Comments on: Thick Skin, Tender Heart

By: admin

admin — Mon, 11 May 2015 17:21:11 +0000

Hi Anthony – It took incredible strength for you to turn down a publishing deal. It’s so difficult these days to even get one – but I so agree with you. The finished novel has to feel right to the writer. We are the ones that step out into the public arena with this work. We take the heat and we take the reviews (positive and negative) and we field the questions. I’ve always been the writer I want to be, and have sometimes been frustrated with how that has not panned out to mean a fat bank account, and a hired assistant (or even living in something I don’t rent), but I understand now more than ever how important it is to me to feel good about my published work.

Thank you so much for writing and sharing. You uplifted me as well. Nancy

By: Anthony Connolly

Anthony Connolly — Mon, 11 May 2015 17:00:05 +0000

Great advice. Like you, I too received extensive notes from an editor of a presumably soon-to-be-published novel for a small press. The letter nearly did me in, and it took enormous amounts of inner strength to keep my sanity and proceed the best way I knew how.
In my case, I ended up reading the notes and re-writing the entire novel from memory, only to have this version equally, and extensively, annotated by the editors.
Finally, going over a version the publisher and editors felt was right for them I came to the conclusion (one that I’d freely provided to my writing students) in the end a writer must make the ultimate decision(s) and I decided to not proceed. I asked that my contract with them be void; they agreed.
I could risk embarrassment, and some temporary disappointment, but I could not destroy my values and creative needs as a writer.
It was with tough skin I’d submitted the work and with tough skin I’d undergone several rounds of revisions.
It was my tender heart in the end allowing me to be at peace with the writer I am, not the one others would have me to be.
Thanks so much for this letter. It felt as if mailed to me personally.
In July, I’ll remember to float on some water.

By: Ruth Knox

Ruth Knox — Mon, 11 May 2015 14:41:53 +0000

I wish you well on your journey. Don’t forget to come up for air.