These free novels are just for you.
Take some time out for yourself. You deserve it.
New Zealand or England. Where will you go first?
Take some time out for yourself. You deserve it.
New Zealand or England. Where will you go first?
We’re besieged by others telling us all the things we don’t do well; the opportunities missed, the odd typos, misuse of the Oxford comma and that time you used a split infinitive by accident. The compliments don’t flood in and it’s too easy to measure the success of others based on the delicacies they feed us and the six figure incomes they bandy around. We retreat to the safety of our reading nooks, surrounded by our own book covers which frown upon our failures to exalt them so.
Then someone tells us they loved our book and what do we do? A happy dance? Treat ourselves to a well deserved pat on the back? Ring a friend?
Unfortunately that’s not always the case. Comparison is the enemy of all creatives and that other author is better than us. So, we allow ourselves a small flush of pleasure and then start looking for holes in the compliment.
They mentioned that book, but not the other twenty-three in the same series.
The books with the other protagonist wouldn’t be their cup of tea at all. No. Absolutely not.
Why didn’t I ask for a review? No, much too pushy. I almost did but then the moment just passed.
The psychology of most creatives I’ve met sits firmly within the realms of introvert. We’re not the kind of people you’d notice at a party – unless you make a point of seeking out those cringing in the corner with their gaze on the clock. Creatives have a few sentences they’d like to say about their work, but distract them and they’re lost. Ask something off the wall and they’ll flounder.
I still remember the first time I felt brave enough to tell someone I was a writer. It seemed unlikely I would ever see her again and enough courage welled up for me to take the risk. Her reply left me clueless.
“Would I know you?”
What kind of question is that? Would she have asked the same of any other profession other than a creative? A gynecologist might have responded with something quirky, but I swallowed my retreating backbone and shook my head. “No.”
I’ve pondered often on that and wondered what alternative answer might have presented itself with a bit more thought. How was I supposed to sum up in that moment, with only her head and shoulders visible through her car window, what her library collection might contain? It was an impossible task and one that muted me for many years after that.
I’ve found that responses range from the sympathetic; “Oh, that must be difficult,” to the wildly overbearing, “I want to write my life story. You must help me. Let’s exchange phone numbers.” It usually pans out somewhere in the middle with curiosity. I am a strange ornament that someone brought along for show and tell. It’s interesting, but nobody wants it in their living room in case it leaks.
There’s no wonder that amid all that poking and prodding and the constant need to defend our trade and our work, that we mistake a rose for a grenade. Anything lobbed over our walls is a possible threat and we dive for cover. By the time we emerge, the rose has wilted and the well-wisher is long gone.
Well, it’s the thing you do best. Write it down. Keep a log. Take a screenshot. Keep them all together. I started keeping my subscribers’ lovely emails in a separate folder on my mail server, but it’s not enough. I rarely open them again.
These compliments of love and appreciation are actual reviews. Yes, we can use them on book covers and advertising, but they have a deeper purpose. We need to transcribe them in our own handwriting and use them to paper over the vulnerable cracks in our hearts.
This year, I will be writing all compliments down in a notebook and keeping them together. Not typing them up and losing them on a hard drive somewhere, but writing them in my handwriting. I shall keep them with me and read them over and over. They will provide the fuel for my writing and my reason for continuing. Every one will be loved and appreciated and sprinkled around me like the confetti of goodness. That is their legacy and it will drive mine.
To my fellow brother and sister authors in the fraternity of creative isolationism, we have the power. Our readers give it to us every day. Seize it. Keep it. Use it. And may we bury the critics under the weight of compliments such as these.
**EDIT** Just to prove I take my own suggestions seriously, here’s photographic evidence of me writing in my own ‘Encouragement Book’ 2019
K T Bowes is the proud author of 26 novels available worldwide. Some have been Amazon bestsellers and she has the screenshots to prove it! You can check these out HERE on her ‘books’ page.
