Chasing Rainbows
Success is relative
Success. What does that word mean? Why is it so important? Have I achieved success, and am I satisfied with that success?
I figure every person you ask will have a different answer for these questions. For me, success would mean I’m selling a ton of books, and I’m a traditionally published author. However, if I look deeper, I realize I’m chasing phantoms. Six months ago, success was finishing my novel. So why did it change all of a sudden once I finished? Maybe I’m not really looking for “success,” or maybe success is so objective and transient that the word isn’t as meaningful as I give it credit for.
So then, what is it that I really want? I want to write. It’s as simple as that (okay, not really, but for this context, sure). I don’t have a specific genre I care about, or a specific audience I’m striving to appease, I just want to tell stories that I find interesting, ones that captivate me, and I think are worth telling.
Initially, I found myself constrained by structure. The worst advice I got on writing was from Stephen King’s book “On Writing”. This isn’t to say I dislike Stephen King, as a matter of fact, I loved “On Writing” (and pretty much anything else he’s written that I’ve read), but I wish I hadn’t taken its lessons to heart. In it, he recommended a book on grammar and style, “The Elements of Style” by William Strunk and E.B. White, the latter of whom is one of my favorite children’s authors.
Sorry, an aside, skip if you must. If you haven’t read “Stuart Little”, “Charlotte’s Web”, or “The Trumpet of the Swan” by E.B. White, I highly encourage you to do so. I’m not sure why (maybe I should analyze it one day), but the ending of Stuart Little was such a profound statement to make to children, and I loved it. Okay, sorry, back on topic.
The book “The Elements of Style” discusses active and passive sentences and how active sentences are generally better, with some minor exceptions. I took that rule to heart, and it made me hate the book I was writing (although I do want to revisit it. It’s got Dragons). So, I threw it out and started writing short stories again with no rules, and that’s how “The Book of Jacob” began. Just a short story no one was meant to read.
This is not to say it’s bad advice. Well, hell, maybe I am saying that, but to be more objective, I guess I should say not everything works for everyone.
I’m over here chasing rainbows when the pot o’ gold is right in front of me. I finished my first novel, something I’ve wanted to do since I was a boy. And now, the second novel isn’t some insurmountable feat; it’s just work, and I can do that.