Some Questions on my Possible Publishing Path

Discussion in 'Traditional Publishing' started by TLK, Oct 31, 2013.

  1. plothog

    plothog Contributor Contributor

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    Ah right I hadn't realised you'd got a first draft completed. You probably know better than me what the best option for you is then.

    For what it's worth I'm not sure any option is a waste of time. If something turns out to be a practice, at least you've got the benefits of practicing.
    You could go over to your other idea. Write it as if its that stand alone idea you're going to get published to give you a better chance of someone publishing your series. If it turns out to be a practice novel, at least you've used it to hone your writing skills further and it means it's likely that your rewrite of novel 1 would have been a practice anyway.

    If your complete rewrite of novel 1 turns out to be a practice and you need to rewrite again, well the practice may be even more relevant, because it's practice writing that particular story, but you'll know better than me how much drive you've got to keep rewriting the same thing.
     
  2. mammamaia

    mammamaia nit-picker-in-chief Contributor

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    congratulations on getting a novel written... be proud of yourself, as it's no mean feat!

    if you'd like a detailed assessment of the writing quality i'll be happy to take a look at your first couple of chapters, the synopsis and query letter and give you point by point feedback, with suggestions for how to improve it, if needed...

    love and hugs, maia
    maia3maia@hotmail.com
     
  3. TLK

    TLK Active Member

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    @plothog, thanks for the advice, that's a very good point you make. I feel like I do have plenty of drive for this particular story, so perhaps I will stick with it, and only with it, and see where that takes me.

    @mammamaia, thanks for the offer. I probably will take you up on that offer at some point, but not just yet. Like I say, I'm aware that the quality isn't good enough at the moment, so perhaps I will send you the second draft when it's done, if that's ok? Hopefully then my writing will be good enough to my eyes, and I'll need someone else to tell me where to improve.
     
  4. JayG

    JayG Banned Contributor

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    Given that the average person writes, polishes, and puts aside more than a half million words before they sell, here's how it will probably go:

    You'll work through this one, edit and polish, and then be satisfied that it's either "there," or damn close. But no one will say yes, so you'll start on another. That will be a repeat of the first, so far as success. But then you'll look at #1 and say, "Oh my god, how could I have made so many mistakes?" and edit/fix till the level of skill matches #2. And then you'll start #3.

    You can see where this is going. I got to number six, without a clue that I was screwing up big time, and had no idea of how to approach the act of writing fiction for the page, because I still thought I'd learned to write in school. There was no Internet, so I didn't connect with people as ignorant as I was, to tell me, "You write like I do, keep it up." ;) So finally, I went for a professional critique, and was horrified to learn what a screw up I was. That's when I made the effort to find out what the profession was all about, and to see if I could substitute education for genus. I haunted the library's fiction writing section, picked up a few tricks, and damned if I didn't get my first yes from a small publisher.

    That's why I'm such a bug on learning craft. I could have saved years, and been practicing and improving professional not amateur skills.

    There's a point to this, though, which is that the first novel I ever wrote—the one I'd been editing every time I gained a bit of knowledge—that sold, too.

    In fact, that's common. You'll see someone flash to the top, and shortly after see several more novels that were taken out of the trunk and published. And often they're not as good as the first work because they were written with less skill.
     
  5. mammamaia

    mammamaia nit-picker-in-chief Contributor

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    ...any time that's ok with you is ok with me... happy writing!
     
  6. TLK

    TLK Active Member

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    Ok, thanks for the advice, Jay :)

    And thanks as well, mammamaia!
     

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