Keep Writing

Firstly! A fantastic new blog for all things UK YA has been launched, courtesy of Keris Stainton, Keren David and Susie Day. Check it out for book recommendations, reviews, guest posts and more.

Secondly! I'm taking part in Crits for Water 2012, which has been set up by the fab Kat Brauer. You can donate to charity:water in return for critiques of your work from authors, agents and editors. I'm not up till June, but the campaign is already running, and there are some amazing critiques to bid for. So go! Bid!

Thirdly! The details of the Derbyshire Literature Festival are up, and you can find out more about mine, Chelsey Flood's and Helen Mort's event on 15th May, where we'll be answering questions about our writing and getting published here. We'll also be reading from our upcoming debuts, so you could get a sneak preview of the opening chapter of ACID!

Fourthly! I have an interview up at fellow Lucky 13 Mindy McGinnis's awesome Writer, Writer, Pants on Fire blog, where you can read more about my writing process, how I got my lovely agent and what it was like to be querying and out on submission.

Which brings me to today's post… 

This time last year, ACID was still being sent out to publishers. I’d already had one book out on sub that hadn’t sold, although it was a near miss. With that book, I hadn’t found the process too stressful, because (and this probably sounds pretty naive) I had an agent! Surely that meant my book would sell… right?

Wrong. Because they don’t. Not always. No-one was to blame – it just wasn’t the right book, and it wasn’t the right time, and eventually, my agent and I agreed we should put the MS to rest.

While that first novel (a contemporary YA) was doing the rounds, I’d already written another, which, for various reasons and after about 5 drafts, got trunked. After that, I started writing ACID. Thankfully, that MS worked out, but when my agent sent it out on submission, I didn’t feel quite so sure about anything any more. Because it doesn’t matter how many people (or books, or blogs) tell you to take the rejections in your stride, to move on, it’s hard – really hard – not to let them knock your confidence. Or it is for me, anyway, as, like most people, I suspect, there’s always that tiny voice in my ear telling me nothing I do is any good. That voice I have to ignore at all costs if I want to get anything written at-all.

This time last year, that voice nearly got the better of me.

With each rejection, I got more miserable and stressed. I was trying to work on a new book, but I wasn’t enjoying it because my confidence had dipped so low. I started to question whether I should be a writer at-all. And I lost sight of the most important thing of all – the writing itself.

Then, right in the middle of all this, I remember asking myself, does my life depend on getting published right now?

And I asked myself, If ACID doesn’t sell, will I stop writing?

The answer to both those questions, of course, was No.

It didn’t make the rejections any less disappointing, and it didn’t quiet my fears that I’d never be a good enough writer to get published, but it did help me gain a sense of perspective about the whole thing. I was putting all my energies into wanting to get published when what I needed to do was put them into my writing. I first started writing (and have kept writing ever since) because I love writing, and I can’t imagine not doing it. I’m also a firm believer that things happen when they’re meant to happen, and reminding myself of that helped too. If I wasn’t meant to get published yet, I wasn’t meant to. Instead, I needed to keep writing, and keep improving.

Easy for you to say, you might think. Your book sold. But it could so easily not have. And if I’d kept get published as my overriding ambition, instead of becoming a better writer, I’m not sure where I’d be right now. Not in a very happy place, that’s for sure.

So if you’re in the query trenches or out on submission right now? Keep writing. Because that’s why you’re there in the first place. And that’s what will get you through… whatever the end result.