A Better Me came out two weeks ago. At one point, it was in the top 250 for New Adult and College Fantasy. That was cool, but the best part was seeing all the likes and shares from peers and others. The support of the community is so important for indie authors and publishers. I’ve been leaving copies in a few select Libraries in the Woods and local Little Libraries as I did with Silly Little Monsters last year. And in less than two weeks, my husband and I are going to a couple of author events in Ohio with more to follow closer to home.
Lots of hustling to do this summer, but also lots of writing. I’m making a contribution to another short story anthology coming late 2022. My next novel Drama Queen is coming out next year. It’s a standalone story, but takes place in the same “universe” as A Better Me. And since it’s set in New York City, things can get even weirder, and I don’t mean the theatre kids central to the story. They’re pretty weird, though (I’m a theatre kid – I can say that).
Speaking of writing and drama, there’s been some doozies over the past few years. A year ago, it was the whole “bad art friends” fiasco. If you missed it, here’s the short version: a sad lonely woman sought the approval of her peers by patting herself on the back for donating a kidney, and some people were so put off by her self-obsession, they began to obsess over her instead of just “writing” her off, and their ongoing mockery culminated in an act of plagiarism. It’s possible the legal battle persists to this day, I dunno. I do know that nobody came out looking great, and I’m amazed that writers of all people didn’t predict a bad outcome. I understand the allure of the literary takedown but revenge is a dish best served in tiny little pieces so nobody can identify the body.
Or maybe not at all. Call me Ishmael, but some whales are better left alone.
I was reminded of it because of another ongoing internet drama due to an unfavorable ARC (advanced reader copy) review of a book that lead to The New York Times publishing yet another tired retread about alleged cancel culture. Once again, criticism is not censorship. Trying to silence criticism is. In this case, YA Twitter has attracted people’s ire (except it’s not really YA Twitter, but someone who reviewed a book that wasn’t even YA). Anyway, supposedly there’s “nothing more terrifying than YA Twitter” finding out about your book because they want perfect characters and plots without conflict, and can’t handle nuance. Uhm. Hmm.
The person making that super nuanced claim was a friend of the author and previously achieved notoriety complaining about “f’ing nerds” giving her own books four star reviews on GoodReads. No, it wasn’t intentional self-parody. This writer was genuinely angry she didn’t have perfect reviews. The only thing weirder than a writer being mad about four star reviews is a writer calling their readers ‘nerds’ as a pejorative. We are the nerds. Aren’t we?
And nerds are still ‘in’, too, right?
By the way, I’m totally cool with YA Twitter finding Silly Little Monsters or A Better Me, purchasing them, and leaving reviews (even 4 stars or *meep* less). Artists are known for being sensitive. This can be a blessing and a curse. At its best, sensitivity makes us more empathetic and better artists. At its worst, it makes us really bad at handling criticism. We can’t be bad at handling criticism. As someone with ADHD, I’m supposed to be that much worse at handling criticism because we receive so much of it, but honestly, as shocked as I am when my editor doesn’t find my drafts perfect, I’m usually nodding or cringing in sheepish agreement as I take in feedback.
The single most important thing after being willing to put ourselves out there as writers, performers, whatever, is being able to handle feedback.
We have to know:
- what to laugh off or reject (anything false or insulting)
- what to use to make ourselves better (because we can always be better)
- what to use for marketing (a friend once received a bad review for a doofy reason, and she uses that review as an ad – it’s brilliant).
Speaking as a reader instead of a writer, I know some reviews are absolute rubbish. My personal pet peeve is when someone leaves a bad review just because they do not like the genre. That’s about as useful to me as a reader as a review of sushi by someone who hates sushi is to me as a foodie. So annoying. It makes me want to review reviews – but never reviews of my own reviews because…yikes, writers! No! Bad writers! Don’t do it!
Then there’s that poor writer who received a bad review on Amazon because some lady’s sausages were late. Now that’s just hilarious. It’s also a good reminder not to take things too seriously…except things that truly are serious – which is why I only scratched the surface of ongoing controversies. I wanted to keep things light today, but I’ll dig a little deeper next time.
Today’s moral is: writers can’t please everyone. We’re not timely sausages.
