Okay, so I am going to finish that series. I promise. I haven’t forgotten it.
But I came to a very important realization yesterday. Between that and guidance from someone very important to me, I discovered I’m going in the wrong direction when it comes to my writing.
I like non-fiction. I love reading it. I love reading those thick books on obscure wars, facts, inventions, countries, people that most others would stare at and say “Who pays for this stuff?” I don’t know why I love it. I do.
I thought writing articles about various things would be a good way to earn some money. So, I bought some books, submitted some articles, and got rejections.
I have no problem with work. I’ve written a few novels, am in the process of revising one for publication, and, in an earlier period of my life, would submit short stories to science fiction/fantasy magazines. I had gotten to the point where I was getting personalized rejections (pretty encouraging ones) when I decided to focus on my family. It had to be done, though every now and then the part of me that loved writing would try to rebel. Even when I finally walked entirely away, I wrote short stories for my kids and retold fairy tales as part of our homeschool.
It wasn’t the work that got me about non-fiction.
It was the detail. The same detail I would look at and say, “Oh, that’s nice,” became a chore at best if I had to write about it with no context other than, “Isn’t this interesting?” Writing information for the sake of sharing information does more than not appeal. I can’t. Stand. It.
I mean, there are some people who are able to take ideas that have been said over and over in various forms and make it sound like it’s a brand new idea. There are some writers who are able to ferret out all the myriad questions they need to ask and come out with a compelling article that alters the way you view the world, even if it’s just how you view the leftover smoothie in the blender.
I’m not one of those writers. Unless it’s in a story. Then, you’ll find me researching the most obscure and insane things for the sake of believability, or the sake of understanding a character I’m creating.
Odd, but I’m glad for the time I spent on non-fiction. I learned a lot about myself including what I love to create.
I’ll still post on this blog, though the topics are going to be fairly diverse for a while until I figure out where I want to go. More later.
Amy Keeley 