|
 Emotions are the driving force in a romance, with love being the core emotion that carries the novel. But for writers, love doesn’t just exist on the pages. In this profession, love drives us as well. We write because we love to. We read because we love books. We all want people to love our books: editors, agents, family, friends, critique partners – even strangers.
Having an editor or agent love your work will *hopefully* ensure getting signed and that book being bought. Having a reader love your book will *hopefully* ensure them spreading a good word or two about it and picking up the next book.
But should you really gauge the success of your writing by how much a person loves it?
That depends on how you define success. I did insert *hopefully* in the above scenarios. Forget making the bestsellers. Forget landing that dream agent. In fact, forget the contract (or lack thereof) for a moment. Without all that, how would you define success?
Let’s go back to what drives us, our characters, and our stories.
Emotions.
What if all you were able to garner from others with your writing was hate? There was something about the story that people disliked with a passion. Would you consider that a setback? Would you think there’s something wrong with your writing?
If you beat yourself up over someone’s dislike of your writing, then stop. It doesn’t mean your writing isn’t stellar. In fact, if you’ve garnered a strong dislike from a reader, then pat yourself on the back. You’ve done something right. Possessing the ability to elicit a strong emotion from a reader – whether they love the story or for some reason or another, absolutely hate it – means that your writing was powerful enough to touch something deep in that person to garner that strong an emotion or opinion. Congratulations, you’ve succeeded in your job as a writer.
I invite you to give me your opinion on this. And the next you get a bad review or comment back, be glad that that person not only read your story, but was worked up enough to write back or blog about it and recall specific areas from the story that they felt so strongly about. Bottom line, you’ve pushed a button, left an impression, and have managed to remain on someone’s mind long after they’ve stopped reading your work. So keep up the good work and continue toying with emotions! Here’s to an emotional success!
****
Mai Christy Thao is an American Title finalist for her fantasy Prince of Darkness. For more information about Mai, visit her website, http://www.maichristythao.com.
3 Comments
| 
Nancy 
Gerri 
I think that in some ways, you’re right on, Mai. Hate is a lot closer to love than people think, and I don’t think there’s anything wrong with doing something in your book that some people are going to hate. I just finished Jenna Black’s THE DEVIL INSIDE, and it deals with a lot of controversial issues that some people are going to hate hate hate, and that’s ok because she did it with finesse and conviction. (I didn’t hate it, by the way. I loved it. Great book.)
On the other hand, sometimes I hate books because they’re sloppily written, and hating sloppiness is way different than hating content or ideas.