Seanan McGuire is the extremely talented author of the October Daye series, the Deadline trilogy (as Mira Grant), and the forthcoming DISCOUNT ARMAGEDDON. In addition to all this (and more), she has posted a series of essays about writing on her blog. And they’re all really good.
One that really resonated with me was number 15, “Follow Your Bliss”. These are the best parts:
“Write what you want to write. I don’t care if it’s a total cliche, if that’s honestly what you want to do, do it. You may never get it published. You may strike it big and wind up in a position to publish all your trunk novels. Either way, refusing to write what you love just because it’s not commercial enough is going to do nothing but turn you bitter and angry at the whole industry, and that’s no good for anyone.”“Everyone who writes has some story they love, some story they’re just bleeding to get down on paper and distribute to the world.”
“We have to write what we want to write, because that’s what makes it possible for us to keep wanting to write, to keep falling in love with the stories. Don’t spend your writing time thinking about the need to sell; that’s what editing is for. Spend your writing time thinking about your story, and how much you want to tell it right.”
I read this advice around two years ago and it’s been floating in the back of my head ever since. Did I listen to it? Not exactly.
I’ve mentioned this before — for a long time, I had an idea that really appealed to me that I refused to work on. I didn’t think I was good enough and that I would ruin the idea if I tried to develop it while I wasn’t good enough. So it stayed hidden. I came up with various ideas that I didn’t like as well as my secret one and I hated working on them. So why did I do it? Simply because I thought writing other stories would make me good enough for my secret idea.
Then, one day I realized that these stories weren’t working because I didn’t care about them. So I was faced with the choice of trying to brainstorm another (probably lackluster) idea, or taking a chance on the project I loved but was afraid to try.
I took the chance, and I’m so glad I did. New project and I are in the honeymoon phase, where everything is beautiful and the ideas come like honey from the comb — they’re golden and sweet and I can’t get enough. Logically, I know hard days lie ahead, but right now I’m enjoying the glow of a project that I truly love and that I’m excited to work on.
