How much help have you really gotten from other writers?

Discussion in 'Revision and Editing' started by aberdeen, May 22, 2014.

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  1. JetBlackGT

    JetBlackGT Senior Member

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    If you become a writer, you will find that everyone who talks to you also "wants to be a writer". They have a story idea. They wrote two pages last year. They are stuck. They don't know how to get it from their brain onto the page.

    Every single person.

    "I never heard from them again." is a great place to start. :) Write your book. Write it all! You will love it and you will HATE IT! It will be worth it though.
     
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  2. aberdeen

    aberdeen Member

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    In other words, you are saying that a beginning writer has no chance to be recognized by who those who have already made it big. Just stay where you are. That's fine if you are the nine hundred ninety nine out of a thousand who don't have what it takes to do very well. Of course, what if someone really is the exception? Just struggle and, once having made it big, everyone then starts to pay attention and tells you how wonderful you are? That does seem to be how it's like out in the real world, so I better not expect anything from anybody.
     
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  3. aberdeen

    aberdeen Member

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    I probably didn't come across in the best way with my original message. I never expected anyone to drop everything and help me. If they had any information or advice to offer, however, that would surely be appreciated. If only one or two of the several dozen leading nonfiction writers and political columnists/commentators bothered to take some interest in me, that would be great. These people are apparently not interested in spotting new talent. Once they've made it, then forget about everyone else. I don't plan on doing but maybe I will do the same if (a big if at that)! I end up doing well as well as I hope to in the coming years.
     
  4. Thornesque

    Thornesque Senior Member

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    aberdeen, you are absolutely CORRECT! Published writers and columnists have absolutely NO interest in spotting new talent? You want to know why?

    That's not what they're paid to do.

    If you're looking for someone to take interesting in spotting new talent, write to agents, editors, publishers, newspapers (I don't now where you want your work published)... But a writer is not going to take the time to go through dozens to hundreds of letters and emails a day in hopes of finding the next "them." They're going to probably have someone sitting there, giving the letter a brief read and writing out generic, "Thank you for your interest and kind words. Good luck writing, have a nice day, etc. etc."

    At the end of the day, though, my question to you is this:

    Why do you need someone else's validation? Surely, as passionate as you seem to be about someday entering the world of writing, you've been doing it for some time? Don't you think that, in the time you've been doing this, you've learned something? Enough to be decent? I certainly wouldn't even consider sharing my work with published authors (my own field of aspiration) unless I was positive I wasn't handing them a big pile of crud (as it were, I'm not going to try and contact an author to get opinions or being hopeful of some sort of push up the ladder).
     
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  5. JetBlackGT

    JetBlackGT Senior Member

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    I mean your friends will be the people you are working with right now. If you haven't finished and edited a manuscript, there is not much you can ask for, from the established writers. If you have a complete manuscript but it is unedited, you should find people like you, in your situation. Befriend them! They are living what you are living. All you can really get from the Douglas Preston's of the world, are "Atta boy"s and "keep at it"s and stuff. That is great! What else can they do if you are not ready to publish?

    Those guys and girls cannot be expected to take time out from their lives to help us if we have nothing to offer. We need words on paper. More than an idea! Everyone has ideas! The world needs not a single extra "idea-man".

    Seriously. Sit down at the computer and start writing your story. If it is good, it will be easy to write. Then it will be hard. It is a job. You now have two jobs. One is working at your desk, making money to support your writing habit. While writing might be your "real job" it is not making you any money yet. Keep writing! Write, write, write! And read. You can do it. Your finished product might be amazing!

    If you get going and you love it, or you even if you get stuck, get back on here and ask for help. We are writers :) We help. We encourage. Your writing might blow like a hurricane and suck like a shop vac but if you love doing it, it will be worth it. If you can edit, you can probably fix whatever you do wrong. But just get those words on the paper.

    When you get a first draft, let me know. If you get a first chapter, let me know. I'll read it.
     
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  6. aberdeen

    aberdeen Member

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    Let's suppose you are a beginning writer who, delusionally, arrogantly or whatever, believes you' re the one in a hundred, thousand, or million who has what it takes to do very well, perhaps even becoming famous one day. Even if some well known writer (or a leading figure in any field) isn't willing to provide any assistance, however minimal, isn't it a good idea to contact him or her anyway? Maybe they are on the lookout for some new and extraordinary talent. If not, then at least you have given them the opportunity to get to know you, and then you will at least find out where you stand.
    Sure, you may have to struggle along and spend years proving yourself, become famous, and then be invited into their lives. Maybe having some established writer spotting some new talent and helping them along in some way is just something out a movie, but isn't it worth it to try to attract the attention of people who have made it big already?
     
  7. aberdeen

    aberdeen Member

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    Maybe I am fool or just a typical and naïve newbie, but wouldn't it be helpful to somehow come to the attention of an established or even famous author? After all, I didn't just write a short email to these folks. I took the time and effort to write two thousand, four thousand, and in one case a full six thousand words to some guy. He just wrote back a couple of sentences and said that writing essays was "an innocent way to spend one's free time." What if he had written back, told me to keep in touch, and then maybe taken the time out of his busy life to read a few of my essays? He might have told me that I had a lot of good ideas and overall talent. He then may have been able to provide contacts which would have helped me in the future. Sure, maybe only one in a hundred people who write to him are worthy of his time and attention, so it may makes sense for him to just throw all correspondence from beginners and other strangers in the trash. In my case however, it is worth it to find out if any well known author is interested in me, since until proven otherwise I must assume that I am the one in a (just pick a number) who has what it takes to do very well. Call me an idiot or whatever you want, but I will not give up dreams no matter what anyone here says.
     
  8. Joe Nathan

    Joe Nathan New Member

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    Here's what you do: Find a woman writer, preferably barren, and speak in a very high voice. With the right pitch, you will sound similar enough to a screaming baby that she will immediately succumb to her long buried maternal instincts and start feeding you and grooming you. After awhile, you must convince her to get back out there, girl. You will hook her up with a man writer, one you admire. They will marry, and he, growing old and feeling death approaching, will desperately look out for some son, some child, to carry on his life's work of pop fantasy fiction. Now the time has come. You bring your ear to his mouth and listen to the words, "You're good. You've got what it takes. You could be the best. You're better than I ever was..." and with this, at last, you become strong enough to follow your dreams.
     
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  9. JetBlackGT

    JetBlackGT Senior Member

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    If you are published, you have a chance. If unpublished, yes. you have no chance of being noticed.

    An established author may send quite a nice email back to another established author just as a respected particle physicist would respond to another. But Steven Hawking and Sheldon Glashow never return my emails. Uppity bastards. ;-)

    Send your work to an agent. If they like it and see that huge spark that a Next Big Thing has, they will snatch you up and maybe even help you edit. But editing is ultimately your job. You write, you edit. Your editor arranges your book to fit the margins and moves your ham-fisted paragraph indents around and puts fancy chapter numbers and stuff in place. But they won't fix a single misspelling. They won't add a single dropped apostrophe or swap out a semicolon for a comma.

    Whatever level of writing you have achieved, make friends with other people who are at your level.

    If you have an idea for a book, but haven't written anything yet, your level is 0 [zero] and every person who can not only write their name and also knows the alphabet, is your peer. :)
    If you have an outline, you are getting somewhere.
    If you have the beginning of a rough draft, you are about level 1 or 2. You STARTED! That is something, it really is.
    If you have a first draft of your WIP, you have unlocked about level 2-3. But you still have a very long way to go.
    If you have self published, you are at about level 3.5.
    If you have a publishing contract and are working on your second book, you are at about level 5.
    You won't be at level 10 until you have several bestsellers and work at a respected university, teaching others how to write. You are teaching Master's level courses and have a few Ph.D. candidates under you.

    Between vanity publishing and level 10, you will have dozens (maybe hundreds) of people approach you, one way or another, about helping them. You have to pick and choose how much energy you spend on them.

    Do you see what I mean? Meet more people like you. You will find them here. It is certainly okay to send them a PM and explain your situation or collaborate or co-bemoan (<--- making English my beyotch). You will all become famous and discovered together! Meet people who write in your genre. They are there. Those are your peers! Ask them for advice and be sure to give advice to those one step behind you.

    Someday someone who you never realized you had even met will tell you that your short email pushed them in some astonishingly crucial way. That day, you had better well get on your writing device and send a message to whoever nudged you in the right direction and thank them. Heck, send a card. Everyone opens cards. :)
     
    Last edited: May 25, 2014
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  10. sunsplash

    sunsplash Bona fide beach bum

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    No author is going to be interested in you, because as @Thornesque said, finding new talent is not their job or even area of interest. Established authors are still working hard writing every day to stay established and don't have time to encourage others to be their future competition, share their resources that they struggled with finding themselves, or waste their time giving a current nobody false hope in a cutthroat industry. It doesn't matter how fantastic a writer you are, other things have to align just right to achieve mass success, and reaching out to another author isn't going to help get your foot in the door. There's a difference between confidence and cockiness. If you want to find out where you stand you need to be querying those in the industry that help authors get published, not contacting people who are published because they receive the same assistance you're seeking. No one is trying to kill your dreams but no one is interested in putting your dreams above their own goals, either. You'll get the rare gem like @mammamaia who has chosen the path of helping other writers now but that's not typical.
     
  11. jazzabel

    jazzabel Agent Provocateur Contributor

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    What makes you think anyone wants to read a six thousand word letter/essay from a fan or a wannabe freeloader? You seriously need a reality check mate. Also, if your demanding attitude displayed in your posts here is any indication, I am not surprised that you aren't succssful at soliciting conversation via your emails.
     
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  12. Okon

    Okon Contributor Contributor

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    What?! I'm surprised he wrote back at all. That's showing a basic lack of respect for their time
     
  13. aberdeen

    aberdeen Member

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    Yes, I do agree that well known writers or other successful people are not obligated to help, encourage, or even acknowledge anyone. At least in my opinion, however, they should be open to helping people who are truly needy or exceptionally talented. Am I exceptionally talented? Well, I believe that I may be. Of course, anyone reading this will, right or wrongly, reasonably or otherwise, conclude that I am not. What would you do if you had a hundred people lined up, and you knew that only one of them deserved your attention? Would you spend your whole day talking too all of them? Just walk away and go golfing, sailing or whatever, right? Can't blame you or anyone else who does that. What happens the one truly deserving and and/or exceptional person in the bunch?
     
  14. aberdeen

    aberdeen Member

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    What are you talking about? Why shouldn't I write to someone whose work I admire? Are they so high and mighty that they can't be bothered to be on the lookout for new and exceptional talent such as myself?
     
  15. Ulramar

    Ulramar Contributor Contributor

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    Think about how much mail they get in a day. If you had the idea to message him/her, so did someone else. And another. And another.
     
  16. aberdeen

    aberdeen Member

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    Is there any way a new writer with exceptional talent can be spotted, helped, guided, and mentored (if only in a minimal way) WITHOUT going it all alone, struggling for years and proving their worth repeatedly with all sorts of awards, bestsellers, and the like?
     
  17. Okon

    Okon Contributor Contributor

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    It doesn't hurt to show a little reason when approaching someone else with your work. Six thousand words takes a while to read through, especially when they have hundreds of stories they want to get on paper before they die and (gasp) family/friend obligations. Yeah that's right: writers have wives and kids too.

    Besides, how much talent will they find when the person writing to them doesn't understand brevity? I'm not trying to sound harsh here, but effective use of language starts at being able to get the message across with a reasonable amount of words.

    It sounds like you're speaking for your writing, instead of letting your writing speak for itself. If your essays are excellent, start a blog, get boat loads of followers, then contact a publisher/agent with your success and plans to publish. They'll know who you are, because your high quality essays will have attracted tons of attention from around the globe. Imagine how awesome it would be to post the link and say: "Yeah, I'm that guy." Done. Success. Then you can spend the rest of your days mentoring new writers, and go down in history as the one that gave back.
     
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  18. Bryan Romer

    Bryan Romer Contributor Contributor

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    It is very likely, almost a certainty that this successful writer became successful without the aid of a mentor or patron. Just like most other writers do. What happens to the "truly deserving"? If they are "truly deserving", they will find a way to get their book published. It may be unfortunate, but that is part of the job, just the same way as a genius inventor or programmer needs to find a way to find financing and to get their product to market. If the author can't find a way, then perhaps he or she is not that deserving after all.
     
  19. thirdwind

    thirdwind Member Contest Administrator Reviewer Contributor

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    Why would an author be on the lookout for new talent? That's an agent's/editor's job.
     
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  20. Bryan Romer

    Bryan Romer Contributor Contributor

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    Honestly? No.
     
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  21. Thornesque

    Thornesque Senior Member

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    Tsh. I'm a selfish person. I don't WANT to share credit. I would love to stand on a pedestal, accept the Pulitzer's Prize and say, "YES, the rumors are true! I did it all on my own without a single speck of help!"

    ...

    We'll just pretend I have even a shred of a chance of winning the Pulitzer's Prize... haha!
     
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  22. sunsplash

    sunsplash Bona fide beach bum

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    I can't tell if you're being serious or not but if you are, this attitude is a complete turn off. You're coming across too strong and arrogant and no one takes that kind of person, writer or not, seriously or wants to establish a relationship with someone that needy. You need to dial it back a bit and get some thicker skin. If you acted like this with a crush, you'd never get a date. If you acted like this with a boss, you'd never get a promotion. Let your work speak for itself. You don't deserve any more of a chance than I or others working our bums off day in and day out...equal opportunity for all! :) Everyone on this thread is telling you you are going about this the wrong way and trying to help you. This community is fantastic for what you're looking for: advice. Instead of defending, please listen and hear what is being shared. Stop overshooting, start at the bottom like everyone else, and stick around to learn with the rest of us. If breaks were that easy we'd all be on bookshelves across the world right now.
     
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  23. ChickenFreak

    ChickenFreak Contributor Contributor

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    But why "should" writers help anyone? Why does anyone "deserve" that writer's attention? If it is one person in a hundred, and ten thousand people write to that writer, is he really obligated to stop his writing career to help that one hundred deserving people? "Great! You're a success! Oh, no, you can't write another book; you just became a teacher instead.'

    Are you arguing that everyone--writers, lawyers, computer programmers, actors, furniture makers, electricians, every profession--is obligated to help bring others into the profession? If so, why? Now, some of those are in professions that have a lack of skilled people. But that's not true of writing. What reason, related to writing, requires someone to help, mentor, and develop people who will compete with them?

    And what kind of help can they provide you? You still have to polish your own skills and write your own book. You still have to deal with the very small market potential for books of essays. You still have to compete against thousands of other authors. Do you expect this help to make those things unnecessary? Do you expect an author to tell his publisher, "Publish this guy or I'll take my books to someone else! Who is he? I don't know; he sent me a letter."

    Many famous authors do provide help--they give talks and seminars and classes. For a fee. Maybe you think that your exceptional talent should make you deserving of their help without that fee. But surely the author would hope that many people in the seminar are talented and worthy of being published. I doubt that they thought, "I'll charge a fee to a lot of hopeless incompetents who have no hope of being published." That may be how it turns out, but I doubt that it's the goal.
     
  24. aberdeen

    aberdeen Member

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    So in other wordswords the one in a hundred or thousand tryly deserving/exc
    Validation would be fine, of course, although I am not really seeking it. I just want to come to the attention of people who might be able to help me in meaningful ways. That is, introducing me to leading people, recommending my essays to others, etc. I might even be able to help them in some ways, especially in the future. I don't expect them to advise me much on how to think or write. It must be said that I write essays on serious topics, so the very large majority of people here probably can't identify with my situation. Essay writing and fiction are entirely different fields and the mindset of those involved is not the same by any means. That may explain the rather negative reaction to my concerns.
     
  25. Ulramar

    Ulramar Contributor Contributor

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    How would they know who is deserving and who isn't? They're writers! They're writing, no reading fan mail or pleas for help or whatever. They don't have time to look through every single one looking for the next prodigy.
     
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