Finding Bravery

I'm a writer who's never been in the habit of giving other writers advice. I've read and made suggestions on projects when I was asked to, but - and this is bad to admit - I have trouble making writers' conferences work for me. That's not a good admission, I know, but it's true. When I get to the table and we all start talking about what we're working on, the advice that gets thrown everyone's way tends to be uninformed. It's hard to make suggestions when you haven't read someone's work. And sometimes - I know I'm this way - as writers, we're always looking at other works through our reader lenses. We ask ourselves, is this what I would read? And if it's not, it can be hard to separate our personal opinions from our critique.

This is one of the difficulties when pitching to agents. Agents have favorite genres and storytelling styles, and they want to represent what they like as readers, or what they think will sell. Whenever a book hits the top of the bestseller lists, they start snapping up very similar works, assuming they'll sell too. But I always wonder, how many gems were passed over because they didn't fit the mold? The book market is almost impossible to saturate - even if something isn't a bestseller-wannabe, who's to say it won't become its own unique, trend-setting bestseller original? Agents say they know what readers want, but I don't like most of what's being passed off as romance these days and won't read it, so in my case, agents don't know what I want. And I'm betting there are other readers out there like me who feel the same way.

So, if I had to give other writers advice, it would be this: be brave. Be brave enough to realize that agents are talent managers, and that writers are the talent.

I was terrified when I first considered indie publishing. I've always been a person who did what I was "supposed to", and if the agents had told me no, then clearly I wasn't writing what I was supposed to...right? But then I looked at their comments more closely. They liked the way I wrote, they enjoyed my samples, but I was unproven. I was a risk. And some of them didn't think I could pull off the story that I'd promised in my query letters. "I don't think you can do it," a few said. They had their opinions, and I respected them, understood them. But I wasn't just a writer, I was a reader too, and I wanted to write the sort of book that people like me were missing. I loved my characters and wanted to share them. And I knew that, at the end of the day, it's the readers who make a writer a success, the people who connect with their stories. The agents doubted me, but they hadn't read the whole manuscript, hadn't watched the rain in Ireland with Jo, or slid their hands into Tam's when he needed it so badly.

Finding my bravery was scary, and I still doubt myself, but it was rewarding too. I'm not the girl to go to for advice on impressing agents, because I quit trying. But, writers, I will say this - be brave. Writing is art, and no one can tell an artist how to hold her brush, or what colors to use. I look to the greats, and the classics, and I aspire to them, to be as brave as they were.