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You get a little leeway for worldbuilding if you write science fiction and fantasy–and I do–but even in the genre most tolerant of long works, a debut fiction manuscript can’t come busting down the door at twice the expected length. (And it’s kinda frustrating that sometimes when I talk about this, people bring up the existence of successful long books, without acknowledging that they are generally penned by much more established authors. Yes, even Stephen King’s first published book was short!)

Marketability is the issue here. If you’re trying to partner with a publisher, you’re ASKING them to bring their knowhow and resources to the table to sell your book. So yes, they get to call the shots, and one of the things they believe is that young adult SFF books are ideally around 90k. It’s intimidating as hell to think I have to UN-WRITE about HALF of the book I wrote to get it to fit in those pants, but I’m gonna try to at least get close.

Some of it will be making hard choices about entire aspects that will have to be chopped. I might lose a plot line. I will definitely lose some big scenes. Then I’ll need to make smaller choices: what does each part of this book that I devoted words to DO for the story, and are there redundancies according to that? Cut ’em. Moving on from there, it’ll be reducing scenes to offscreen references or cutting them, toning up bulky language, and eventually the nitty-gritty of knocking individual words out of sentences to make them tighter.

But all that writing that gets cut still served a purpose. Some of it helped me figure out aspects of the worldbuilding that I can then be more subtle about (or not include at all). Some of it helped me figure out characters’ voices and relationships. Some of it was done as loosely as it was in the spirit of not editing myself to death while I was trying to get the story down. Some of it just turned out to not be needed, and I found that out by putting it there to be judged. But none of it is wasted, even if it does end up on the cutting room floor.

I’ll never write short first drafts. My life would be so much easier if I did, but I just don’t. And while my books can sometimes lose enough words to come out tight and smooth and presentable to the publishing industry’s expectations, I’m not going to strangle them while they’re coming out to have them start out that way. It’s like a recipe I’ve got to taste as I cook it. I think I’ll get there.

But dang, it sucks. (Readers, let me know if you want to join the test reader list for an upcoming Sapphic science fiction romance/coming-of-age novel.)

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In honor of my other webcomic, Negative One, hitting 20 years as a webcomic this month, you get a So You Write comic based on a real thing that happened. Heh.

Obviously it’s simplified and doesn’t capture the actual nuance of the conversation I had with this person, but yeah, I once got an e-mail like this, explaining to me with Utmost Seriousness that a story featuring a missing child where she isn’t found safe and sound and returned to her parents “didn’t make sense” and that my stubbornness in writing a story with this sad plot was driving my readers away. This reader was quite polite and sincere, but they were adamant: I was making a HUGE mistake writing what I was writing; that I must be “married to” a plan I’d written for the story that I felt compelled to miserably carry out even though it was obvious the story should go a different way, and that the reader was certain my other readers would all feel the same way.

Furthermore, I was not adhering to the correct way to write stories, was refusing to listen to feedback from readers (which responsible authors really should take into account), and should provide some way of disclosing to readers ahead of time that they’re not going to get what they’re all going to want. (This reader explained to me that they truly felt I should post spoilers of the future story so no one would be harmed by not getting the ending they wanted in the story. They would certainly all be reading to get the plot point they wanted, and I had a responsibility to reveal that it wasn’t going to go that way.)

Obviously I was baffled by this weird entitlement–no, readers don’t get to tell me what I have a responsibility to write!–and I was pretty confused by the suggestion that I owed people full disclosure of future events, not to mention the reader’s belief that I was knowingly writing the story in a way everyone would hate. I’m pretty sure that if I’ve written it to be devastating when characters experience tragedy, I’m doing something right! But on top of that . . . you’re welcome to stop reading any story you’re not enjoying, for any reason!

I sometimes have strong feelings about stories–we all do, right? That’s why we write!–but I’d never dream of e-mailing the author of an ongoing story and telling them what they should be doing with their plot. I’m good at offering feedback when it’s solicited, and I love posting book reviews when I read completed books (some of my reviews are negative), but I can’t say I’ve ever felt entitled to explain to another author that they should be writing a different story than the one they chose to write.

(And if you think an author wrote an awesome story up to one point and then ruined it, or corrupted the story with an element they should have left out, or just wish they would have written it how you would have . . . yeah, that’s what fanfiction is for!)

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Do you know how long it’s been since I finished writing a novel? DO YOU?

I’m not going to say because IT’S EMBARRASSING.

And now I literally have to cut half the words out of this thing to really even have a chance at sending it anywhere.

Let the games begin.

(After ice cream.)

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You mean I could actually wrap the book up when my character’s major arc is over?

I don’t have to, like, revolutionize her culture, give her a happily ever after, make peace between two alien species, and solve homophobia?

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Different strategies work for different people, but dang, I don’t relate at all when people actually find lots of social interaction helpful in terms of motivation!

I’ve had people tell me it helps so much to have other people engaged in their work and rooting for them to finish so they can read the new chapters hot off the presses. I’ve had people tell me how helpful it is to be around other writers to keep them excited about working on their project. I’ve had people tell me that social interaction infuses them with they energy to get through the long stretches of solitary creating, and that connecting with others is a breath of fresh air.

And I’m the exact opposite.

I’ll participate in a social writing activity if I’m truly going to learn something (or, you know, help somebody else!), but I really like being all by myself, butt in chair, working on the WIP, no interruptions.

We’re all different! That’s for sure!

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To be clear, I do NOT think that every kind of coach must have direct successful personal experience with the subject they’re coaching; it’s just the nature of some professions that certain lessons CAN be taught (and successfully followed by students) without the teacher having personal experience. I can teach you about different kinds of coffee beans without having personally harvested them where they grow, for instance. But if you’re trying to teach people how to do something and what you’re doing DIDN’T work for you? Reconsider.

I once knew two young women who were excited to go on a surfing trip with their boyfriends, but they had literally never surfed before. After their boyfriends taught them some basics and then, ya know, went off together to do real surfing, the girls began filming each other demonstrating how to surf and giving pointers that had probably been given to them a few hours ago–demonstrating the basics incorrectly, getting details wrong, and basically looking ridiculous but trying to sound like they had any authority to teach others how to surf. It had the feel of a toddler in a play kitchen explaining in baby babble how to fix a sandwich. They posted their video proudly on one of their YouTube channels. The comments filled up with people saying what was wrong with their advice or warning people not to take advice from them. They eventually deleted the video.

You should not learn how to do things you care about from people who don’t know how to do it. At best it just will not work. At worst it will teach you bad habits.

Furthermore, some people who have no experience or credentials are out there to intentionally scam you. People posing as editors, writing coaches, and especially publishers and agents will sometimes draw in victims by pretending to have expertise and offering advice, then separating you from your money. You should want to know the background of people who give you advice in a professional capacity, and especially if they create materials or provide coaching that you have to pay for, it isn’t wrong for you to expect them to have either proven insider knowledge or personal success on the subject. They’re most likely not going to tell you straight up that they don’t have the experience the way the conversation went in this comic, either, so beware.

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I’ve had this sort of thing happen and of course it’s annoying. One time I pitched an agent with my nonfiction concept and mentioned that the proposal was available. He responded by displaying weird ignorance about the subject matter (about which I am an expert), presumed to educate me about it (by informing me that it wouldn’t make sense to try to sell an asexuality book in the queer section because IF asexual people even exist they certainly don’t think of themselves as queer), and explaining to me that if I want anyone to look at it I would need to write a proposal (and here are some helpful resources to teach you how, ya n00b). I did write this guy back and inform him that asexuality wasn’t some weird thing I made up; that communities and studies existed (including multiple of both that indicated asexual people are queer); and that I had mentioned the proposal was both written and available. But I didn’t tell this guy those things because I expected to work with him. If he had offered after that, I would not have accepted. Who wants to work with someone who ignores half the things you say in a relationship that’s ABOUT communication?

But just like you can’t call the human resources department of the job you were rejected for and explain to them how you are in fact the most qualified, talking back to an agent who said no is going to do three things:

1. Annoy the agent, who will either ignore you or put you on a list of people to never work with;
2. Place the blame for the miscommunication on the agent, which even if you are right and they read carelessly, will not result in a positive relationship with that agent if you somehow were to work together;
3. Not result in getting another chance. It will not work.

Take a publishing industry professional’s possibly inappropriate rejection as an opportunity to make your pitch materials clearer. And if it was 100% on them and you literally did not say the thing they insist you said . . . again, they’re proving you don’t want to work with them. Their whole JOB is reviewing these kinds of materials. If they can’t be arsed to read yours properly, you’ve learned that they approach these things carelessly or in a cursory manner. And while everyone makes mistakes, your work deserves proper respect and attention.

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I mean I had other plans for that Sunday but sometimes I don’t have much of a choice. . . .

(Also, it’s probably bad luck to act like I’m upset about it. . . . )

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Don’t beat yourself up if Massive Life Events get in the way of your creative activities ;]

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Another long one for #160! And no, you don’t have to become an expert on everything your characters do, but especially if it’s an integral part of a protagonist’s story arc, at bare minimum you need to not make mistakes representing it. And you may want to say stuff like “OK, so what if my character is an exception?” For instance, what if one of your test readers says your police officer character wouldn’t do a certain thing because that’s not part of the protocol for the incident they’re responding to, and you want that character to break the usual rules and do it anyway? The answer there is you need nuance. You need someone to call it out or later acknowledge that the officer shouldn’t have done that or have the character’s inner monologue note that they’re ignoring protocol. You don’t want it to look like you just didn’t know how to write this.

Think about your own hobby or profession, and then think about the silly things you’ve seen in movies/TV or read in books about the way it’s represented. It’s pretty obvious, isn’t it, when these things are phoned in! But it’s not just about not wanting to get laughed at by experts. It’s about respecting your own work enough to represent an accurate picture of the character’s life. In researching these things, you may even find some insight that will help your story feel more authentic in general!