I’ve made the point before that dissecting trade journals, studying and diagramming the latest trends in the fiction market, and trying to target your work to whatever is currently hot in the industry is the quickest way to drive yourself insane – even if you can churn out a bestseller in a matter of months to capitalize on the hottest trend, the industry can shift just that fast as well. Second point, if, on the heels of Harry Potter, you wrote a book about a girl attending a school for psychics, or a boy going to a summer camp for half-breed aliens, or a dog going to a college for spy-animals, it’s going to be glaringly apparent as a knockoff or clone.
A point I’ve made less often is that it’s also the quickest way to lose your way – put enough time and effort into chasing the curve in that way and pretty soon, you’re going to lose your sense of yourself, your own writer’s voice, the things you really love to write and therefore do well. Spend that time and effort only on what you think will sell, what you think you ought to write to be successful, or what some trend-prognosticator has told you will be hot in the new year, and writing becomes just a job for you, something to earn a paycheck, not a love, a passion. And it will come through in your writing.
It’s only a philosophy, but to chase fame in that way is a losing proposition. Everyone who was ever successful will tell you that they worked hard, probably harder than they ever have in their lives. A want to be successful isn’t enough to fuel that kind of drive. You have to love what you are doing, to have a passion for it. Yes, you can be successful pushing yourself to your limits on nothing but that want, but you will not be happy doing it, you will not be happy having achieved it, you will run out of steam eventually, and ultimately the entire effort, successful or not, will not be rewarding to your soul.
Soul here is not used in any religious sense, but only in the context of a composite of the things that make you content and fulfilled – your pride, your self-worth, your memories and legacy, etc. Things that cannot be built through artifice nor bolstered by money.
I urge you to go to that calm, quiet place in your heart, pick up a pen and paper, or rest your fingertips on the smooth keys of a keyboard, take a breath, and write what you find there, and not what you see in statistics and trends and diagrams.
What a moving blog, Kevin, and a timely reminder as we enter a new decade. Thank you, and here’s to a year of joyful writing!