Conquer Writer’s Angst
by
Sally Jenkins
Being
a writer is a scary business. It starts with a blank page and the fear of failing
to fill it. It finishes with publication or submission for critique and the accompanying
terror that readers will hate what we have written.
Apart
from popping pills and downing alcohol, how can we get control of this constant
literary angst?
Tips
for Blank Page Trauma
·
Write
quickly. Pretend every month is November and NaNoWriMo.
·
Write
the scene that’s buzzing in your head. Scenes don’t have to be written in the
order they appear in the book.
·
Don’t
read any of it back until you’ve reached the end of the story.
·
Banish
that self-confidence seeping gremlin who whispers in your ear about how rubbish
the writing is. The gremlin knows nothing!
·
Have
an external deadline to aim for. Competitions are good for this – you don’t
want to miss the closing date and the potential for prize money!
·
Accept
that it’s OK to hate your first draft. It’s easier to improve a bad first draft
than write perfect prose from the start.
·
Write
because you love that afterglow feeling of ‘having written’. It’s the same high
as ‘having exercised’.
Tips
for Accepting Criticism
·
Understand
that the adverse comments apply to one particular manuscript or book only. They
are not personal or necessarily applicable to all your work.
·
You
are always in control. Analyse the criticism and then decide whether or not to
act on it.
·
Taking
criticism on board and giving it serious consideration shows maturity as a
writer.
·
The
only way to avoid criticism completely is to never show anyone your work. If
you do that, what was the point in writing it?
The
Case Study
My
second psychological thriller, The Promise, was published on 28th
January 2018. I banished the blank page blues by aiming to finish the novel by
the closing date of a competition with a prize of publication and £1000. I kept
myself buoyant mentally by imagining how I would feel when the novel was
published and the prize money mine.
I
entered but didn’t win the competition. However I did now have the complete
manuscript of a novel – a prize in itself!
The
next step was obtaining feedback on the novel. I sent The Promise for a critique. Two big ‘failures’ in the novel were
highlighted:
·
A
romantic subplot didn’t work because there was no chemistry between the two
characters supposed to be in love. The reader said, “You are much better at
conjuring up a scene of horror. The psychological thriller is your genre.”
·
The
structure could be improved. An inciting moment in the novel takes place thirty
years ago in prison. I’d written the novel chronologically from this moment.
The reader suggested the novel would be better starting in the present day with
flashbacks to the past.
·
This
criticism hurt and taking it on board would mean a major rewrite. But if I
didn’t take action the money spent on the critique and all the time spent
writing the novel would be wasted.
I
rewrote the novel. Then I used a beta reader. She came back to me with some
minor changes, for example, too many names beginning with the same letter. In
her summing up she described The Promise
as ‘a fast- paced psychological thriller with stark, dark elements at play. The
characters struggle with the central dilemma.’
Armed
with confidence from my beta reader’s comments, I directly approached The Book
Guild, the publisher involved in the competition that I hadn’t won. After a
wait of several weeks they offered me a publishing deal.
I did
a happy dance and some alcohol was downed (!) but this time in literary
celebration rather than to fight fear. Someday soon I hope to raise a glass to you,
your writing success and banishment of writer’s angst!
Introducing...
The
Promise
A man has been stabbed. A woman is bloodstained. The
nightmares from her teenage years have begun again for Olivia Field – just as
she is preparing to marry.
 |
| Amazon |
Ex-convict, Tina is terminally ill. Before she
dies, the care of her younger, psychologically unwell brother, Wayne must be
ensured. So Tina calls in a promise made to her thirty years ago in a prison
cell. A promise that was written down and placed with crucial evidence
illustrating a miscarriage of justice in a murder case.
Tina believes Olivia is perfectly placed to provide the care Wayne needs, but to do so, Olivia must be forced to cancel her own wedding and wreck the lives of those close to her. Tina’s terrible blackmail demands put Olivia’s entire future and, ultimately, her freedom under threat.
The Promise is a fast-paced psychological thriller told from several third person viewpoints. The novel explores the lengths to which people are prepared go in order to protect those they love and the impossibility of ever fully escaping our past actions.
Tina believes Olivia is perfectly placed to provide the care Wayne needs, but to do so, Olivia must be forced to cancel her own wedding and wreck the lives of those close to her. Tina’s terrible blackmail demands put Olivia’s entire future and, ultimately, her freedom under threat.
The Promise is a fast-paced psychological thriller told from several third person viewpoints. The novel explores the lengths to which people are prepared go in order to protect those they love and the impossibility of ever fully escaping our past actions.
~
Sally Jenkins lives in the West Midlands. She is a member of
a Speakers’ Club, a volunteer library reading group coordinator and a church
bell ringer.
Sally's first psychological thriller, Bedsit Three won the Ian
Govan Award.
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