I’ve just finished writing the first draft of my new book for children in The Wishing Girls series. It doesn’t have an official title yet, but I’m calling it Mollie after the main character.
It’s a book that I really wanted to write, and luckily my agent and editor were keen on it too. But sadly this isn’t always the case in the publishing world. Sometimes you may be gently nudged (or blatantly asked) to write a book that is outside your comfort zone.
Depending on the market you may be asked to consider trying a vampire romance, issue based romance/popular fiction (think Jojo Moyes or Sinead Moriarty), ‘mummy porn’, a misery memoir . . . And even though your heart may not be in it, you might be tempted to give it a go. And if you do, and you can make it work, and even enjoy the experience then good on you. And let’s be honest here, maybe you really need the money and that can be a strong enough motivation in itself – many fine authors have written to pay the bills, nothing wrong with that.
But my honest opinion is this – life is too short to spend months/a year/years of your life on something that doesn’t make your heart sing. And by the time your book hits the shelves, the market may have changed.
Every book has its difficult scenes. No book is easy to write. But it’s hell of a lot easier if you actually adore the book you’re working on. If you love (or detest) the characters with a passion, if you think about the plot every waking moment of the day, if you can’t get the damn thing out of your mind, if you’re itching to get back to your desk every day to continue telling the story.
Write the book that YOU to write. If you put enough passion and enthusiasm into your writing, if you write the book your heart begs you to write, it will work. And it will get published. It’s as simple (or as difficult) as that.
Yours in writing,
Sarah XXX
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HI!!
Hi Lucy!
Thank you so much for writing this – it is really helpful and so true. I have spent nearly 2 years writing something I hope will get published – but I don’t regret a moment if it doesn’t because I learnt so much in the process. I still hope it is taken up though!
Hi Anne,
Best of luck with your book – fingers crossed. You are right – you learn so much from writing. It’s never wasted.
Best, Sarah
[...] for a long, long time. If I was a normal person, I’d be sick and tired of it by now. I read a lovely blog post this morning about writing the book you want to write, and how it’s a good thing if your book is in your [...]
Lovely post, Sarah. Some areas of life need to be compromise free!
Thanks, Maeve. I agree 100% SarahX
Thank you very much from Belgium, I’m Spanish and I’m writing my first book. Your blog is helping me a lot
Good luck and ” gracias” again!!
Good luck with it, Patricia! Sarah