refachina.blogg.se - Old manuscripts

Old manuscripts how to#

A well-executed rescue mission of old manuscripts can turn a fizzle into sizzle.

Anne points the way to writing a publishable first novel. They’re the books we wrote when we still needed training wheels (but didn’t know it). To venture into real estate-speak, they’re fixer-uppers. Or, to use a banking analogy, old manuscripts are a savings account of ideas/characters/plots from which we can draw. To use a sports analogy, think of your old manuscripts as bench players, ready to come in to save the day or relief pitchers who can save the game. For writers, creative value counts as does the value accrued from experience, even the efforts that seemed to fail. Not all value can be counted in dollars and cents.Įverything we write has value even if in our darkest moods we don’t think so.

We lost our focus when we had a bigger, better, more fabulous idea and couldn’t resist the lure of the bright, shiny object of our new desire.ģ.

Old manuscripts how to#

Turgid info dumps that bored even us because we didn’t know how to skillfully handle backstory.

Protags so goody-goody the unwary reader risks diabetic shock.

Villains so horribly, vomitously, irredeemably, slime-drippingly evil even a four-year-old would just giggle.

Arc? What arc? Noah’s arc? They’re unmotivated and so were you.

Poorly conceived or ineptly drawn characters.

The pleasant-on-the-surface small town that doesn’t harbor deep, dark secrets. The gold-plated McMansion whose status-conscious occupants never feel the sting of envy or confront the threat of Losing It All.

And speaking of swamps, what about unused or underused settings? The haunted house that doesn’t scare anyone.

The plot that meandered into a vast swamp of dead ends.

The brilliant idea that turned out to be not so brilliant.

We had reasons for abandoning the old manuscripts: What!? You think stuff like this doesn’t happen? Your publisher put a steam punk cover on your tender coming-of-age story and/or titled your hot, steamy romance Really Boring, Don’t Read. No ads, no promo, the book ended up spine out on a bottom shelf next to the utility closet on the second floor at Barnes & Noble.

Published? Technically, yes, but your publisher kept it a deep, dark secret.

Dumped-the option book your publisher turned down.

Ghosted-agents or publishers never even bothered to send a rejection note.

Turned down by the editor who “loved” it-but not enough to make an offer.Rejected by the agent who was once upon a time so enthusiastic.My post on rejection lays out the reasons why publishable manuscripts get turned down. There’s the perfectly good book that was rejected by publishers.They also include books we finished that were never published, or else were published so badly they never found their audience. They’re our false starts, our duds and misfires, our first novels, our practice novels, our orphans, our cast-offs.Ībandoned, neglected, shunted aside, started but never finished, they’re the old manuscripts collecting dust somewhere in the distant reaches of our hard drives. They’re the old manuscripts we-most certainly including Anne and me-started but didn’t finish or did finish but somehow went off track. Are old manuscripts gathering dust in your archives? by Ruth Harris.Įvery writer has (at least) one and probably more.