Chapters left to revise: NONE! The MS is now with test readers.
Books read: 16
Words on LIBRARIUM: 1800
Words on WD Contest story: 200
I've managed to complete one of my goals for the year. It's been about a five month process, but this round of revisions for my manuscript is complete. As I told the two readers who are looking over the book for me now, I hate it again, so it's time to put it in someone else's hands.
With that big goal complete, it's time to work on other things. I'm hesitant to devote too much time to my Librarium story before the first round of feedback from the writing group, and I don't want to dive into BRUSHSTROKES until the semester ends and I can give it full focus. So, I thought I'd take a swing at one of my other goals--enter a writing contest.
To say that I've never entered a writing contest wouldn't be entirely accurate. My school district ran a yearly arts competition with a creative writing category. I placed a couple of times in elementary school. I entered a poetry contest at my junior high when I was in ninth grade. That one I won. There's a plaque in the school with my name on it and everything.
But that's really it as far as competition goes.
I don't really have a good explanation for what's stopped me from entering contests. I mean, imposter syndrome is the easy answer: deep down, I don't think I'm a real writer or a talented one, so I don't enter contests because losing one would give weight to those insecurities. But honestly, the same thing could be said about submitting work for publication--rejections aren't exactly great for self-esteem, either. I pitch to publishers and query agents pretty regularly (and get a fair share of rejections).
Maybe it's the winning thing that gets me? With pitches and queries, I'm not really being assessed in comparison. The agent or publisher looks at the work and decides if they want it pretty much independent of what other writers are doing. A contest, though, has a ranking system. There's a comparison.
I subscribe to the belief that comparison is the enemy of progress--I try not to compare myself to anyone other than the writer I was yesterday. It helps me keep my momentum. If I compare my work to the stuff I find on the shelves, my sense of my ability may be skewed one way or another, but I can pretty easily compare my older work and my current work and get a sense of how I've improved. A contest, though, is about that comparison. Was your story better than the others?
And I get that it's subjective. That good and great stories still lose. But my ego is fragile. I already feel like I'm faking my way through this whole writing thing. The last thing I need is something to topple my already precarious balance.
Ultimately, though, I can't get better if I don't take risks, if I'm not willing to put myself out there. So, this week, I started work on a piece for a contest. I don't know what will come of it, but I think the chance will be worthwhile.
In celebration of this risk (and of the Amazon Author Central page I finally got around to setting up), I'm giving away two copies of one of my favorite reads from 2017, This Savage Song.
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