Depends what you mean by “success”
One of my writing groups (the one that isnāt a critique circle) has set a blog-post prompt of āHow do you measure success as an author?ā
Weāre supposed to introspect, come up with wise words to inspire and console others. I donāt know about yāall, but the past two years have been a low-rising roller coaster, beginning with a brief burst of elation that my first book (my ādebutā if you want to get precious about it) was coming out.
Only then we had a little bit of a pandemic to deal with.
And now itās two years later.
All That Was Asked has never had a book-launch party (it slightly predates online launch parties), a signing session, a reading at a conventionānone of those things. Not uncoincidentally, it hasnāt made much dough for me or for my publisher. At least the print copies are mostly print-on-demand, so no oneās staring at a warehouse full of unsold copies and calling a shredding company.
But is selling a ton of books a success? To stay sane in this business, I think you have to measure success more on the basis of what you are doing than what you have done. If youāre making oodles of money in the publishing industry, thatās mostly a matter of luck, so is that success? Iād call it good fortune. Itās very much a lottery. Iāve read absolutely stunning work in critique circles, listened to mind-blowing readings by little-known writers, and Iāve even had people tell me after a reading āwow, that was awesome!ā
What makes sense is to measure how this workāwritingāimpacts your life. Is this what you live for? Not in a rosy-eyed, dreamy way, not āI luv writing <3ā but āwriting is what drags me out of everything elseā and āwriting is my food, drink, and sleepā and āwriting is how I exist in this universe.ā
What Iām doing right now is working on projects that Iāve wanted to tackle for yearsāno, decadesābut never could due to the vicissitudes of child-rearing, day-job workload, personal upheavals, and disability.Ā Iām not whining. These are just facts. I chose to raise kids, and it was satisfying work (and, yes, frustrating, too, but in all the right ways). However, doing the best job possible involved more than dropping them off at our barely-adequate schools. It meant advocating for them, fighting an uncaring administrative system, volunteering, fundraising, and, as a last-resort, homeschooling. At least in the pandemic age, there are more parents out there who understand that homeschoolingāat least not ideallyāisnāt a romp in the garden, itās serious work. And, like most of us, for me that was work that had to take place in parallel with earning a living.
So right now, Iām successful. Every morning (afternoon?) I wake up, and thereās writing to do.
What I’ve been looking forāand yes, I’ve found some, but far too fewāare stories led by characters who have trouble communicating, who donāt fit in, who think differently than others but find a way through life anyhow. I’m tired of hero’s-journey stories and chosen-one tales that take themselves too seriously. I don’t mind playing with the tropes. For instance, one of my WIPs has a seeming “chosen one” in it, but the whole thing is a crock, a scheme worked up by a person who’s trying to change society and is using an old myth to get buy-in. Not that the “chosen” person isn’t worthy, but there’s no magic in the processāthey’re carefully selected for capability and then trained for the job.
Iām not writing to market. I admit that. So I canāt complain about sales, not too much. It may take time for people like me to find the stories Iām writing for them. Thatās OK. I waited a long time. A little longerāI can deal.
Well, I’m trying to, anyhow.
In the meantime, Iām keeping on. For me, that writers learned to use remote meetings to connect for critiques, discuss craft, conduct conventions, and more has been a compensatory gain during the pandemic. Itās not a benefit of this horrible time; itās a thing we could should have been doing all along, and only just now learned to value. When the pandemicās over, weāll keep connected this way. Thatās a good thing, but we donāt get to pretend itās all right that millions of people died while those of us privileged to live were fumbling our way to this belated discovery.
Iāve leveraged that new learning, because Iām an engineer and tech things come naturally to me. Iāve let myself get roped into volunteering to help others less comfortable with the technologyāand thatās OK, because participating with other writers helps me connect more deeply with my writing community. I value the friendships Iāve formed with people Iāve only met in Zoom rooms. This is not a trivial feelingāI dedicated my Monday afternoons for half this past year to help a Zoom friend whose critique circle had lost their only zoom-capable member. That meant stepping aside from one of my other critique circles, one that needed me less. Iām returning to my prior group as of this month, because my friend’s old zoom-host has returned. Iāll miss the new friends I made in her circle, even though we only ever saw each other in little boxes on our computer screens.
Am I a failure because I had to defer my writing career? Looking back through my drawer of shelved and partly-done stories, one thing is strikingly clearāI was so young, so ignorant, so clueless. Much of what Iām writing now, I couldnāt have done when I was younger. In technique, I’m much better than my younger self; some of that gain I can attribute to years of writing science and engineering reports and papers, working collaboratively with colleagues on phrasing, structure, and word choice … plus coping with deadlines. Beyond the technique, older me is able to imagine more-complex characters, see worlds with more-different people in them. Through personal experience, I know most livesāmost real storiesādon’t have a ācall to adventureā or a āsupreme ordeal.ā Thereās no wise mentor waiting to guide us. We have to muddle through, try to survive in an irrational universe, and deal with the fact we’ll never quite make sense of it all.
Sure, Iām still learning. You have to keep learning. Itās the key to growth in every respect. Even there, though, Iām doing better, working actively to learn more of what I need to continue improving.
In my next posting, Iāll demonstrate my success by sharing a list of what I consider to be my 2021 accomplishments not only as a writer but also as a member of the writing community.
Iāll warn you right now: itās a longer post.
