The Writer's Alphabet - N is for No

No.  No thank you.  Not a chance.  Nyet.  Nada.  Not in my lifetime. Not in yours.  As a writer, you will hear variations of No in every rejection letter you get.  And you will get them.  Even Twilight and Fifty Shades of Grey received rejection letters. Stephen King got them.  In his book On Writing, he relates that he received so many rejection letters for "Carrie", that he papered one slanted wall in an upstairs room in his home.  And we all know what happened with him.

So, the word NO is important to you as a writer.  I have been asked in the talks I give for aspiring writers how I react to rejection letters.  I'm sure they expect me to say I handle them well, and I use every one as a jump start to a wonderful new novel, but that's not what I tell them.  I tell the the truth.  I am personally offended every time I get one.  And I am FURIOUS.  I vent and steam and rant and rage and then spent, I sit back down at the computer.  Sometimes for revenge's sake alone, I write an seriously good story.  A damn good, get-me-a-contract-quick novel.  As much as I hate to admit it (truly, i feel physical pain to admit this), that NO I received is the exact thing I have to thank for my great new story. (Ouch).

Each time you get a rejection letter, don't wax philosophic about how amazing the damn thing is.  Shred it up, throw it in the air and write your epic opus!  Or better yet, pin them to a wall in your room.  You just never know......*wink*

The Writer's Alphabet - K is for Kill Your Darlings

I wrote a blog post about this topic before and am sharing it in it's entirety. As always, I love to hear your opinion and experiences.  Enjoy.

If you are a writer, author, or simply aspiring to be published, I am sure you have read Stephen King's not-to-be-missed tome "On Writing".  A brilliant how-to/personal journey from the master of all scary things, it is the single reason I decided that my little stories could be more than little stories.  I decided that a year and a half ago and now I have six published works.

There are so many lessons I took from that book, it's hard to point them out in one post.  But there is one tip that I have never forgotten: Kill Your Darlings.  Mr. King invites us to write until our pages overflow on the first draft, intending to please only ourselves.  Then, put on your critical hat, take out your bloodiest red pen, and prepare to leave wreckage.

Kill your darlings means to be able to hit the delete key.  And not just for a couple of words.  I mean, highlight HUGE chunks and blast them into the stratosphere.  It's not easy.  After all, you lovingly created those words, gave birth to them, nurtured them. They are your darlings.  And you have to kill them.  Sadly, they must go.

This hasn't happened to me in a while, but it did last week.  I went on an absolute tear, writing for a hours.  I thought I had this amazing concept for a story and literally SPILLED words onto the laptop.  They couldn't get out of me fast enough and I barely stopped to breathe during the immersion.  Then, exhausted, spent, I collapsed into bed.

I woke up the next morning and my first thought was this: the premise didn't work.  I crawled out of bed and regarded the laptop hesitantly.  The failed story was in there.  If I opened it, I had to fix it.  I couldn't face it.  So i let other things take my attention the remainder of the day and busied my brain away from the story.
And then night came, everyone else went to bed and it was just me and Laptop.  Musina was there too and she kept nudging me. She poked and prodded until I flipped open the laptop and knew I had to do it.  I had to let my story go.  I had to kill my darling.

I re-read it one more time and knew it's time was over.  Quickly, before I could lose my nerve, I highlighted the lot, and jammed the delete key.  Angrily.  It HURTS to kill them.  But, I did.  And then the most amazing thing happened.....a new idea spattered across my mind.  I wrote again, long and obsessed, but this time it was different.  I knew I was playing the right notes on my literary piano.  I finished a new short story I am proudly calling The Serial Killer's Wife.  Spooky, right?

So, like Stephen King says, you have to kill your darlings.  If you don't absolutely love every word you've written, your reader won't either. They will know, as surely as you do.  Only when the mediocrity is removed, is there room for excellence.