…I am unashamed in admitting I’m a selfish scribbler… oh, sure, I gladly share my blog space and (albeit limited) experience in the arena of self-publishing with whomever wishes to engage with me on that… I’ll ReTweet and share other authors’ efforts and successes on Facebook and the other SOSYAL NETWURKS where I lurk… I regularly post reviews on the various Great God Amazon pages for books by new quill-scrapers (we all started sum’where, and I remember always with immense gratitude the wonderful generosity of spirit and support afforded me by the amazing global writers’ diaspora along my own authorial path)… but there is one element I guard ferociously—my promise to myself to enjoy my WURK… in essence I write for me… if others derive entertainment or pleasure from the product of my wee grey cells, that’s a welcome bonus… but first and foremost I create stuff that I like to read myself… so many times I read efforts from our fellow ladies and gentlemen of the alphabetical persuasion, and I cringe to note the obsequious pandering to a ‘target market’ or a ‘pitch-to-them-what-sells-readership’… and believe me, Lads and Lassies of Blog Land, some of the biggest names in our industry indulge that game… and I shun it… and I mentally paraphrase, ‘what shall it profit an author if he succumbs to a publisher’s whims to serve the need for sales, if he loses his own creative writing soul?’… or sum’thing like that… in like manner, from the outset of this marvellous self-publishing journey, I committed not to be ruled by the stupidity of deadlines… the daft notion that the WURLD will dance to a timetable and schedule demanded by a sales partner at a major publishing firm…
…for this ol’ Scots Jurassic writer, I revel in the languished time of crafting my books as I please… and if that means one or twenty more titles before the candle in the garret extinguishes, so be it… Author deadlines?… at my time of life?… are yeez kidding?… see yeez later… LUV YEEZ!…
ALL MY BLOG POSTS ARE FREE TO SHARE OR RE-BLOG SHOULD YOU SO WISH—BE MY GUEST!
Who said that phrase “To thine own self be true”? My mom had embroidered it and it hung on the wall. A phrase worth remembering.
(and I like how you say “crafting a book” ’cause that’s really what it is if the writers does it right.)
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…I had actually toyed with having that very phrase in the post, m’Lady… great minds think alike, huh?…
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Lovely post. Put me in mind of the late Douglas Adams who said …
I love deadlines. I love the sound they make as they go whizzing by.
All the best. Kris.
https:///awritersden.wordpress.com/
https://1951club.wordpress.com/
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Doug had the best quotes! 😀
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Reblogged this on Chris The Story Reading Ape's Blog and commented:
What say you?
Share with Seumas on his blog – He LUVS YEEZ!
😃
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cheeers , Chris 🙂
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Welcome Seumas – great post and points 👍😃
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I agree with you! I write what I like to read, or would like to read. 😉
I don’t think I would do well with a publisher as I like my own time table, my own writing ways and I like the control of my own books or writings. Does that mean I’m a control freak? haha!
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probably! 🙂
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Agreed! Both what you say about deadlines, but especially the stuff about “target market.” I’ve often had similar thoughts, but hesitated to lay them out in the blogosphere. Thanks for doing that!
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..cheeers, m’Lady, Audrey:)
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Sadly, I have to work with deadlines (blogs and book) as I want to get a regular and growing readership. Tho – to put the laternative (and I know you were being slightly tongue in cheek) I think deadlines are good. If I didn’t impose them, I’d sod around doing nothing. I NEED a deadline to get the adrenaline going and the fingers pounding the keyboard. So for me, even if I impose it on myeslef, I’m FOR deadlines…. saying that…oh, look, a distraction…..
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…cheeers, m’Lady Carol 🙂 mwaah 🙂
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Totally agree!!!! You must enjoy your work when it’s finished… if not… your work isn’t a “work” it’s a “hard toil” and perhaps not a good book…
What I do it’s because I LIKE it… if other people say is nice or good, then I enjoy double!!!!!!!!
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:):) mwaah 🙂
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Ah, deadlines. Sometimes I find they help, most of the time they just stress me out. And life has a way of messing with the best-laid project plans and timetables anyway. Kind of like when you’re pregnant — they tell you it’s OK if you want to make a “birth plan”, but don’t marry the idea as babies and circumstance have a tendency to toss your pretty little plans out the window anyway… so in that vein, I suppose that, like babies, the next books will get here when they’re darned well ready to get here. 😉
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…great analogy! 🙂
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I just hope I don’t have to wait twenty years or so before I can sell something, even a short story. If so, it’ll probably be from the afterlife. At my time of life I don’t worry either. Why spend your last years by being miserable. 🙂 — Suzanne
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Reblogged this on theowlladyblog.
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