I’ve always wished that when I’m about to do something stupid, a loud booming voice would echo from the sky, “BAD DECISION!”
Alas, that has yet to happen.
I made a ton of mistakes when I was a newbie writer. But, the silver lining in that statement is that those mistakes helped me learn and grow. Now I’m here to explain what I did wrong and hopefully, you won’t make the same mistakes I did.
So here it is, my list of things NOT to do.
1) Query before you’re ready.
It’s shameful to admit, but I did it. Even after reading about a million different articles and blogs advising not to query before you’re ready, I was so sure I was different. I was the exception (I am so NOT the exception). My first novel was so horrible, but I didn’t know it was horrible. I thought it was fantastic. I had visions of Oprah, Ellen, and six figure publishing deals dancing in my brain. And then when I realized I still had a lot to learn, it was humbling, but important. If I hadn’t realized how much I sucked, I wouldn’t be where I am today.
2) Let the market or other people influence what you write.
The first book I wrote was a paranormal romance. At the time I started writing it, paranormal romance was all the rage. Of course, by the time I finished, the genre was on it’s way out the door and getting an agent to even look at it was akin to getting someone to agree to having their skin slowly peeled off.
However, the first book I wrote was also New Adult (before New Adult was a thing), and an agent once told me on some social media site that the genre would go nowhere. I went to writing YA which I enjoy, but my heart wasn’t totally in it. I wanted to write about characters in college, and it took me a few more years to get back there.
3) Don’t finish what you’ve started.
This was a big one for me. After my first novel, I spent about three years writing, re-writing, throwing away and never actually finishing anything. Now, I love writing beginnings, but endings are always a struggle. I wish now that I would have persevered and finished some of those novels, even if it stank. There’s something to be said about writing “The End” on something.
4) Assume that everyone’s path will be the same or similar to yours.
I went through a period of time where I was obsessed with “Path to Publication” stories. I still love hearing about how people get published and the way they got there, but I realized something very important. Everyone’s path is different, and you really won’t learn much from how other people got from A to B to published, but you might find some inspiration from writers who never gave up, despite the time and obstacles placed in their path. Don’t compare yourself to other writers. Some of us are successful right out the gate, others take time, and some might never get there. As long as you’re happy with what you’re doing, that is true success.
Lucy London puts the word genius to shame. Having obtained her PhD in microbiology by the age of twenty, she's amassed a wealth of knowledge, but one subject still eludes her—people. The pendulum of passions experienced by those around her both confuses and intrigues her, so when she’s offered a grant to study emotion as a pathogen, she jumps on the opportunity.
When her attempts to come up with an actual experiment quickly drop from lackluster to nonexistent, she’s given a choice: figure out how to conduct a groundbreaking study on passion, or lose both the grant and her position at the university. Put on leave until she can crack the perfect proposal, she finds there’s only one way she can study emotions: by experiencing them herself.
Enter Jensen Walker, Lucy's neighbor and the one person on the planet she finds strangely and maddeningly appealing. Jensen's life is the stuff of campus legend, messy, emotional, complicated—in short, the perfect starting point for Lucy's study. When her tenaciousness wears him down and he consents to help her, sparks fly. To her surprise, Lucy finds herself battling with her own emotions, as foreign as they are intense. With the clock ticking on her deadline, Lucy must decide what's more important: analyzing her passions...or giving in to them?
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Genre - Romantic Comedy
Rating – PG-13
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