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Camp NaNoWriMo and the Impatience Demon

KWhipkey Leave a comment

Alright, week 3 of the REUTS Publications Camp Nano Team Competition is ending, and I’m starting to look like the stress ball I’ve become. My hair has definitely taken on a few more strands of silver, Carpal Tunnel has taken up permanent and painful residence in my right wrist and I’m pretty sure my blood is now caffeine. And don’t even get me started on the pounds I’ve packed on thanks to stress-eating several tubs of ice cream. Yeah, I told you this wasn’t going to be pretty.

Turns out, there’s a downside to curing the Perfection Plague. Just when you think you’re free and clear, it appears. Spawned from the depths of River I-Can-Actually-Do-This located in 50,000-Words-in-a-Month-is-Nothing Land, the Impatience Demon will take every shred of patience you have and maul it into nonexistence. And if you’re already an impatient person, well, sorry to say, you’re just doomed. You may as well have a bullseye tattooed on your forehead, because it’s coming for you, and, like the Grim Reaper, there’s no escaping it.

(What? Every camp needs a good ghost story, doesn’t it? 😉 )

I’ve never considered myself a patient person. In fact, before I discovered the beauty of headphones, I was that kid that asked, “Are we there yet?” every 5 minutes on a road trip. So it’s not surprising that Camp Nano’s Impatience Demon found an easy target in me. What is surprising is the level to which it pushed me, sending me so far off the cliffs of bitterness and resentment that I became paralyzed. I’m sure you can guess what happened to my word count after that. Yep, last week was definitely not my shining moment productivity-wise.

What does an Impatience Demon haunting look like? Well, something like this:

You wake up feeling slightly sick to your stomach but sure you’re going to get things done. A few deep breaths and you’re good. You’ve got this. Until you realize that, oh crap, you have to go to work or that empty refrigerator isn’t going to get filled.

Grumbling, you punch in to your daily sentence at the Dreaded Day Job, only to get slammed with things that interfere with even thinking about writing, let alone sneaking a few minutes to do it. But you push through, growing more and more resentful with every paper that lands on your desk.

Eventually, your time is up and freedom is yours. Except, oh yeah, you have to put gas in the car. You roll up to the gas station and it’s got a bazillion idiots in front of you, lollygagging around the pump like it’s an ice cream social. When it’s finally your turn, you run into problems with your rewards points, say “screw it” after a few failed attempts, pay full price and head home– only to get stuck in traffic. Every jerk on the planet decides to cut you off, because apparently understanding the concept of merging lanes isn’t required to obtain a driver’s license anymore and you end up inching feet at a time until that 7 mile drive feels like 200 and you’re pretty sure you could have walked home faster.

You step in the door with a few minutes left before dinner, but you still don’t get to write. There’s a pile of bills you have to deal with first, and you watch your bank account dry up like a puddle in a drought. That’s Ok though, you didn’t really want to eat this week anyway. It’s now dinner time, so you scrounge around in what’s left of last month’s groceries and concoct something passably edible.

Now you get to write, yes? Nope, because there’s laundry to fold, dishes to clean, people to pay attention to, and oh yeah, your DVR is about to implode. You tackle all of these things, growing more and more irritated at anything that stands between you and the computer until finally, you get a moment to yourself to write. There’s only one problem, you can’t concentrate.

Focus? Yeah, you kiss that goodbye as it floats out the window on the laughter of the Impatience Demon.

Sounds a lot like the Procrastination Monster, doesn’t it? Except for one major difference– the Procrastination Monster gets it’s power from distraction, while the Impatience Demon’s comes from a lack of control. You want to write during an Impatience Demon attack, you just can’t, resenting everyone and everything that keeps you from getting to your manuscript.

I was actually shocked at how quickly I went from happily going about my daily routine to uttering streams of expletives worthy of a sailor over every little thing. I have never hated folding laundry so much. Or checking social media. Or answering emails. Or even watching TV! And you know if I’m resenting the DVR, there’s something wrong. That’s when I figured out I was being haunted, that my impatience had reached such a toxic level, I was in danger of burning everything to the ground in frustration.

So I did the only thing I could– I walked away. I disconnected from everything, buried my head in the proverbial sand for a couple days and pretended the Demon didn’t exist. Not my smartest move; it completely backfired. When I came back, the Demon was still waiting for me, except now it was armed with a mess load of things I was behind on.

But if I failed to exorcise the Impatience Demon, how is this lesson helpful? Because, Grasshopper, I didn’t fail.

Yes, I lost the battle, but admitting that I lost allowed me to find my fractured focus, pick up the pieces and glue them back together with a renewed sense of purpose. I called on all the Martial Arts training I’ve had to find discipline and all the tricks from decades of fighting Depression to forcibly change my thinking back to the positive. Essentially, I stripped the Demon of it’s power. And you can too.

When you find yourself starting to drown under the avalanche of things you can’t control, hating everything around you and sending your loved ones scrambling for cover from your fire-breathing nastiness, try this:

Step 1) Find an appropriate outlet for all that pent up rage.

Go for a run, punch something (preferably not your loved ones), escape to the library, the beach, or anywhere that grounds you in tranquility for a few hours. You’ll feel the Demon’s poison leech from your brain, and when you return home, you’ll be ready for step 2.

Step 2) Remind yourself to see the silver lining.

This step is the hardest. It takes a lot of will power and self-realization/acceptance to change your thinking. But it is possible. All it takes is stepping outside of your negative thoughts, realizing that your perspective is skewed and forcibly changing your thought process, focusing on positive things instead. (I make it sound so easy, don’t I? Trust me, it’s not. It took me years to master it.)

For example, say you’re royally ticked off about having to do the dishes, your thoughts swirling around an image of breaking plates on the wall. Recognize that thought as negative, realize that your emotion is far more violent than the situation warrants, and press pause. Now, try to think of what’s good about this particular activity, like the fact that you won’t have smelly dishes stinking up your kitchen, the feel of the warm water, or the smell of the soap. Once you have that positive thing in mind, press play again and your thoughts will take on a rosier disposition. See? Not that hard once you figure it out. The hardest part is recognizing when your thoughts take that turn down Negative Lane.

Step 3) One step at a time.

Now that you’ve let go of all your angst, the Impatience Demon is gasping for life. You’re just about free from its clutches. Instead of feeling overwhelmed, like everything is out of your control, take a deep breath and focus on a single task. Forget everything else. Put blinders on and just get that one thing done. Then move on to the next task on the list, focusing entirely on that one, and so on. Before you know it, you’ve conquered the entire list! Pretty slick, huh?

And there you have it. A simple remedy for surviving the Impatience Demon’s attack. I’ll bet, if you listen hard enough, you can still hear the echo of its last cry as it disappears in a poof of smoke. Feels pretty good, doesn’t it? Now take your victory and get back to writing. I know I’m going to. I’ve got one week left and a massive number of words to make up!

Camp NaNoWriMo and the Perfection Plague

KWhipkey 4 Comments

Week 2 of my participation in the REUTS Publications Camp Nano Team Competition (Whew! That’s a mouthful, isn’t it?) is drawing to a close and I’ve fallen further and further behind in word count thanks to the Procrastination Monster’s evil twin, the Time Thief. Just like the Dryer Gnomes, who sneak in when you aren’t looking to raid your socks, the Time Thief steals away minutes from your day. I’m sure you’ve had days where you start off well-intentioned, then life steps in and next thing you know, you look up to see it’s dinner time, and you could have sworn all you did was blink. Yep, that’s the Time Thief’s fault. Sometimes, if you listen hard enough, you can hear him laughing as he runs away with armloads of your missing minutes, grinning from ear to ear like the maniacal little bugger he is.

But that’s not actually what today’s post is about. No, I pledged to write each week about what I’d learned from my time spent at Camp Nano. What did I learn from week 2? That perfection is a plague.

Hey, don’t roll your eyes at me, Mister! I’m well aware that perfectionism is a common topic here on Nightwolf’s Corner, and you probably think I’m beating a dead horse. But hear me out; this time it’s got a different ending. I promise. 😉

The Perfection Plague is an illness that attacks your muse from the inside, slowly squeezing the life out of her like a giant boa constrictor. It’s highly contagious, spreading from writer to writer, and is eventually fatal– for the muse, not the writer. Symptoms include a tendency for alcoholic binging, a refusal to work when called upon, and abandoning you to the wolves of inner editors until you’re so frozen by the fear of writing something less than perfect that you write nothing at all.

If you’ve been paying attention to my posts over the past months, then it should be apparent that my own muse is bordering on being DOA. I’m surprised she hasn’t keeled over as it is. Maybe she’s slipping some kind of exotic cure made from rabid plot bunny fur into those fruity beach drinks she enjoys so much. I certainly haven’t been doing much to help her out, creating such high expectations for my overly-complicated, tangled narrative webs that some days, I can’t even bring myself to open the file for fear I’d just mess it up. Or, if I do manage to write, I agonize over it, revising and editing and sometimes just straight up deleting and starting over. Yeah, I’ve got the Perfection Plague bad. In fact, I’m probably Patient Zero.

But fear not, my fellow perfectionists, the Perfection Plague can be cured. (At least, I think. It’s kind of early to tell.) That’s where exercises like Camp Nano come in.

The whole point of Nano, if you recall, is to simply write. To throw all caution to the literary wind and get lost in the wild abandon of creative freedom like a naked hippie dancing in the rain at a music festival. Or, to be less poetic, to word vomit all over the screen until you hit that hideous goal of 50,000 words in 30 days. And, in case it’s not painfully obvious, that leaves very little room for perfection. In fact, it forces you to break the chains of expectation and just say @#%& it, following your muse down whatever weird and twisted rabbit hole she manages to find. It’s not pretty, and for a perfectionist, it can feel a lot like an exorcism.

But as painful as the process is, you learn something valuable– how to be prolific. Yes, nothing you write will be anywhere near your usual standards. Yes, you’ll feel like you’ve suddenly been struck with Schizophrenia as those inner editor wolves howl louder and louder. And yes, this novel will make your first attempts in grade school look like Pulitzer worthy masterpieces. But you know what? None of that matters. Because you’re writing. Constantly. And that lesson alone is worth the misery, the ulcers, the prescription for anti-anxiety meds you were forced to get when you ended up in the ER with a panic attack.

Seriously, it is.

I don’t know about you, but I had reached the final stages of the disease. I’d become so paralyzed with requirements for myself that my writing had come to a screeching halt. If I was lucky, I might eek out 300 words once a month. Maybe. On a good day. And part of that was due to the fact that I’d somehow gotten it into my head that I needed dedicated time to write. (Hmmmm, now where could I have gotten that idea from, blogosphere?) That I had to have the perfect storm of conditions– silence, hours of availability, limited distractions (I’m looking at you DVR), and inspiration. And if I didn’t have any of that, I didn’t write. The Perfection Plague had progressed from simply attacking the words I wrote to infecting the process itself, spreading like a cancer to overtake everything even remotely writing related. Even my plot bunnies were starting to suffer, dying with weak gasps shortly after birth because they weren’t strong enough to make it past the Gauntlet of Genericness. (Yep, totally made that word up.) A few were even eaten by the others in a fit of cannibalistic rage, combining their concepts into horrifying franken-bunnies I’m honestly kind of scared to write.

Then along comes Nano with a lovely little break from the complexities of Derek or swapping tenses in Kindred, or anything else I’d become mired in, and suddenly I was free. Like an asthma patient’s rescue inhaler, Nano cleared up my constricted creative passageways and I can write again. Freely. But more importantly, I now want to.  I actually look forward to those moments, however brief, I can steal some time to work on my manuscript; something I haven’t felt in years. I’m not saying that I’d stopped enjoying writing. Just that it had lost some of that sparkle of innocence you have as a teenager first starting out. When the pressure of creating a product worthy of charging money for didn’t exist and you hadn’t contracted the Perfection Plague yet. When you wrote simply because you loved it. That’s a nice feeling to remember.

I’ve written more in the last two weeks than I have in the last year, working whenever I can, even if all I have is ten minutes while I wait for my cup-of-noodles to cook. (What? I never claimed to be a culinary genius.) Is it brilliant? Definitely not. I’m embarrassed by the very thought of letting anyone read it. Does it terrify my editor side with the massive amounts of revision it will require? Most definitely. But that’s OK. My hope is that once Nano is over and this manuscript gets shelved in the darkest, dustiest archives of my computer’s hard drive, I can take what I’ve learned about being productive and apply it to my more complicated, perfection-mired projects and actually succeed in finishing them! If that happens, every second of torture endured will have been worth it.

I still don’t believe it’s wrong to be a perfectionist, that it’s a literary sin to edit and revise while you work, and I fully expect to return to that routine. But when that starts to stand in the way of ever finishing anything, when the Perfection Plague has withered your muse into a ghost, it’s time to try something new. After all, they didn’t coin the phrase, “Outside the box” for nothing. Care to join me?

Camp NaNoWriMo and the Procrastination Monster

KWhipkey 7 Comments

Some of you may remember my first post about Nano, where I described it as a lesson in self-torture, an insane endeavor that I would gladly never partake in. Well, time to eat those words. Thanks to a friendly kick-in-the-butt sponsored by the REUTS Publications version of the Camp NaNoWriMo competition, I am now five days into self-imposed insanity.

“But it’s July,” you say, “Isn’t Nano in November?”

Why yes, yes it is. Fortunately, the Office of Letters and Light, founders of the original National Novel Writing Month challenge (NaNoWriMo for short) finally realized that November was just about the worst possible time for anyone to attempt this manic exercise in writing hell and created the twice-yearly Camp Nano project, inflicting their misery on writers in April and July as well as November, and thereby enabling my panic-inducing mission during the hottest part of the year, when my brain melts like a tub of ice cream and my muse decides Alaska sounds like a lovely place to run off to– alone.

But despite my cynical sarcasm, I do believe that the idea behind Nano is a good one– for everyone else. It forces writers to duct tape their inner editor’s mouth and just write. To push through that first draft of crap and complete the bones of a novel in a single month. Will that novel be anywhere near publish-ready? Heck no! But it will be done. That feeling of accomplishment can motivate a writer to either revise and edit that horrific mess of a manuscript or more likely, throw it onto a bonfire, roast some marshmallows over its carcass and move on to the novel that will be publishable. Because now they know they can do it. And that’s an enviable feeling. One I would love to experience.

Which is why, when the idea for an in-house version of Nano was raised at REUTS Publications, I foolishly volunteered. It’s no secret that I’m highly dissatisfied with my level of productivity and have been looking for a way to fix it for a while now. Will Nano be that fix? Doubtful. I suspect that I’m just not built to write this way.

Where most people wrestle with an inner editor, I wrestle with the fact that I’m 3/4 editor, making the practice of writing what I instantly know is awful far more difficult. I’ve had to restrain my editor side with a straight-jacket chained to the wall to keep her from getting in the way. And I can still her screaming at me through the duct tape to revise what I just wrote. Needless to say, this is going to be an extremely interesting month.

Over the next few weeks, I’m going to document the lessons I’ve learned about Nano and my dangerous dance around a mental breakdown. It’s likely not going to be pretty, but it will definitely be snarky. 😉

What have I learned after week #1? That one of the most sure-fire ways to get the Procrastination Monster to rear its hypnotizing head is to impose a deadline on your muse.

I don’t know about yours, but my muse is the most spoiled, self-centered, entitled brat I’ve ever met. If she doesn’t get things exactly her way, she’ll just straight disappear, pouting for weeks at a time on a beach somewhere, sipping fruity drinks to drown her irritation. So I knew when I said, “be here, this time, every day,” we’d have a problem. And sure enough, she lived up to expectation. As soon as I imposed a strict regimen of focus, she decided to sic the Procrastination Monster on me, resulting in a typical writing day that goes something like this:

Stumble out of bed, grumbling all the way to the shower, where I finally start to wake up. Excitement for all the many tasks I’ll accomplish streams through my head and I start mentally writing– blog posts, scenes from Unmoving, random to-do lists, etc. (What? Some people sing in the shower, apparently I write.) By the time that’s done, I don my super-woman cape, completely enthused and set out to tackle the day.

I sit down at the computer, all those lovely snippets of words still echoing in my head, and do what? Open my internet browser, glance at MSN’s homepage and hey, look, some dude caught a 200 year old fish. That looks cool…**clicks to read stupid article that has nothing to do with my day.**

5 minutes later, I realize I’ve been distracted and close said stupid article. I’m gonna write now. But maybe I should check my email first, just to see what’s up. There could be something important in there. **Logs in to first email account and proceeds to waste ten minutes deleting the pages and pages of spam it attracts like a magnet.**

Nothing good in that one, let’s see what’s up with account number two. **Logs in to second email, reads over all the various blog posts from awesome bloggers I subscribe to, sinking an hour and a half into informative procrastination.** There’s also a new submission for REUTS, a weekly update of all our awesome endeavors with a few discussion points, and some misc. emails from the authors I’m lucky enough to work with. (I love opening my email and finding REUTS stuff. Best part of most days!) So I dig in and start responding.

3 hours later, I’m finally done. (Yes, I’m slow and take my time, what of it?) Woo-hoo! Time to write. This time I do actually open the file, but I suddenly realize it’s laundry day and I’m wearing my last pair of jeans that actually fit. Horrified at the prospect of having to squeeze into too-small jeans, I leave the computer and throw a load of denim in the wash.

Alright, crisis averted, so back to the computer. I look at the title page of current WIP, ready to dig in and be productive. (By now, those glorious snippets from the shower are fading.) Oh, I haven’t checked Facebook yet….I wonder what everyone’s up to? **Meanders away from the document and browses Facebook newsfeed, looking for inevitable drama.** 20 minutes later, I reach the end of anything interesting and, satisfied with my dose of daily gossip, return to manuscript-in-progress only to realize it’s been way too long since I last worked on it and crap, where was I going with this scene?

Since the wisps of inspiration from the shower are now long gone, I decide to read over what I’ve written so far in the hopes of picking up the narrative thread. Who should decide to join me but my Editor-in-chief side, and she’s not going to let me past that sentence until I’ve fixed whatever’s going wonky somewhere in the center. More valuable creative minutes are lost to revisions until finally, task-master EiC is satisfied. Now I get to actually create, right?

Nope, because the laundry just stopped, and I really should eat something.

Another 2 hours pass before I finally make my way back to the computer. The laundry’s folded and put away, and I found something to munch on, so I should be all set. I cue up the spot where I left off, sure this time of where I’m going with the scene and….oh hey, Twitter. I wonder what’s happening over there? **Boots up shiny new Twitter account and gets lost in trying to figure out the intricacy of hashtags and @-signs.**

Eventually, I manage to frustrate myself and log off. I look up at the clock. “Son of a biscuit-eating monkey-nut, it’s 3:30 already? Where did the day go?!” I now have a half hour left before I have to pick Hubby up from work. Frantically, I go back to the neglected manuscript, the cursor patiently blinking at me like it has been all day, and finally manage to write something. Then I log off the computer, call it a day and return to life offline.

Meanwhile, my muse is sitting back, arms smugly crossed, laughing at me. (Yeah, I told you she was a brat.)

By now, I should have 8,065 words to actually be on track for successfully completing Nano. My actual word count? 1,997. (That, children, is what it looks like when someone gets bit in the face by the Procrastination Monster.)

So Round One of this battle clearly goes to my muse. (Well played, Muse, well played.) But I’m not giving up. I still have time to make up the lost words, to find a way to separate the Procrastination Monster from it’s tricky little head. If anyone has some tips from their own battles with the creature, I’d love to hear some victory stories. Leave them in the comments below. I have a feeling I’m going to need some armor to survive whatever else my muse has up her sleeves. 😉

The Different Types of Critique

KWhipkey 9 Comments

Every writer knows there are varying levels of quality in the critiques they’ll receive. Some will be extremely helpful, offering ideas for fixing particularly troublesome areas, or finding plot holes/inconsistencies you missed during your 142 times reading the manuscript. Others will be glowing, fluff-filled ego strokes that feel amazing, but offer virtually no help. Still others will be harsh, brutal and make you want to curl up in a hole, never to write again. And the worst part is, you can never predict which type you’re going to get. Sometimes the horrible, hate-filled ones come from the people closest to you, and the fluff-filled ego strokes come from the professionals you’d expected to tear it to pieces. So how are you supposed to deal?

The most common advice you’ll receive is to simply “grow a thicker skin.” But that’s right up there with “show, don’t tell” and “kill your darlings” in terms of prosaic, vague responses that ultimately provide no help at all. Instead, I suggest learning the various categories of critique, that way you’ll know instantly what you’re dealing with and whether or not to pay it much mind.

(Disclaimer, these are not official categories. They are completely fabricated by me, and therefore, contain the appropriate amount of tongue in cheek– lots. 😉 )

The Fan-Boy/Fan-Girl

These are the ego-flatterers. The “OMG!!!! I LOVED IT! SQUEEEEE!” type critiques we all secretly want to receive by the millions. But as much as they puff our chests with pride, they actually aren’t very helpful. Once you come down off your pedestal of hot air and strip away the loudly screamed outpouring of emotion, you realize that you’ve learned absolutely nothing of value. Except how awesome you are, and you already knew that, didn’t you?

A helpful critique, even a glowing one, should tell you why– why they loved it, what they identified with, what the strong points were. But the overwhelming, star-struck gushing of love from a Fan-boy/Fan-girl doesn’t usually contain a shred of this. You have their reaction to your work, (and probably a new stalker), but you don’t have anything you can take away and replicate in your new project. So at the end of the day, soak up the adoration, but know that these kinds of critiques are fairly worthless.

The Thinly Veiled Swap Request

Similar to a Fan-boy/Fan-girl critique, these will include a generally positive diatribe of how brilliant you are and how you’re the best author they’ve ever read ever, and oh, by the way, would you read and critique their story now too, please? Yep, the Thinly Veiled Swap Request is really just a bait and switch. A cleverly positioned “I scratched your back, now you scratch mine because you owe me.” You’ll usually see these kinds of critiques on public writing sites like Wattpad, Figment, and Authonomy, where the popularity system relies on the number of favorable reviews (or hearts) a story gets. These requests are vaguely insulting and usually best ignored. Upon close inspection, many will reveal that the person asking for a return critique hasn’t truly read your work at all. So be careful with these ones. Don’t fall for the fluff.

Your Mom (AKA Friends and Family)

No, that’s not meant to be a badly worded “Your Mom” joke.  (I can’t believe you would think that of me! 😉 )

One of the scariest groups of people to share your work with is those closest to you. I’m sure it stems from the fact that they are close to you, and we tend to trust them over strangers. But that’s a double-edged sword. How many people really believe their mom won’t wax poetic over everything they’ve created, even if it’s the worst thing on the planet? She loved your stick-figure blobs and macaroni/toilet-paper-roll art, didn’t she? Yeah, exactly. Now tell me again why you’re worried she’ll hate something you’re hoping people will pay for.

This category is its own special blend of helpful and unhelpful. Chances are good that even though you’re more terrified of showing your friends and family your work than having your wisdom teeth removed, these reviews will generally come back positive. Even if they hate it, these are the people that love you, so they’ll pull their punches. Which is also what makes this batch of reviews hard to trust. Instinctively, we do, because we value their input, but that can lead to a skewed perspective if we’re not careful.

The best approach is to bask in the positivity, but then cull the review for anything valuable. Surprisingly, this is where you’ll get your first really helpful tidbits, as these readers are comfortable enough with you to point out potential plot-holes or problems with your story. Just make sure you keep your ears open and take the criticism graciously. You do have to live with these people, after all.

The Critique Partner

Every writer should have at least one of these. Seriously! Every. Writer.

Critique Partners are an amazing blend of friendship and writing ability. Typically writers themselves, these are the people you can be your absolute strangest with. The people who won’t just smile and nod when you start talking about your characters like they’re real people, but actually join in! They understand all your writerly eccentricities because they have them too. But the best part about a critique partner is they’ll give you brutally honest, valuable feedback. Of all the critique categories, listen closest to this one. Critique Partners are a step away from the professionals, and their suggestions are usually right. They can be the difference between handing an editor the equivalent of dog-poo and a beautiful, ready-to-publish masterpiece.

The Aspiring Writer Knock-Down, Drag-Out

Alright, on to one of the less happy styles of critique. The Aspiring Writer Knock-Down, Drag-Out is a particularly nasty one. Stemming from insecurity and a fear that success is a limited resource, this critique will unfairly rip your work to shreds in an effort to beat you to the finish line. Most writers don’t fall into this category. Most of us are genuinely friendly and want to help our fellow authors succeed. But there are those out there with superiority complexes that thrive by tearing others down.

The worst part about these is that they come from people who sound knowledgeable. These insidious, evil creatures are armed with an intimate familiarity of the writing process and they’ll attack your work at its core. The key to surviving one of these critiques is to see past the intentionally hurtful language and look for something positive you can use to grow. Don’t listen to the individual words, but look at the overall viewpoint. If they’re going after your character development with a butcher knife, consider that might actually be a weak spot in your story and use that clue to improve. The best way to defeat a bully is not to give them any power, so turn their negativity into something good that helps you, or ignore them completely. (Easier said than done, I know.) Politely thank them for their feedback and then go home and stab the voo-doo doll you made in the eye.

The Editing Writer

This is another insidious type of critique that masquerades as helpful. These reviewers assume that because they’ve written some drafts of novels or some short stories that were well-received in school, they’re qualified to offer feedback as an editor. But that’s a slippery slope to go down. Not every writer is a good editor. And not every English degree equates mastery of storytelling. Writing and Editing really are two completely different skill sets. Some writers, like me, genuinely do possess both. (You’ll be able to tell by the solid feedback that can be easily verified against known writing rules.)  But it’s not as common as you would think.

Usually, these critiques will try to rewrite your work. They’ll be couched in personal preferences and will try to get your writing style to conform to theirs, citing made-up rules and questionable storytelling approaches. A good editor will preserve an author’s voice, offering suggestions that strengthen it rather than try to replace it with their own. Take these critiques with a grain of salt. Likely there will be some beneficial morsels regarding areas that need work, but find your own path. Don’t necessarily take theirs.

The Grammar Nazi

Who doesn’t love a good Grammar Nazi? These people go through your work and pick it apart punctuation by punctuation. Their review will consist entirely of technical suggestions and pretentious gloating over every mistake you made. It will feel like you’ve suddenly been sent back to your least favorite English class, with dangling participles, evil adverbs and misplaced commas haunting your every move. But as horrible as it can feel to be schooled by a Grammar Nazi, these critiques are actually helpful. They did just flag all the really technical stuff that needs fixing, after all. So as painful as it is, listen to these people. Someone has to be the Grammar Nazi, and thankfully, now it doesn’t have to be you.

The Structural Editor

Now we start to get to the really meaty types of reviews. The ones you’ll receive from the professionals if you’re lucky. And from the freelance professionals if you’ve got money. 😉

Structural editing focuses on the actual elements of storytelling, the underlying framework of your story. Critiques of this type will talk about things like character/world development, pacing, dramatic tension and suspense, to name a few. They won’t go into detail on the mechanics of writing, but will go into heavy detail about what’s working and what isn’t, and most importantly, why. This is one of the most valuable critiques you’ll receive during the pre-publication phase. Often, your book won’t go to press until the issues found by a Structural Editor are taken care of. So they’re definitely good people to pay attention to.

The Copy/Line Editor

Right up there with the Structural Editor is the Copy/Line Editor. Where the Structural Editor’s domain is everything storytelling, the Copy/Line Editor lords over all things technical. Similar to the Grammar Nazi, but with a bit less pretension, the Copy/Line Editor will go over your manuscript with a fine-toothed comb, providing valuable suggestions on everything from word choice to sentence phrasing to punctuation usage. These people are masters of the English language and will help you refine your work into it’s most clarified form. Also similar to the Structural Editor, they tend to stand between you and your final goal of publication, so it’s wise to listen to their advice.

The Reader Review

This is the holy grail of critiques. Ideally, the Reader Review is a coveted blend of Fan-boy/Fan-girl, Your Mom and the Structural Editor. The best ones will go into detail about what they loved and why, convincing other readers of your awesomeness without you having to lift a finger and providing insight into what you should include in your next book. But, though these are the reviews that matter most, they can vary widely in quality. Readers are just that, readers. They won’t have the expertise that some of the other critique categories do, nor will they try to sugar-coat their thoughts. You can get everything from a Fan-boy/Fan-girl reaction, to the complete opposite– the Hate-boy/Hate-girl, (Yes, I totally made that up, but it could be a thing, right?)– to everything in between.

A lot of writers recommend not even reading these reviews, as the negative ones will undermine every shred of self-confidence you have. But if you don’t know why your book is bombing, how will you know what not to do in the next one? I think you should periodically check up on what people have to say, just don’t obsess over it. (Again, easier said than done, right?) Negative reviews happen, and the internet allows people to be far less civil than necessary, but regardless of whether it’s good or bad, the Reader Review trumps everything else. So it’s good to pay attention to it.

The important lesson here is that feedback of any kind is good. Even the worst review can be helpful, once you learn how to see past the negativity. (There’s that darned thick skin requirement again.) No matter what, thank the person for giving their time to your work, and for bothering to review it. Receiving a bad review hurts, but I can imagine nothing worse than receiving absolutely no feedback at all. I’d rather hear that someone felt passionately enough about my work to voice their thoughts, even the nasty, hurtful ones, than fade away into obscurity to a symphony of crickets. Wouldn’t you?

The Curse of Being a Slow Writer

KWhipkey 6 Comments

I don’t think it’s news to anybody that I am the equivalent of a sloth when it comes to writing fiction. At least, it shouldn’t be. I’ve said it quite a few times. But usually, I try to put a positive spin on that fact, embracing my molasses covered words and declaring it proudly, like it’s some kind of statement of quality. But the truth is, it sucks. It is the single most frustrating thing in my writing career. So today, I’m going to indulge in a moment of venting negativity. Today, I’m not going to try to convince you that it’s OK to be slow; that it’s alright to procrastinate with research, or editing, or any of the other excuses I’ve told myself are justifications for slackerhood. Because it isn’t. If you want to make it in this industry, you have to be prolific. That’s just a fact.

We had a saying at Dragon Heart Tang Soo Do: “If you can’t be a good example, then you’ll have to be a horrible warning.” So let me be your horrible warning. Being a slow writer isn’t a blessing, it’s a curse. Here are the top 5 reasons you don’t want to be me.
 

#1: Limited Productivity Potential

 
At my current rate, I’ll be lucky to finish a novel a decade. And since I also conveniently dragged my feet in deciding to take my writing career seriously, that means I’m joining the party late. So that puts my productivity level at direct odds with the amount of life I have left. If (fingers crossed) nothing horrific happens, I could potentially be looking at a long and happy life. But how much of that will I realistically spend writing? I’m going to say that probably by my 70’s, I’ll be running out of oomph, and likely Carpal Tunnel will get me before then. So given my late admittance that I really wanted to be a writer after all, that optimistically gives me a productivity potential of 4 books. (4?! That’s pathetic. This is why I dislike math, it never pans out in my favor!)

Now, say you were smarter than me and realized early on that you were destined to write for a living. I’m not so ancient that you’d have that much of a head start. Most people figure out their life’s passion during their twenties, and a lucky few know by their late teens. So at best, you’re a book and a half ahead of me. That’s still not a rosy picture of successful writerdom. I suppose there is a chance that you don’t see yourself being prolific. That you only have one or two titles in you and then plan to call it good. But I think the majority of us choose to be writers because we’re bursting with ideas waiting to find their way to the page. Am I wrong?

Which leads us to reason #2 why you don’t want to be me.
 

#2: Royally Pissed Off Plot Bunnies

 
The thing about plot bunnies is they breed like, well, bunnies. I have yet to go longer than a month without finding another cute and fluffy little detour hopping innocently across my path. (Innocently? Yeah, right. Those little buggers know my muse can’t resist them. They’re about as innocent as creepy children in a horror film.) So when I compare my maximum potential output (the measly 4 books) to the avalanche of rabbit fur weighing me down, you can guess what happens.

Personally, I don’t want face the legions of plot bunnies running around in my head when they realize that only 4 will ever get their moment in the spotlight. They’ll probably start a riot. They might even turn carnivorous. I don’t know. But I do know that they’ll be royally pissed off, and that can’t be good for my muse. Or anyone, really.

So unless you’re one of those rare writers content to write only a couple books, I’m guessing you’ll be facing the same predicament. And in case the thought of angry, carniverous plot bunnies hasn’t scared you away from my path of slackerness, let’s move on to reason #3.
 

#3: Getting Lost in the Discoverability Jungle

 
It’s a well-known fact that the fastest way to gain momentum in a writing career is to continually publish new content. Whether you’re self-publishing (especially if you’re self-publishing) or traditionally published, name recognition is everything. In an ever-growing jungle of titles, being prolific enough to constantly have your work in front of readers is the only way to survive. No problem, right? I just established that, like me, you have a plethora of ideas to choose from. “Prolific” will be easy!

Hear that screeching of the brakes? Yeah, you forgot about one key element– reason #1. When you’re as slow as I am, your chances of consistently staying on your readers’ minds goes out the window. I’ll survive in the Amazon jungle about as long as a fruit fly with that level of productivity. There’s no amount of marketing in the world that can save me from sinking into the mire of oblivion.

Pretty convincing case for not being me, no? But just for kicks, let’s say the issues of discoverability aren’t really that bad. That I’m being over dramatic in my snarkiness. (I did warn you I would be venting negativity.)

Welcome to reason #4.
 

#4: Being Stuck in a Permanent Day Job

 
Every writer dreams of waking up every day and spending the entire time writing. But the reality is that most of us still have to work day jobs. The fridge doesn’t fill itself, unfortunately, and the bill collectors don’t look kindly on IOU’s. So chances are, unless you’re secretly a billionaire, married to a billionaire, or homeless, you need some source of income. Where do you get it? The dreaded day job.

Now, some of you may be lucky enough to actually have a career you enjoy. But the rest of us punch the time clock like we’re signing in for a prison sentence. The only thing that gets us through the day is that shiny dream of someday getting to say “F you!” to the boss and walking away with certain fingers held high.

But what happens to that shiny dream when you write like a snail? It shrivels up and disappears. Yep, that’s right, your shiny dream is now a rotting, wrinkled hunk that looks like a dried apricot. Why? Because you’re too slow to be considered prolific. And since you’re not prolific, no one knows who you are. And because no one knows who you are, your books don’t sell. And when your books don’t sell, you get to offer that chicken-scratched IOU to the bank and pray they let you keep your house.

Such a pretty picture isn’t it? I think I’m rather gifted at casting the most depressing slant ever on the situation. But in case you missed the lesson in that dreary portrayal, let me reiterate it. If you don’t want to be stuck permanently in that day job you hate, don’t be me!
 

#5: The Burden of Emotional Turmoil

 
By now, I hope you’re seeing the downfall of succumbing to the slow-writing curse. If not, (man, you’re a hard cookie to convince!) here’s one final reason.

I’ve already covered the practical, tangible reasons it sucks to be a slow writer. But there’s also an emotional aspect. When you move with the agility of a tortoise, you tend to find yourself battling things like frustration, irritation, depression, anger, all the lovely turmoil that goes with swimming in the negative side of life. That self-doubt all writers experience? Yeah, quadruple it about a gazillion times. That lure of perfectionism? You’ll be chasing after it like a siren’s song. The regret over letting your dream slowly starve to death and die? You’ll carry it around until you start to look like Atlas, carrying the world on his back.

My point is, eventually, you’ll find yourself so immersed in the quicksand of negative emotions that you’ll end up writing a blog post just like this. 😉

So there you have it. The top 5 reasons why you shouldn’t be me; why you shouldn’t succumb to the curse and let your writing career languish on the back burner. If you already find yourself hovering dangerously close to joining my sinking ship, don’t despair. There’s still hope. All you have to do is kick your lazy booty into gear. Figure out where you have the time to write and commit to it even if it means sacrificing sleep, weekends and watching Celebrity Game Night. (Seriously, though, that last one’s not a sacrifice. Whoever decided that sitting around watching celebrities play board games was quality television needs to be fired. Immediately.) You can do it. I have faith in you. In fact, how about we make a pact? Let’s take all the negativity and turn it on it’s head. Let’s laugh in the face of frustration and prove to everybody, including ourselves, that we do have what it takes to be writers and we can be prolific. Let’s break the curse together. Deal?