Ask the Author: J.R. Young
Answered Questions (6)
J.R. Young
A great question that I will share at a later time due to the personal nature of the answer.
J.R. Young
If a scene, scenario, story idea, phrase, philosophical mental mumbo-jumbo, enters my mind AND resonates in my chest, I know there's something there. For me, an idea, especially a story, has to resonate with the heart because if a story has no heart then it is no story at all. Soulless stories may make a lot of money (Fifty Shades of Grey), but they are the "empty calories" of the storytelling world.
J.R. Young
Currently, as of now, which is just a few days after launching The Tale of Nottingswood, I am swamped in marketing efforts. As a self-published Indie author, you don't have a choice but to handle both the creative and the business. It stinks, but it's what one must do.
J.R. Young
This is the advice I have for writers who want to make a living from it: After you pour yourself into your book, detach yourself from it. Once you detach yourself, seek out trusted critiques and ask them to tear it apart; tell them to find every little thing wrong with it, to take a red pen and "bleed" all over it. If you've detached yourself from the book, you won't take criticism personally and will help you be more objective and accepting toward making changes that will take your book from "Yeah, that was a good book," to "Holy cow, that book is friggin' awesome!"
J.R. Young
There are many "best" things about being a writer. For me, the most bestest is the opportunity to create new worlds. That's fun. A close second is writing allows me to explore true principles and how they would function in realities different from my own. Many times, when stories do this, it helps us to see our own reality in a new way, and can often lead to solutions we'd never before considered.
J.R. Young
I write anyway. Even if it's garbage. I can always go back and edit or delete. "Nothing you read was written; it was re-written." Writer's block can come when you're too demanding of yourself for perfection right out of the gate. Punching through that wall of writer's block by writing anyway, you're telling your brain "it's creativity time whether you like it or not." That's when magic happens.
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