Never say
never...
I wanted to
blather on about quitting for a couple of minutes. There comes a point in many endeavors when
you realize you’re not getting ahead.
That all the time, effort, and enthusiasm that’s been expended on this project
just isn’t enough. For one reason or another, I didn’t make the cut. The team picked that skinny kid with the limp
and the glasses over me.
At which
point, I need to make a choice. Do I
keep trying to get on this team? Do I continue throwing myself unto
the breach? Forging on despite all odds
with the strength of my convictions?
Or should I
give up?
Honestly? After working at this writing thing on one
level or another for a good chunk of my life...
I think
it’s time to quit.
If I’ve
spent the past decade trying to get any publisher in the world to just look at one
of my book manuscripts, and they’re not interested... that’s a sign. If I’ve spent thousands of dollars on
screenwriting classes and books and contests over the past ten or twelve years, but
I still don’t even have a toe in the door...I should consider saving my money
this year. When I submit a story to a
hundred magazines, journals, and anthologies and get back a hundred rejections...
I need to take that hint.
I should quit. Cut my losses. Stop beating my head against the wall, demanding
to be recognized, and move on.
No, hold
on. Don’t leave yet. Keep reading ‘till the end.
What I’m
getting at ties back to an idea I’ve talked about a few times here. I need to be able to look at my own
work honestly and objectively. Knowing
when to give up on a project is part of that.
After querying a hundred or so reps or editors and not getting a single
nibble, I need to consider the fact the problem may not lay with
them. My writing may be perfect, it may
be gold, it may be what everyone in America is dying for. At the moment, though, for one reason or
another, it’s not what those specific people—those, dare I say it, gatekeepers—are
looking for. And, right or wrong, they’re the ones who make that decision.
Now...
here’s that important part.
I’m not
saying I’m going to stop writing altogether. This doesn’t mean I should never touch a
keyboard again or that it’s time for me to forget the big leagues. It’s just time to sit back and look at what I’ve
done and how I’m doing things. Maybe the
problem is the characters. Maybe it’s dialogue. Perhaps even something
as basic as an overwhelming number of typos. Heck, it could just be my cover letter. At the end of the day, something is holding me back, and that needs to stop happening.
I’ve met
people who wrote one novel way back in college and have spent the past twenty years
sending it to agent after agent, publisher after publisher. They haven’t changed a single word since they
first set it down on paper. They haven’t
written anything else since (“Why should I write something else nobody’s going to pay me for?”). They’ve just got
that one novel going out again and again and again...
Same thing
in Hollywood. People write a screenplay
over a long weekend, never polish or revise it, but try to use it as a calling
card for years. I know of a guy on the
contest circuits who pushed the same script for almost a decade. He hasn’t done anything else in the meantime,
just sent that same script to contest after contest, waiting for fame and
fortune as if winning was a lottery and he had to keep playing his lucky
numbers.
Knowing when
to quit and move on isn’t a weakness. It’s not a flaw in my approach. It’s a strength. It’s the only way I can grow and learn new
things, because I won’t get any better if I keep rewriting the same manuscript again and again for decades. Sometimes
you just have to give up on something.
It took me
almost eleven years to finish my first solid novel, The Suffering Map. Not an
idea, not a work in progress, not something I’ve been poking at. A complete, polished book manuscript, first
page to last page. Beginning, middle,and end. Yeah, that’s a long
time, but close to a decade of that was the film industry convincing me to go
work on screenplays instead. It probably
only took about two years of actual work.
So, eleven
years of on-again-off-again work, and then the querying.
Letter after letter, rejection after rejection. Go through it again, create a new draft, and then start the letters again.
Some folks asked to see it (one or two of them were powerful,
well-placed folks). Many letters and emails were traded back and forth.
In the end,
though, after almost a dozen very major revisions, all of them passed on it. And then I realized, this was done. I’d been
working on that book on and off since graduating from college. It was time to expand my horizons and write
something else.
And that
something was an early draft of a book about a government teleportation project gone wrong. Which I followed up with a
book about superheroes fighting zombies.
And then a few things since then.
If I’d
stayed focused for years on that novel no one wanted to see, though, I
wouldn’t’ve done any of it. I’d still be
back there at square one. And my list of
published credits wouldn’t be the size it is now.
I’m not
saying I’ll never go back to The Suffering Map. Many writers will tell you if your screenplay
or novel gets rejected, put it in the drawer and wait a few years. I’m also not saying it will sell in a
heartbeat if I decide to try again in five years. For now, though, I’ve given up on it.
So the next
time you’re frustrated by months and months of trying to find a home for your work... stop and really think about it. Maybe it’s time to move on and try something
different. Something new.
Because
that next thing could be the big thing.
Next time
might be a bit delayed. Sorry. But when
it happens, let’s flip this around.
Until
then... go write.
For a moment at the beginning of this I didn't realize you were speaking 'in character' and got really scared. Peter Clines is giving up writing? "Nooooooooooooooo (deep breath) ooooooooooooo"
ReplyDeleteThen the light bulb came and all was right with the world again.
I always thought that I would just try and sell the current novel I was writing. I have so many story ideas, I can hardly focus on doing the same novel over and over for years before the new ideas would barge through the front door, demanding they now be written, at which point, the old one would become a "drawer novel." It's painful to drawer something we've spent so much time on, a world we've built, characters we've made and seen change, and so on, but if the only thing we walk away with is getting better at our craft, then it's definitely not a total loss.
ReplyDeleteI'm of the opinion that we must always be writing, and writing something new. If your novel gets published, then great. If not, write something new and see what happens with that one. Keep churning the stories, and keep trying, but keep, keep writing. I'm not a published novelist, so I don't know, but I assume this is the attitude we should have.
Phew...Came to make sure there would be more Ex-Heroes and almost had a heart attack. That's one of my favorite series--I recommend it to all my friends, and I loved 14 as well! Keep it up Peter!
ReplyDeleteNew to your stories; so far have only read Ex-Heros and 14, but really enjoyed both.
ReplyDeleteHave you looked at self publishing it? I mean, you could keep it in a drawer for years. Or you could put it on Amazon as an ebook. Fans would go find it.
Hey, Andy-- I could self publish it, yeah, but the truth is (as I've brought up here a few times), these people were right to reject it. It's not very good and it needs a lot of work. To be honest, I'm glad it didn't get published.
ReplyDeleteIf you like, follow the Suffering Map tag through some posts and I talk about some of the places it went wrong.