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My guest this week is Sheila Webster
Boneham, author of several nonfiction books and the first in her mystery
series, Drop Dead on Recall.
"I want to write a [novel, memoir,
poem, book about...]...." I hear that a lot. I hear it when I teach
classes and workshops, and I hear it in coffee shops and at book signings. I
think this is partly because the need to create is a fundamental human drive.
Have you ever met a healthy child who wasn’t eager to learn and make and do
things? I also believe that the creative urge plays out in more ways than we
usually think of as "creative" – writing, visual arts, dance, music,
and so on. Take dog training.
My new Animals in Focus Mystery series
begins with murder at a canine obedience trial in Drop Dead on Recall. For more than a decade I taught obedience
classes, mostly to pet owners who wanted to gain some control of their dogs.
Many did fine, and emerged at the end of the class with better skills for
communicating with their dogs. Some were inspired to continue training, and a
few of those eventually went on to compete. At each step up that ladder from
"my dog is dragging me down the street" to "my dog just earned
an obedience title!" there were dropouts, because I’m here to tell you
that as easy as it looks when you see a well-oiled dog-and-owner team perform,
it took them a lot of hard work to get there.
So it goes with writing. Many people
begin with an urge to write. Some have a specific project in mind, but others
just feel they’d like to try writing and find their subject as they go. They
take a class or two, or join a writers’ group, or go to a conference. It’s fun
at first. Then the fun becomes more complicated. Painful. Not all criticism is
"constructive," and even when it is, it’s hard to hear.
When the work is ready to submit to
agents or publishers, things get tougher. Rejection is part of the deal, and
rejection sucks. So like the doggy-school dropouts who don’t want to spend time
teaching the things their dogs don’t learn quickly, a lot of beginning and
intermediate writers drop out when the pleasures of writing bump up against
disappointments and plain old hard work. And it takes a lot of hard work to be
good, much less great (at writing, at anything). Many people quit when this
becomes evident.
I’ve heard people say that quitting is
sad, but I'm not sure it is. I think we should try something new every so
often, even if it doesn’t work out. If you think you want to write, give it a
whirl! Even if you’re never published, you will have expanded your view, had
some fun, learned something. You might even turn out to be a writer! How will
you ever know if you don’t try?
As for the quitting, I think that’s
okay too. Because quitting doesn’t mean failure. It means we have successfully
identified our lack of interest or skill in a particular activity. It means we
can move on to try something else, or we can go back to what we already know
and love. It means we tried. And that is success!
ABOUT
SHEILA
Award-winning author Sheila Webster
Boneham writes fiction and nonfiction, much of it focused on animals, nature,
and travel. Although best know for her writing about dogs and cats for the past
fifteen years, Sheila also writes fiction, narrative nonfiction, and poetry.
Her new Animals in Focus mystery series has just debuted with Drop Dead on Recall, now available from
your local bookseller and online. In addition to her next mystery, Sheila is
currently working on a series of essays about traveling the U.S. Wilmington , NC
ABOUT Drop Dead on Recall
When a top-ranked competitor keels over
at a dog obedience trial, photographer Janet MacPhail is swept up in a
maelstrom of suspicion, jealousy, cut-throat competition, death threats,
pet-napping, and murder. She becomes a “person of interest” to the police, and
apparently to major hunk Tom Saunders as well. As if murder and the threat of
impending romance aren’t enough to drive her bonkers, Janet has to move her
mother into a nursing home, and the old lady isn’t going quietly. Janet finds solace
in her Australian Shepherd, Jay, her tabby cat, Leo, and her eccentric
neighbor, Goldie Sunshine. Then two other “persons of interest” die, Jay’s life
is threatened, Leo disappears, and Janet’s search for the truth threatens to
leave her own life underdeveloped – for good.
http://www.amazon.com/dp/0738733067
paperback
