Telling or Selling?

Last week at the second session of the writer’s workshop at the Huntington Library, I spoke with a friend who asked me to read her work.  In the course of our discussion, I couldn’t believe what came out of my mouth.  I said: “Do you want to tell a story or do you want to sell a book?  They can be two very different things.”  I have probably taken more than 5 university-sanctioned writing courses, mainly focused on creative writing, and after all that work and all those courses, I didn’t learn nearly as much as I did in that two hours at the library.

Whether we like it or not, writing is a business.  You can be the best writer in the world, have the best story in the world, but it will never see the light of day if you are not out there selling it.  I remember two teachers in junior high both telling me,  You can wallpaper your walls with the rejection slips.    What a way to nuture a 13 year old’s budding writing talent — to insinuate she’ll be a failure even before she starts!  I realize now what they were trying to tell me was that I was good, and it would take alot of effort to break through the noise of all the other writers out there who were also good.

As we answered questions from the workshop participants, I began to think about where my own WIP was in relation.  I thought I was telling the story of my heroine, and I realized I am actually telling the story of a secondary character. Some reworking is definitely in order if I want to turn this into a seller.  

What about you?  Are you telling or selling?

 Don’t forget to join the published writers of Dunes and Dreams at the Amagansett Free Library on March 14 at 1:30 for  The Love of Romance Novels:  why people read them, what makes them special, why and how we write them.  For more information, visit http://amaglibrary.suffolk.lib.ny.us/

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