Hey, you know something? I’m just gonna read from my journals a little bit. I don’t know if I’ve done this one already. It’s called “How I Pictured It.” Well, that’s the title I put at the top.
“How I Pictured It, dot, dot, dot.” Okay. Here’s life the way it was supposed to go, according to the narrative in my head. After years of working on novels and completing them, along with meeting people: authors, publishers, editors, reviewers, et cetera, at conferences, I managed to get a short story published in the Sisters in Crime Chesapeake Chapter’s first anthology, and then the publisher signed me to a three-book contract.
I figured I’d earn a few bucks, maybe because I didn’t have grand expectations as a newbie writer. In fact, I have very little patience for anyone who comes into the writing profession with the attitude that they have produced an absolute work of genius, such as the world has never possibly encountered. This is because I knew that writing was difficult. Writing well is difficult, that is, and making a living at it required a few key attributes plus the wild card no one can control.
Those attributes are dedication, habit, perseverance, a rhino-thick skin when it comes to criticism and the willingness to listen to said criticism and make changes as needed. Plus the wild card–luck. Well, that didn’t happen. Exactly. Dot dot dot. Okay. That’s it for that one, and I’ll read you the next one next time, <laugh>. Thanks.
BONUS: It’s alive! Again. 🙂 And completely incomprehensible.
Perhaps Kate Stein and I should file an amicus brief? 🙂 RIP Mystery Scene Magazine. 🙁
Looks like Gene Weingarten quit just in time, huh? (That’s a gift link from our Great Benefactor the amazing Jeff Bathos Bezos!
PS: For additional thoughts on these subjects and “how I’ve survived the Internet,” click here! 🙂
Don’t you love the internet? 🙂
PPS: Next week, a continuation of “The Non-B.S. Guide to Self-Publishing: Final Part”! (Here’s Part Seven!) Audiobooks—the big thing now! Assuming you can afford to make them. 🙂
