Author: ireneg

Here’s a little trick I picked up somewhere along the way. I started using it when an author had to make a decision. Say she’s got two offers and doesn’t know which one to take. Or she’s presented with two different cover designs. Or she can’t decide how to start her first page.

Here’s what you do. Get a coin. Any coin will do. Assign Option A to one side, and Option B to the other side.

Flip the coin.

Now before you look at it, ask yourself. Are you secretly hoping it will be one or the other? That’s your answer.

I have rarely encountered a situation where the secret wish wasn’t there. If it isn’t, make a list of pros and cons for each. If that doesn’t work, take a walk and don’t think about it. Then think about it very suddenly. It will come to you. It may even come to you while you are asleep, but it will come.

It’s what’s on that page or screen that counts. Not your social media. That helps to sell the book once you have been published, but it can’t get you a contract. Not the fact that we met at a conference and really hit it off. Not the recommendations of prominent author friends. Not the fact that you pitched someone at a conference and they asked to see the manuscript. Not the accolades from all your friends, your mom, and your dog. Not the freelance editor you hired and not the writing class you took.

In the end, it comes down to the reader and what’s on that screen. They are alone together, just the two of them. You cannot stand there and advise the reader that the coming section is really good or that you know you need to work on Chapter Five.

Once you send something out, let it go. Now is the time to work on something else. Don’t fret (well, you will, but try to turn your attention elsewhere). Once it’s gone, it’s out of your control.

Don’t try to edit once it’s sent. Just let it speak for itself.

That’s really all you can do. The important thing is to keep going. You can’t fail if you don’t quit.

THE GREEN-EYED MONSTER

Admit it. You’re jealous of someone. And you probably don’t know it, but someone is jealous of you.

It may be human nature to be jealous, but it’s a really, really, really bad way to live.
You have your path, and they have theirs. You both bring different backgrounds, styles, attitudes, energies, talent, and drive. There is no way that recipe can ever come out the same.

If you have a writer friend and that friend seems to be doing a lot better than you, let it go. The likelihood is probably that she is selling better than you and that’s why she gets more money. Authors sometimes think that publishing is a ladder of success that everyone can climb equally.

No, it’s not. Just because two authors started at the same time, have published the same number of books in the same genre, and may even have the same publisher does not mean they are entitled to equal recognition or treatment. Because one is almost certainly selling more books. That means it isn’t equal at all. And that easy, obvious, inconvenient little fact is the answer.

I have seen several cases of “joined at the hip” author friendships, where two authors become best friends and swear their friendship will last forever. In every single case, they ended up parting company, sometimes not very amicably. Why? Because one started doing a lot better than the other and that put a serious chink in their relationship. In every single case, the author who wasn’t doing as well never looked in the mirror and asked how he might be contributing to this imbalance. The answer is usually that the person doing well is simply writing better books. Or they are much more adroit and current with social media and keeping their platform strong. Or all of the above. That’s something no one wants to hear (I never promised rose-colored glasses in this blog), but it’s better to face the truth. The truth will set you free and you will be rid of the soul-eating jealousy. What can you do to write better books? What can you learn?

Or maybe you can’t. Maybe you are capable of writing A- books but not A+ books and maybe that’s okay. I know of at least one major bestselling author who always hangs out with the same two author friends. He is a household name. They are not—not even close. But they have all stayed friends, because they all recognize the reality. He has a magic spark that they don’t have and that’s just how it is. Jealousy doesn’t play a part, because they all accept the reality and this is how it was meant to be.

Have you ever seen the movie Amadeus? It’s about Mozart and his then-rival, Antonio Salieri. Salieri is the only one to recognize the depth of Mozart’s genius, but he can’t stand it. He doesn’t understand how Mozart, an otherwise unimpressive individual, could be so gifted, whereas he, Salieri, is good but not great. He is so jealous that he spends his entire life trying to destroy Mozart. Think of that. He is so eaten up by envy that he ruins his own life and Mozart’s instead of enjoying his own considerable success and being grateful that he got to witness a once-in-a-century genius. (Note: most of this is not historically true. It was a play and then a movie, but most of it never happened). It’s a story about jealousy, and I think it should be required watching for all authors.