On the Playlist: Down - Jason Walker
Today, a friend asked me, "What are you writing now?"
My answer? "It's YA Contemporary. With romance, but it's coming-of-age. *pause* It's about dance. *longest pause of my life* I hate to say this because it's embarrassing and a cheap trick *somehow an even longer pause than the last one* There's, uh, a freak car accident that puts the dancer in a wheelchair, and the story goes from there."
Yeah, I wouldn't read it either.
I don't know how to talk to people about what I write, unless it's over the internet or with a fellow writer. Though I'm certainly no expert at queries, I could write once that's better than what I told my friend (ok, given what I told my friend, that is not a hard thing to do.)
This friend is even one who I trust, who I know doesn't think I'm crazy for wanting to be a YA writer. Yet, I didn't know what to say to her. Heck, much of what I said wasn't even true. There's dance in my WIP, yes, but that's not what it's about. The accident isn't really a freak accident, or at least the results of it weren't as the character who was injured wasn't even sitting in a seat when they crashed. I have thought that the car accident was a cheap trick before, but I don't really anymore. It's necessary for the plot and it does more than just paralyze my character.
But I was embarrassed to say that I used a car accident, and strangely, embarrassed to say that I write romance. That's ridiculous, because I love romance, and believe it is as important as every other genre. The embarrassment came from the fact that I'm writing romance, because I don't have much experience with romance in real life. I was so tempted to tell my friend, "It really is better than it sounds", which we all know makes everyone think your novel is just as bad, if not worse, than you made it sound.
Being able to talk about my novel in real life (you know, as opposed to this fake life that is the internet) is definitely a skill I need to work on. How can I expect anyone to be interested in it when I can't make it sound interesting?
Does anyone else have verbal diarrhea when it comes to talking about their writing?
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
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3 comments:
Omigod yes yes yes! Sometimes to cover the romantic element to my story, I say, "It's a dystopian novel, aimed at Young Adults. About demons. And religious connotations. Imagine V for Vendetta and Halfway to the Grave have a lovechild, and you've got my story". And they usually just smile and nod. I'm always afraid they'll laugh in my face if I say anything about the romance - Mills and Boon have a lot to answer for...
*looks around....slowly raises hand* yeah, i have the hardest time talking to "real" people about my writing. i don't know why, but i just start stuttering and saying...'well, you know...it's literary' and if i say YA? forget about it. i so know where you're coming from...i mean almost all of my stuff is tragedy...so yeah :)
This happens to me all the time. I've recently worked out a one-sentence pitch that gives me some direction, hopefully so I won't embarrass myself again. I've used it once over the internet, so I could copy and paste it in. I don't even mention the genre (YA, dystopian, fantasy, romantic elements. I don't think there's a way to say all that without sounding stupid). I just give a general plot overview.
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