Writing is a very personal thing. Me? I love my writing. Not in that narcissistic way that Kayne West loves himself, but in a warm fuzzy way…a way that says, I worked hard to create you and now, whenever you need a hug…I’m here.
Our work as writers is akin to a God-like creative process. We are setting the scene, creating the characters and putting them in situations just as I imagine the Almighty must do. (If you believe in that sort of thing of course) We also suffer the disappointments when those little created worlds don’t do well. And when we send them out into the world…well…some of us even cry. (Not me of course, but some writers…wimps)
Taking all of this into consideration I want to propose something that may help your writing…if you love it…it will do well out in the world, just like your kids. When creating a story you must care about it in every way. You have to care about the characters even if you enjoy a love-hate relationship with your villains. You have to want to continue the story. You have to want to see the ending…good or bad. You must feel affection for the hero of your story; if you don’t he/she will give up on you too. Here’s the thing, you can’t create something that other people love if you don’t love it too. It’s called emotional transference and it will happen to your story. If you hate it, it will fall flat. If you don’t enjoy writing it, you will find all the reasons in the world not to write it at all.
I have had one or two stories that I grew to despise. One of them I even finished…forced of course…and it didn’t do well on the shelves at all. That was my fault…I should have never forced the characters to march on to the end knowing that they were going to be subjected to my own self-hatred for having even taken the journey. I owed them more than that. Here’s the rub…I REALLY liked the characters but now, I can’t truly use them because I shoved them into a sad sack story and shoved them out into the world….and it sucks because I could have used them in a story that actually worked.
Just like being parents requires us to love and nurture our kids, we writers have to do the same with our stories. Those pages need love and care…they need someone who will look out for them and make sure that they are not going to end up in Half Price Books…the foster program for all books that end up unwanted or un-enjoyed. And you know what happens to “fostered” books, don’t you? They end up balancing Aunt Freda’s coffee table…the one that Uncle Joe built with the uneven legs… So if you are working on a novel that is falling flat…stop it…you owe those characters more than a half-assed attempt to breathe life into them. You owe them the whole story and the love that is supposed to come with having written them into existence. Be a good book parent darn it…hug that book and show it some love at the keyboard.
© The Writer’s Advice, 2012. Unauthorized use and/or duplication of this material without express and written permission from this blog’s author and/or owner is strictly prohibited.
