulation, and will endure all manner of trial and travail to find it. But there is more to it than just ego. We write even when we’re certain no one will ever read a story. We write because that’s what is inside us. And in some respects, the accolades from being read, particularly oft-read, are a happy circumstance, an accidental result of our efforts.

I suppose there’s a contradiction there… that man on the hill with all his umbrellas… he would place them in the thunderstorm regardless of whether he got struck by lightning or not. And he would do it again the next day… and the next.

We are writers.

We understand.