Infinite patience
produces immediate results.
SNARKY RESPONSE:
Talk about an oxymoron! Infinite patience produces immediate results? Patience infers passage of
time. And Immediate, well, now, I'm hearing that old joke about someone shouting at their
microwave – Hurry!
Infinite patience
produces immediate results.
Attempting a career of any kind requires a huge helping of patience. No one
becomes successful alone. It takes time to build a groundswell of any size.
Not to mention the patience it takes to produce a finished product like, say, a
book.
To my knowledge, no successful writer
has ever written a publishable book in one sitting. Certainly, there have been instances where a completed manuscript is highly satisfactory, but it is far from polished. After the story has been set down, there is editing for
grammar and plot, fine-tuning of continuity and dialogue, filling in setting
and character, to name a few. These steps are crucial and must not be skimped
on if you hope to produce a polished work. Of course, if you're not interested
in craft and just want to see you name in print in a
self-published book, you might skip those steps, but skip them at your own peril.
Like words spoken
in haste, a reader's experience with your book is something you can't erase.
Make sure that
you've gone over every chapter/paragraph/word to make sure it was
necessary, succinct, and factually/grammatically correct. Readers have enough
books stacked up on their TBR pile that if they become disillusioned with your
book for any reason, they can just shunt you aside for someone who did the
work. Don't be That Writer.
All that work and
patience may not result in immediate results, but it will guarantee consistent
results—positive reviews and most importantly, Sales!
My enovella, The Festival of The Flowers: The Courtesan and The Scholar, took several years to
finish and polish to the point where I could actually submit it to publishers.
It found a home at The Wild Rose Press. And I'd like to think that all my work
and then the work I did with my TWRP editor comes through to the reader.
Now, my second
enovella, Collector's Item, is in the final stages of edits with my editor at
The Wild Rose Press and once more I am glad that I have taken the time and
practiced the patience required to produce what I hope will be a quality
result.
As they say,
anything worth being done is worth being done well! Or at least to the best of
your ability. Short cuts only cut you short. Be patient with yourself, your
writing, and your career and you will see positive results. I'm certain of it.
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