Writing Journey 6 – The 99 Percent – Hard Work

“Genius is 1% talent and 99% percent hard work…” -Albert Einstein

Some give credit for this quote to Thomas Edison instead of Albert Einstein. I’m not entering that argument, but I did come across the quote when I was working hard to write stories that editors would like enough to publish. As I said in my last post, I had done all the assignments for my writing correspondence course and was intrigued by the idea of writing a novel by the lack of desire to write an outline for a novel. My whole writing life might have turned out differently if I’d buckled down and written that outline. I might have found out that plotting a novel out made a book easier to write and perhaps better.

But that didn’t happen. Instead I plunged into the idea of writing a novel. I did not sit down at my typewriter and roll a blank piece of paper in ready for Chapter 1 the way I sometimes sit down at my computer and trust my idea to get some words down on that chapter one after I’ve done research and a lot of thinking about my characters. At the beginning of my novel writing hopes, I did much pre-writing. I had a notebook full of character sketches, plot ideas, setting details. All of that gave me time to trust my idea and to get to know the people I hoped to bring to life in the story. While I don’t do so much of that pre-writing these days, I still do some character sketches and a what if page. Even if I don’t write down those what ifs, I ponder them.

Way back when, as a very young writer, I knew I needed more than just ponderings. I needed words on paper to give me the confidence to write a story that would stretch out into three hundred or so typed pages. Typed because this was way before the computer and word processing age. I did consider pen and paper. I did all my planning and character sketches with that pen and paper. But by then I was used to writing those first drafts of stories on my typewriter. I don’t remember the exact day I had the courage to type Chapter 1 and start, but one day I did. I was committed. I had to follow my characters down their story roads.

I just got through rummaging through my old desk’s drawers trying to find the writing journal I kept then, but the earliest I found was 1976. It started by saying the entry was a continuation from the last journal book. Not sure where that previous journal book might be, but I’m almost positive it’s here somewhere. I probably didn’t have a lot of time for journal writing since I was here in our new house, two kids in school and a toddler to keep me busy along with a big garden out by the yard.

The picture is of my husband and me all dressed up to go to my tenth high school reunion. The boys wanted in on the picture before they went to their granny’s house for the evening. My daughter took the picture. She would have been eight. I made my dress. That was back when I made most of my daughter’s and my dresses. So add sewing to my busy times. But I was young with scads of energy and I saved some for writing.

The reason I searched for that old journal was to see  if I could find the title of that first long ago book. I don’t remember what I might have called it. I do remember it was a gothic type story with some downhome Kentucky flavor, I’m sure. At any rate, I finished it. Got all the way from Chapter 1 to “the end.” Then what? Time to go back to the library and find more how to write books. Time to study my Writers magazines for help on how to submit a novel to publishers. One of the first things I found was the puzzling statement that you can’t get a publisher if you don’t have an agent, and you can’t get an agent unless you have published a book.  That seemed to eliminate all possibilities.

However, I’m not one to give up so easily. Remember, no internet to try to search out an answer. So back to the library for a look at a reference book called LMP, Literary Market Place. I think that was the title. In it, the book had lists of publishers, lists of everything to do with publishing, and one of those lists was of literary agents. I studied how to send a query to one of those mysterious people and picked a name at random to give it a try. I think I picked her because her first name was Ann, spelled without an ‘e’ just like my name. I mean you have to find direction somehow.

The direction must have been good or my query letter was great or she was looking for a new author to represent, but whatever the reason, she invited me to send her my new, fresh out of my imagination story.  I was singing that song about high hopes as I packed up my story in a mailing box and sent it off with the requisite return postage.

Some weeks later – I don’t know how many but I’m sure it felt like months to me at the time as I waited to hear from her – I got an answer. She liked my writing. That part was good. But. Why is there always a but? But she said gothic stories were going out of style with readers at that time. I was so new and wet behind the ears as a writer that I had no idea there were trends in publishing or that some genres were more popular than others. I had so much to learn. Anyway, she suggested I try to write a historical romance. They were all the rage in the publishing world.

I read that in her letter and think about how history was never my favorite subject in school. Dry, boring facts piled on top of other dry, boring facts. But if a New York agent told me to try historical fiction and that she would be willing to read my story if I did, then I was ready to delve into some history. When I did, I discovered I liked history when I could pick the history I wanted to find out more about. But first, I was already well into a new story that wasn’t historical fiction. That was because of another bit of author advice I’d come across as I tried to shape myself into one of those authors. That advice was to not fasten all your hopes and dreams on that one piece of writing. To send it off to publishers, agents, whoever, but back at home, start a new story. Also to send the story back out if it landed back in your mailbox. To have a whole list of options to send that story. That way, by the time the manuscript came back for the thirteenth or fifteenth or whatever number of times and your marketing options had gone to nil for it, you would have another story ready to go. Great advice for any writer.

So, I wanted to finish that book I had underway before I headed back in history for a story. Best I remember, I was already in the middle of a cattle drive out west with my heroine pretending to be a guy while she rode along herding cattle. Endless exciting possibilities for action and I learned a lot about cattle drives. Don’t remember them now except a little about how lightning could run across the top of a herd.

I felt I was on my way. I had an agent who said she liked my writing. I was ready to jump into a new genre after I finished my work in progress. Life was good and things were looking up.

But…  Why is there always a but?

You can find out what happened next on my next Writing Journey Post.

Have you ever experienced good things happening and then there was that pesky “but?” 

One Writer’s Beginning

A Teenage Wanna-be Writer

The Next Step in My Writing Journey

My First Writing Sale

Writing Journey – Outline Writing Inspiration