writing – Page 19 – Patricia J. Parsons

One writer’s New Year’s promise – to herself

Posted on 30 Dec 201430 Dec 2014 by Patricia J. Parsons

And so that time of year upon us again. You know the one – where news organizations begin publishing their greatest stories of the year lists, the weather networks offer us a list of the ten worst storms of the year gone by, and the rest of us tally up what we’ve done, and more precisely, what we are planning to do. I have never been a person to make New Year’s resolutions.

First, as a professor for the bulk of my working life, New Year’s has always been the first Wednesday after Labor Day – the first day of classes on my particular campus. Now that was the time for making a new start. But January 1? Not so much.

This year I’ve been thinking about what the word resolution really means. Who knew that it had so many different nuances of meaning?

According to the Oxford English dictionary[1] it can mean (among other more specific things) any of the following:

“A firm decision to do or not to do something;”
“The action of solving a problem or contentious matter;”
“The process of reducing or separating something into constituent parts or components.”
To resolve to do something means to “Decide firmly on a course of action.”[2]

Clearly, when people say they are making New Year’s resolutions, they mean they are making a firm decision to either do something, or refrain from doing something. A firm decision. I’m thinking that making a decision is not necessarily enough to actually get you to act on that resolution. Perhaps we need something more.

That got me thinking about making promises. What does a promise have that a resolution doesn’t? Back to the Oxford English dictionary I went.

A promise is “A declaration or assurance that one will do something or that a particular thing will happen;” which seems to me to be a synonym for what a New Year’s resolution is, but…
To make a promise means to “assure someone that one will definitely do something or that something will happen.”[3]

So, I guess semantically they seem to be much the same, at least as far as their denotative definitions go. But what about that connotative definition? In my mind they are different.

A resolution to me seems a bit business-like, clinical, removed. On the other hand, a promise seems more personal, closer to the bone. For me, the promise holds more sway. Keeping promises is a value that I cherish, far above the notion of keeping resolutions. So, what am I promising myself this year?

My 2015 promise to myself is to finish what I start, and that includes what has already been started but not finished. Oh, I don’t mean finishing those manuscripts that in my heart of hearts I know were just for practice. I mean finishing the ones that I know are meant to be finished. That means that between now and the end of 2015 I have to finish two novels.

I think that those of us who write – whether for personal growth and a sense of accomplishment – or for a living (or both for the ideal writer’s life) all have unfinished business. Maybe you’ll join me in making 2015 the year of getting the finish line. Let me know how you’re doing!

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

[1] http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/resolution?searchDictCode=all

[2] http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/resolve?searchDictCode=all

[3] http://www.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/english/promise?searchDictCode=all

Backstory, Ideas generation, Journals, Writing craft

A writer’s letter to Santa Claus

Posted on 16 Dec 2014 by Patricia J. Parsons

What do you give a writer for Christmas? Most of the lists of suggested gifts are filled with things like computer writing software, printer paper and coffee cups emblazoned with bon mots from writers who have gone before us. I have a different view of what a writer – like me at least – really covets. So, apart from the Moleskines which I covet every year, Santa Claus is really the only one who can fill this list. I’d like to share my 2014 letter to Santa with other writers and aspiring writers.

“Dear Santa:

So we come to the end of another year. It’s been a year of writing, not writing, writing some more, editing manuscripts, madly searching for a publisher, and taking a foray into self-publishing. Well, you know what I’ve been through this year. I’ve worked hard so I know you’ll look kindly on this writer’s little Christmas list.

First, I would like a few Moleskines.[1] I know that they’re expensive as notebooks go. I know that other people in my life can provide these as well – but one can never have enough Moleskine notebooks, can one? After all if they’re good enough for Ernest Hemingway, they’re good enough for the rest of us. I also know that most of my work is digital. But I can’t shake my addiction to those brightly-colored covers. I seem to be inspired to write just by looking at them. Or at least I’m inspired to think about writing. That’s a first step in any project, isn’t it?
Now to the things that only you can give me. First I’d like the gift of a continually open mind. Let me see ideas everywhere I go and in everything I do (then the Moleskines become very useful, right?). Let that open mind accompany me when I read the newspaper, eavesdrop on conversations in restaurants and airports – well, you get the idea.
I’d also like the gift of patience in the rewriting and editing process. That feeling that comes at the end of a finished manuscript at long last is wonderful, but can put me off from the rigors that are then required in the revision process. I need that forbearance more than anything else to get me through that part of the writing process.
Then, Santa, although I know it might be difficult, I’d like the gift of compassion for all those agents and editors who can’t seem to answer their email in a timely fashion – even when they’ve requested the proposal or manuscript. *deep breath*
I’d also like the gift of creativity so that I can see old ideas in new ways. I have journals filled with all those ideas from my sometimes open mind (see #1), but they are often derivative or jotted down on a whim leaving me without a clue as to context later. Please let me revisit those journals and consider how to turn those ideas on their heads or inside out to come up with a truly innovative approach to the material.
Finally, thicken my skin just a little bit as I prepare to send out a manuscript to readers for pre-publication comment. I’m sure they won’t all love it (as they should).

Well, that’s it for this year Santa. I’m planning another hard-working writing year and hope to be able to share with you at the end of 2015 just how far I’ve come with these gifts of Christmas 2014. Merry Christmas!”

[1] For the uninitiated, Moleskines are (as their web site says): “…the heir and successor to the legendary notebook used by artists and thinkers over the past two centuries: among them Vincent van Gogh, Pablo Picasso, Ernest Hemingway…” You can read about them at http://www.moleskine.com/en/moleskine-world and buy them all over the world in book stores and online. The paper is great and the array of sizes and colors amazing.

Publishing, Self-Publishing

When self-published work is derided: Often it’s justified

Posted on 9 Oct 2014 by Patricia J. Parsons

Caitlin Dewey who runs the Washington Post’s Intersect Blog online wrote the following on October 2, 2014, “In the past 90 days, some 84 people have self-published Ebola e-books on Amazon, almost half of them in the past month alone…”[1] She goes on to say that many of these books have highly-rated reviews on Amazon and yet, “…many of the books — almost all of them, in fact — contain information that’s either wildly misleading or flat-out wrong…”[2]

This is the best evidence I have yet seen on why the self-publishing world is so often deserves the criticism it regularly receives from the traditional literary media and publishers. There are no gate-keepers. At the most benign end of the outcome spectrum all you have is drivel; at the most malignant, it can cause wide-spread misinformation if not panic, as could potentially happen in the case of Ebola.

I’ve written before about my happy and not-so-happy encounters with self-published books. A novel might simply be poorly written, derivative twaddle that otherwise does not harm other than wasting your time and clogging up the channels of entertainment. Non-fiction, on the other hand, without benefit of editing, can disseminate all manner of harmful or simply wrong information. So, why do I self-publish?

There are probably two reasons: first, I am sometimes impatient. Perhaps I am often impatient. The traditional publishing process takes a long time. Sometimes a really long time. Second, and I am being more honest here than I have seen of other self-published novelists, my writing may not be up to the standards that the publishers I have approached in the past are looking for. I have a track record as a well-published non-fiction writer, but I am a relative newcomer to fiction. So, does that mean I shouldn’t publish my own novels?

Of course not. I can and I probably will continue to do so. Indeed, I’m also likely to publish a non-fiction piece or two in the future. That being said, I have no call – nor do any other self-published writers – to either feel hard-done-by when the indie publishing industry is criticized, or to pester traditional reviewers.

If you are a self-publisher or contemplating this route, and you haven’t read Ron Charles’s recent piece No, I don’t want to read your self-published book, you should. Charles, by the way, is the editor of The Washington Post’s Book World. In it he refers to another piece you should read: An open letter to the self-published author feeling dissed penned by Roger Sutton the editor of a book review magazine. Charles asked Sutton what inspired his open letter rant. Evidently its genesis was in an email exchange with a self-published author who was feeling affronted by Sutton’s refusal to review self-published books. When Sutton suggested to Charles that “…people are more interested in writing self-published books than in reading them…”[3] I thought, I could not agree more. And we need to stop deluding ourselves.

[It is heartening to note, however, that Sutton’s derision of the self-published book has evolved over the past few years. In his view, self-published children’s books today are still terrible; but he admits that “self-publishing for adults these days is demonstrating considerably greater skill and sense of audience than it used to, especially when it comes to niche topics and genre fiction.”[4] Yay!]

The bottom line is that we should continue to write and even publish if we want to, keeping in mind that not all of our work contains as many bon mots as we think. But we do need to stop feeling so maligned by the traditional reviewers and publishers: they are not the problem. The plethora of unedited, poorly written self-published books is.

Of course there are many self-published authors who are probably as good as or even better than many taken on by traditional publishers. Sadly, it is more often the case that this is not true. As a community of indie authors, what we really need to do is everything in our power to ensure the quality of our work. Here are my suggestions:

Write any kind of drivel that you want; publish only your best.
Work diligently to improve you writing at every opportunity.
Support other high-quality indie writers.
Be honest when giving feedback or reviewing the self-published work of others.
Stop feeling that the world of the indie writer is somehow in a war with traditional publishing.

What would you add to the list?

[1] http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2014/10/02/popular-on-amazon-wildly-misleading-self-published-books-about-ebola-by-random-people-without-medical-degrees/

[2] http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/wp/2014/10/02/popular-on-amazon-wildly-misleading-self-published-books-about-ebola-by-random-people-without-medical-degrees/

[3]http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/style-blog/wp/2014/10/01/no-i-dont-want-to-read-your-self-published-book/

[4] http://www.hbook.com/2014/09/blogs/read-roger/open-letter-self-published-author-feeling-dissed/#_