I Have Some Answers For You
all about feedback--from yourself and others and the world
Last week I put out a call for advice questions about writing (and, by extension, life), and this time I got SO many good ones that I’m going to have to break this into at least three different posts. And there’s a question or two that probably deserves its own entire newsletter. I am definitely going to attempt to answer everything, though! Here, I’m clustering a few questions that seem to fit together.
Perseverance counts for more than talent, I hear. But how to know if you have the talent to persevere? Meaning, how do I know if the story I’m telling is worth telling? I feel driven to write it, and get some joy out of the process, but is the idea of getting published a pipe dream? I guess I’m asking, how do you know if you’re any good before you put your work out there? Did you always *know* you could write?
Oof this is such a hard one, and I get this question a lot, and of course the core of the question—am I, personally, the asker, going to be successful?—is unanswerable whether or not I’ve seen that person’s writing. Everyone who ever got published toiled for a long time having absolutely no idea if this was going to be their career or be a modest success or turn out to be just a hobby, and the product of all that toil would be something like an awkwardly crocheted sweater, something the maker and maybe a handful of other people might admire.
Here’s the obligatory “the work is its own reward” part: Hey, the work is its own reward! It’s fun! It’s therapeutic! I play the piano not because I want to get to Carnegie Hall but because it’s fun to play the piano! Okay, that’s done.
Did I always know I could write… Well, yeah. Mostly because I put myself out there early and got early validation. Starting when I was about six, I wrote stories and puppet shows and read or performed them for my class. Starting in fourth grade, I’d enter my local library writing contest every year. Sometimes I’d get an honorable mention, sometimes I’d win. One time they awarded a winner, no second prize or third prize, and gave me an honorable mention. (Hmmm.) They printed up all the stories in a Xeroxed book that lived on a real shelf in the library. I imagine there were only three or four people entering per grade, but my success there was galvanizing enough that I moved on to my high school lit mag, my college lit mag, professional lit mags, world domination. (Well, not yet.)
Importantly: This was possible because I was writing short stories (and, early on, poems). I don’t think anyone should have to write short if they don’t want to, but beyond the obvious craft benefits (you can finish many pieces, see the whole arc, practice landing the plane again and again), you’ll also be able to send things out for publication sooner and more broadly and with better chances than if you’re only working on one novel or memoir. Since you say “the story I’m telling,” I assume this might be the case. That’s a tall order, to work for years on one book without ever knowing how the world will react, and without ever feeling the validation of seeing your work in print.
Here’s my three-part prescription:
Put the book aside for a second and write some flash fiction. Try to write five very short stories. Revise the hell out of them, and send them out to Smokelong Quarterly or 3:AM Magazine. Hey, look, Craft has its flash contest open right this moment! (Or write longer stories or personal essays, that’s great too.) If nothing gets accepted, you’re fine—try again, revise, fail better, learn, etc.
Get someone you really trust to look at it and give you feedback. This needs to be a person who will either say “I LOVE IT” if they mean that, or “Here’s what you need to do to make it better.” (More on that below.) There’s no such thing as a project that isn’t worth pursuing, and so it’s not worth it to find a friend who’s going to say “This whole thing doesn’t work.” They’d be wrong.
Read this poem, “For the Young Who Want To,” by Marge Piercy. I give this out to just about all my writing classes.
This leads us too…
Do you think it’s worth entering writing contests?
Hell yes! In some circumstances.
See above: Contests can get you going, they can make your name, they can give you confidence, you can win some money, and you can use a win when you contact an agent later—as in, A part of this project won the Big Fucking Deal Prize for Novels In Progress.
Here, though, are the times when you might not want to do it:
When the entry fee is very high and your odds of winning or low, and/or the prize you’d win is quite small. A lot of literary magazines support themselves by holding annual contests with an entry fee, and this is a great thing, because we want those lit mags to survive. If the entry fee is $50, though, and they’d pay you $200 if you win, and their print run is 400… I’m not sure. Think about those ratios, and about whether you’d be happy considering your entry fee a donation.
When you have to write something you wouldn’t otherwise be happy writing. Like, the contest asks for sestinas about tuna casserole, and you aren’t very inspired, but you write this thing anyway, and you don’t love it, and you don’t win, and now you have a sestina about tuna casserole to send around to a bunch of journals that are probably swamped right now with non-winning tuna casserole sestinas.
Mmmm, semi-nutritious AND minimally inspiring. When this is a book deal you wouldn’t otherwise take. There are a lot of small presses that (for an entry fee, for the same reasons as above) run contests for which the prize is book publication and something like $1,000. If that sounds great to you, your next step is to investigate what that press’s distribution looks like. Do they work with a major distributor like Ingram to get their books in stores? If not, are they out there at every book festival peddling your books? How many copies do they typically sell? And then what about the press itself? Does it seem like the one guy who runs it from his basement might fold up shop and move to Denmark? (This exact thing happened to a friend.) And if you like all that, then you need to look at the contract, or better yet, take advantage of the Authors Guild’s free legal service and have them review it. (This can be done after you’ve won, if necessary; just because you won doesn’t mean you’re obliged to accept the prize.) Does the contract claim all translation and adaptation rights in perpetuity, plus occasional use of your left leg? Are you okay with that? If all of this sounds great to you, then absolutely go for it. I’ve judged a couple of book prizes and was absolutely thrilled to help see Amy P. Knight’s Lost, Almost and Daphne Kalotay’s The Archivists into print. Small presses often take risks on books that a bigger press might not be able to put money behind. But don’t accept an offer you don’t actually love just because you’re so thrilled you won the prize.
How would you like one US dollar AND publication on the back of some envelopes I just found, please say yes
How do you know if a critique group is for you or not? Is it better to be sharing work with folks who have similar literary tastes or those working on really different projects? Whose opinions should you be seeking out when you’re trying to strengthen a manuscript??
I’d say yes, they ought to share your tastes to some extent, but no, they don’t need to be working on similar projects. I do have a critique group in Chicago—there are seven of us—and part of why the group works well is we’re all interested in pretty chewy literary fiction. If someone in the group were aspiring to be the next James Patterson, I’m not sure we’d work as well together; it’s easy to dismiss someone else’s notes when you’re thinking “Well, you wouldn’t get it anyway, you think 50 Shades of Grey is high art” or “You don’t know what I’m doing here because you only care about snobby books with, like, themes.” But if you share a basic sensibility and one of you is writing poetry and one is working on a memoir and one is doing YA, that’s fantastic. You’ll benefit from that richness and variety.
And if you’re looking for ways to find a writing community from which you can choose the very coolest people for your critique group, I talked about this the last time I gave advice.
What kinds of questions do you ask when you seek advice? Sometimes, critiques feel unhelpful and I don't know how to prompt them so they are.
It partly depends who’s giving you advice. If it’s an experienced editor or another author, they might not need much guidance, but I’d make sure to let them know where you are in the process. Are you still brainstorming and just looking for encouragement and ideas, or are you ready to think big-picture stuff about structure but you’d rather they not waste their time on line edits, or are you far enough along that you want them to hit you with everything they’ve got? And do you have specific questions that need answering? When I meet with students about manuscripts, I usually ask both “What is your biggest concern or question right now?” and “If I had a magic wand and could fix one thing for you, what would that be?” You might ask your reader to read with specific issues in mind (e.g., “Would you please keep an eye on point of view and let me know what you think?”) or you might wait to hear their raw impressions and then pose those questions.
If your reader is a friend who’s really smart but isn’t experienced with editing, you need to be much more guided in your questions. I know far too many writers who show a manuscript to their sister, “who loves to read!” and she comes back with “I just don’t think it’s working. Maybe you should tell the boyfriend’s story instead.” Great, super helpful. You might ask them to note three main things in the margins: places they loved, places where they were bored, and places where they were confused. And you might ask them, when they’re done, if they can tell you what they think the book was basically about, at its core. But the odds are long that someone who isn’t a writer or editor is going to tell you exactly how to fix your pacing.
Some other questions you might ask any reader: “What did you feel changed in my character over time?” “What did you think was at stake for Janet?” “What kept you reading? When did you want to put it down?” “Did you understand the part set in the Argentinian circus?” “Was there anything that could be cut?” “What did you need to know more about?” “Was the part with the dentist believable?” “Do you think the title fits?” “Do you happen to know any dentists currently performing with an Argentinian circus who might be up for an interview?” “What do you mean by ‘You’ve used up all your favors’?” “Why did you Sharpie out half my words?” “Can we still be friends, though?” “Beatrice???”*
*Some of these might not apply to your particular situation.
Great advice. I particularly like the part about whether you have a talent worth pursuing. I'd like to add that there are so many different types of fiction writers with so many different voices and styles. For years I was a creative nonfiction mag journalist so I wrote long form pieces. Even so I had to adhere to the voice of the publication. In magazine articles I didn't write long, beautiful and elaborate sentences, so I assumed I couldn't write fiction. But in my thirties, I revisited the works of Hemingway and Joan Didion (for creative memoir style) and I began to see that good writing often was clear, precise and evocative, just like the best journalism. Good fiction writers wrote in scene; they had to show, not tell. In my dream to write fiction, I had to first break out of my mindset of what I thought "good novels" looked like. If I try to compare myself to an author I admire that leans flowery or even literary, I'll lose every time. But I learned to accept that my style is different and yet my voice is still worthwhile and (very readable). That's when I was able to finally transition from journalism to full-time fiction. Thanks, Rebecca!
Thank you, such great advice and THAT POEM! I started as a screenwriter (currently picketer), played around with memoir which lead me to personal essays which lead me to short and long fiction. Putting myself out there--workshops, classes, submitting, contests, publishing on Medium--has been the best confidence booster, lead to more work and an audience. At some point, you just have to jump in. And that poem, wow, yes. Keep going and ignore the noise.