A writer’s group challenged its members to post about the best advice we’ve received. I sort of flat-lined on this. I haven’t received much advice, because I haven’t sought it enough. Many times I’ve longed to have a really good writer—someone who’s put up a bestseller or ten—come along side and mentor me in this art. It would have to be someone with a very tough personality in order to bull past my objections, self-justification, and downright ego.
I fear critique groups and editors. Most readers will simply like or not like my work (or worse yet, have no reaction at all), but the experts can look at it and point out with precision its weaknesses. Art is a strange thing, where you bare your soul then people judge how well you did it. It’s like sex. Do you want someone to tell you what you did wrong while making love? Not really, but only if you listen can you ever get better at it.
At least you recognize your weakness, so when advice does come along you can look at it and decide whether or not it’s bad advice or just your ego getting in the way. 🙂 Been there.
As an editor, I’ve also been the one giving advice that writers didn’t want to hear. When readers and reviewers repeat the same things — sometimes with eerily similar wording — then I know I was on target. By then, however, the book’s already published.
Yeah, it’d be great to have a bestselling author as a mentor, but most of us are mentored by writers who’ve simply been writing longer than we have. Some of us don’t have mentors at all, but we know what we’d like to read, so we’re writing it. And all a bestseller guarantees is that it had good marketing. One would hope it also meant that the story itself was well-written, well-researched, well-told, but that’s not necessarily the case. There are some bestselling authors whose advice I’m not interested in hearing.
Still, if you can find a couple critique partners you trust, who are honest, knowledgeable, and are not obligated to say nice things about your work, you’ll find your writing craft improve apace. I am thankful for such people.