Wordcraft blog by Avi

Q&A: How do you deal with criticism?

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gulls

It is the way of most art—a piece of writing, movie, painting, dance, etc., etc.—that it is generally created to be experienced by others, and in so doing exposes itself to both public praise and criticism. That is inherently part of the art-making process. Moreover, this critical response comes to the artist, for the most part, by people you don’t know, and will never know. It is impersonal. These critics have little or no knowledge of how you created your art, why you did so, how long or how hard you worked to create it. Perhaps that’s how it should be: the art is experienced by how it is received. It is simply (more or less) liked or not liked.

When I first began to publish, critical responses (favorable and unfavorable) came from professional critics in journals, magazines, and newspapers. Nowadays, because of the internet, criticism comes from everywhere. Moreover, it has become the nature of internet criticism, (not just in the world of art) that people feel free to say anything, from lavish praise to dismissive insult. It can be wildly supportive, or bluntly cruel. I’ve experienced both.

(I’ve sometimes wondered when I read a very caustic negative review [not necessarily for one of my books] how the reviewer would like his or her work being reviewed by a casual passerby.)

One of the things that people do not fully grasp is that art—in whatever form—is rarely created by just one person. Next time you go to a movie, hang around and watch the final credits—the listing of the many, many people who were engaged in the making of the film. It is not so different from the making of a book. A publisher once told me that she estimated that some forty people have a hand in each published book. But published books of fiction, unless there are fulsome acknowledgements, rarely list all the people involved.

Yet criticism of a book is almost wholly aimed at the presumptive sole author of the book.

The question posted here is how do I respond to that criticism? If it’s positive, one can smile, and think “That’s nice. Thank you.” Moreover, a positive review helps sell the book, and bluntly, that’s how I make my living.

Negative criticism is much harder to absorb. But what I have learned is if—in the public criticism—a fair number of folks say the same thing, it is probably accurate. This is to say, the best criticism allows you to learn and get better at your art. That’s hard to do, but ultimately, necessary. That means a negative response can be much more helpful than a purely positive critique.

But the insulting, or dismissive responses can be very painful for the artist.

Many years ago a book of mine was published in England. The book—meant to be funny—had a line that involved baseball. Since baseball is not played in England, the English editor changed that baseball line to one that referenced soccer. When that book was reviewed in England, a critic who did not like it, quoted that very line to indicate why he thought my book was weak. And when True Confessions of Charlotte Doyle was published, one reviewer indicated that “If writer and editor had worked harder it would have been a better book.”

So the essential answer to this question is that I have learned to live with what is made of my work. If I can learn from it, great. If it’s insulting, well, I don’t so much turn the other cheek, I turn another page.

Struggling: Redux

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[Photo credit: Adobe Stock]

This summer we are re-running my most-read blogs from the past year, in case you didn’t have an opportunity to read them the first time around. I’ve rewritten each one of these, so even if you’ve read them before, you may wish to read them again! Here is the tenth of those articles:

I am working on a new book—and I am struggling. Given the fact that I’ve published some eighty books, it may surprise some that I am having a hard time. Let me suggest why.

  1. Every book is a new book, and the success of one, though presumably it gives confidence to write another, that is not necessarily so. A writer’s confidence is, at best, fragile. A nasty remark on Goodreads can kill a day’s work. Let past success give me patience for my current failure.
  2. One of the pitfalls of a new book is my contract—if I have one. A contract will specify the total word count—say sixty thousand words. But there on my screen, the PC is always counting and it reads “2,465 words.” The psychological tendency, then, is to write more words than I need. That clogs up my writing, and makes it verbose. It feels as if I am writing badly. I am.
  3. I agreed to write such and such a book, with such and such a plot, and I made a good pitch. But a pitch is not a book. There is many a slip between pitch and book.
  4. Reminder: talk as little about my book as possible. It boxes me in. Silence is freedom. A talked book becomes an unwritten book.
  5. Sometimes as I write, I see a possibility for a shift in the story. But I promised something else. Reminder to self: go with the shift, with what feels right. The one person I should talk to is my editor.
  6. Reminder: Beware the book that is focused on place, rather than characters. Travel books are about places. Fiction is about characters.
  7. Reminder: Professional writers get paid for their work, and I depend on that income to live. Get it done! reverberates in my head. The rent is due. That creates another kind of pressure, one that may be real but that doesn’t help my writing.
  8. Reminder: Good writing is re-writing, endless re-writing. Patience is a key component of writing.
  9. Reminder: Never deny your deepest instincts about your own work. But be open to those instincts.
  10. Reminder: Read good writing by others. Good writing is generous.  Other writers will show the way.
  11. Reminder: Slowly (if not surely) it will get done.

When Can I Read
the Next Book in the Series?

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The End of the World and BeyondIn January, Publishers Weekly published a column titled “Notable Novel Sequels: January 2019.” It was brought to my attention because my new book, The End of the World and Beyond, was cited, one of six books. The full text of the citation reads:

Avi’s sequel to The Unexpected Life of Oliver Cromwell Pitts finds the 18th-century protagonist in transport from England to America, where the convicted thief is enslaved and forced to work on a tobacco farm. Avi offers verisimilitude while calling to mind classic picaresque novels.

While grateful for the notice, and glad to be referenced as “notable,” this is not really a review of the book. That is because—so I have been informed—PW has a new policy of not always reviewing sequels and books of a series. A publisher suggested to me that it might be because, given today’s economics of magazine publishing, there is pressure to reduce page numbers. That said, consider what might not be reviewed with this policy: Through the Looking Glass. the Oz books. the second Pooh book, the Narnia books, the Lord of the Ring books. Harry Potter books, Percy Jackson books, Diary of a Wimpy Kid. I’m sure you can easily think of many more.

series books

It’s not for me to debate the economics of magazine publishing but, surely, publishers are working with writers to create them, though perhaps not so many as the 28 volumes of the (19th Century) Elsie Dinsmore series, or the 19 volumes (20th century) of the Nancy Drew series. Will such new review policies discourage the publication of series books? I have no way of knowing. Most of all, young readers are grabbing them up in great numbers and enjoying them. Will they be discouraged by a lack of reviews? I doubt it. Young readers should have access to them in schools and libraries. A lack of reviews might diminish their acquisition and shelf space in such places.

Over the years, being curious, I’ve asked young readers why they like series books. I surely read them as a kid. Adults read series books too. Why? The easy answer is, having liked one book, there is a built-in recommendation to read a similar book—in the expectation it will bring the same pleasures. The reader has already gained a comfort level with the characters. A comic character will renew the laughs. An adventure figure will bring back the same thrills.

Young readers often mention the sense of family a series brings. One enjoys being surrounded, so to speak, by the same cast of characters who become like friends.

The series book is easier to come back to. You are generally with familiar characters and circumstances the moment you open the book. I knew Tom Swift was going to invent something new, and then do something amazing with it. I looked forward to it, and knew I’d be rewarded.

And in my day, too, the series book was cheaper. It was cheaper when published. When I walked into a used book store there were multiple copies of series books that were all but being given away.

At one time, Schools discouraged them. Do they still?

Happily, libraries had them.

And let it be said, a series book is not automatically a poorly written book. Consider some of the books I mentioned above. In my view, they are really good books.

My sense is that if a young reader reads all the Harry Potter books, they have advanced themselves as readers. After that experience, I’m willing to bet they read more.

Here’s for anything that encourages young people to read. And that includes series books.

Struggling

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[Photo credit: Adobe Stock]

I am working on a new book—and I am struggling. Given the fact that I’ve published some eighty books, it may surprise some that I am struggling. Let me suggest why.

  1. Every book is a new book, and the success of one, though presumably it gives confidence to write another, that is not necessarily so. A writer’s confidence is, at best, fragile. A nasty remark on Goodreads can kill a day’s work.
  2. One of the pitfalls of a new book is my contract—if I have one. A contract will specify the total word count—say sixty thousand words. But there on my screen, the PC is counting and it reads “2,465 words.” The psychological tendency, then, is to write more words than I need. That clogs up my writing, and makes it verbose. It feels as if I am writing badly. I am.
  3. I agreed to write such and such a book, with such and such a plot, and I made a good pitch. But a pitch is not a book. There is many a slip between pitch and book.
  4. Reminder: talk as little about my book as possible. It boxes me in. Silence is freedom.
  5. Sometimes as I write, I see a possibility for a shift in the story. But I promised something else. Reminder to self: go with the shift, with what feels right. The one person I should talk to is my editor.
  6. Reminder: Beware the book that is focused on place, rather than characters. Travel books are about places. Fiction is about characters.
  7. Reminder: Professional writers get paid for their work, and I depend on that income to live. Get it done! reverberates in my head. The rent is due. That creates another kind of pressure, one that may be real but that doesn’t help my writing.
  8. Reminder: Good writing is re-writing, endless re-writing. Patience is a key component of writing.
  9. Reminder: Never deny your deepest instincts about your own work.
  10. Reminder: Read good writing by others. Other writers will show the way.
  11. Reminder: Slowly (if not surely) it will get done.

Story Behind the Story #64:
The Most Important Thing

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Though writing short stories is nothing I do on a regular basis, I read them, and occasionally write them. More often than not I have written them at the behest of editors asking for a story for a themed anthology, such as “Loss,” or “Guns,” “School Life,” or even the beginning of a new millennial, as say, the year 2000.

What Do Fish Have to Do With Anything?In 1997, a collection of my stories was put together under the collective title, What Do Fish Have to do with Anything? It was published by Candlewick.

Over time, that book proved sufficiently successful that the publisher asked if I would like to put together another such volume.

I gathered up a collection of previously published stories and put them together. (One of the stories had been written for an anthology but never published.)

The Candlewick editor thought four of these stories suggested a theme—father/son relationships—and suggested these might be the topic of a new collection. But, I would need to write three new ones. That I did.

When I write my novels, the characters, the plots, and the settings are almost wholly creations of my imagination. By contrast, when I write short stories they tend to come out of my own experiences or experiences I have observed close at hand.

The Most Important ThingThus, one of the stories in The Most Important Thing is based, for the most part, on something that really happened to me. See if you can determine which one.

Writing short stories—for me—is both challenging and fascinating. Write a novel, and one needs to illuminate—as if with barn fire—whole aspects of life. My thinking about short stories is that one uses a (metaphoric) flashlight to illuminate one aspect of life. A novel must (at its best) reveal the whole. A short story suggests the whole. Or, as someone said, (I don’t recall who) “A short story is a photograph; a novel is a film.”

A quick snapshot of how current readers receive a book may be had by comparing the professional reviews (Booklist, SLJ, Kirkus, etc.) of this short story collection with the reviews of the same book on say, Goodreads. Whereas the professional reviews were upbeat—among the best reviews I have ever had—the private reviews tended to be downbeat, with a clearly stated desire that they wished these stories could have been uplifting, positive, putting father/son relationships in a cheerful context. While the private reviews were dismissive of the stories’ connections to reality, the professional reviews applauded that connection. Curious.

But, then, one of the curious things about short stories is that they can lead to long discussions.

The good, the bad, and the disappointing

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Toby from Roseburg, OR, writes: “I guess you feel good when one of your books gets a good review. How does it feel when (if) you get a bad review?

I do know writers who say they never read any reviews. I am not one of those people.

ReviewsIt is always a pleasing experience when you get a positive review. It’s truly gratifying, because I’ve worked long and hard. It’s nice to know that someone thinks I’ve done okay. Reviews of children’s book are often quite short, and a plot summary can take up many of the words. Thus, when I get a good review, it is meaningful. That said, I admit, I too often jump to how my publisher looks at them: is there a quotable phrase? Such phrases are a key aspect of marketing.

After all, one wants readers to read your book. Good reviews do a lot of good.

Negative reviews are a whole different kind of experience. I would suggest my first response is disappointment. During the whole publishing process one hears positive remarks, hopes, and high expectations from your publisher. Negative reviews can douse all that quickly.

There is also a difference in the kind of reviews. How they are written. That is to say there are professional reviews (from Booklist, SLJ, Kirkus Reviews, Publishers Weekly, and newspapers, etc.) These, even when negative, tend to be well written, and measured. You understand what the reviewer is saying, and thinking. There have been moments I may even agree with it. “Wish I had seen that.”

However, in these days of the internet, reviewing skills are all over the proverbial map. They may be quite professional, or they can be highly personal and subjective about the writer, even dismissive. Such reviews are painful to experience, and one wonders (or at least I do) why they are written at all.

Then, of course, with a given book, one can get negative reviews and positive ones. That can be a puzzle.

Beyond all else, if you are a professional writer reviews are part of your professional life. When reviews are well written and thought out—there are real skills involved—one can learn from both positive and negative reviews.

That’s the hope, anyway.

Writing less

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delete keyIf you are a writer there are many reasons to love the computer. It does make writing easier. But it also makes books bigger, as in more words and more pages. Books are longer these days, despite the fact that it is just as simple to remove text as to add it. Easier, actually. But psychologically, I think one tends to add rather than subtract. That, I think, is a pity. Famously, Shakespeare, in Hamlet, has Polonius, Ophelia’s long-winded father, say:

Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit,
And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes,
I will be brief. Your noble son is mad. . . .

[See my December 13, 2013 post for Samuel Johnson’s thoughts on prolixity.]

One of the most important on-going writing lessons I ever had was, curiously, writing book reviews for the School Library Journal many, many years ago. I was a young writer then (still writing plays) and was more than happy to write long, two-page reviews of books. However, SLJ only wanted short reviews, at most a paragraph. Out of necessity, I would take those long reviews and then try to use fewer words to say the same thing.

The point is, I could.

To this day I write on, and on, and then work backward, and cut, and cut, and cut. Famously, “Less is always more.” As my writer friend, Rachel Vail once said to me, “The most important key on my keyboard is the delete key.”

Slogan of the day: You can always write better by writing less.

Dangling participle in the first paragraph

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fimgersYears ago, I was reading aloud a piece I had newly written to a willing listener, wanting to both hear it myself, and to get some kind of objective reaction. After reading for about half an hour, I stopped. “Well,” I asked, “What do you think?”

The first thing the person said was, “There’s a dangling participle in the first paragraph.”

Keep in mind I had been reading for half an hour, which meant that my listener was so focused on that dangling participle (in the first paragraph!) that very little of what else I read could have made any impression. Now I have very little doubt there was that grammatical error in that first paragraph, but as a critical response, it made me not to want to hear any more of this person’s reactions.

Criticism is always hard to take. It also must be said that criticism is also hard to give. To lead off with negation—no matter how justified—is to invite a defensive response. While it can be described as a cliché, if you cannot find something to say that is positive, you might as well say nothing at all.

It is not often referenced, but when there is writing, there is always criticism of that writing. It may come from your best friend, your writing group, your editor, these days a blog, or online critical forum, or from some professional journalistic response. My point is that criticism is always part of the writing process. Even if you claim to pay no attention to it—and I have heard some writers say that—it has impact.

These days—particularly with mostly anonymous internet—criticism can often be harsh, and even abusive, revealing more about the critic than the work being critiqued. That said, unless you get a critical response (positive or negative, or a mix thereof) you cannot learn from what you have done.

Criticism is one of the more painful aspects of writing, but in the end, it is critical.

The ARCs are In

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Catch You Later, TraitorAdvanced Reader Copy—or ARCs—as the publishing world calls them, are not so designated because they are for people whose reading skills are considered high (i.e., advanced) but for people the publisher wishes to read a new book in advance of publication. This is to promote interest among those who can generate interest, or buzz. They are also meant to be review copies, so that reviews of the book appear in vital publications (Library Journal, Booklist, Kirkus Reviews, Publishers Weekly, etc.) around the time the book is actually published, and available. Early responses to ARCs can also suggest to the publisher how the book will be received, so they can change marketing and printing plans. Given the world we live in, it should come as no surprise that these days ARCs are—for eligible folk—available on the internet.

Receiving an ARC of one of my own books brings mixed emotions. It is a pleasure to finally see the book you have written as a real book, looking and feeling like a book, even (most often, but not always) with the cover in place. That said, when the ARCs are created there is often a certain amount of rewriting and proofreading still taking place. Granted, not much, and surely, nothing fundamental. However, it has always bothered me that those who read an ARC are not truly reading the finished book—for better or worse. [I once had a review of a book which referenced something that was in the ARC but had been edited out of the published book.]

Now I just received ARCs of my forthcoming book, Catch You Later, Traitor [Algonquin], which will be published March 10, 2015. So, here’s the deal: We’ll choose ten readers of this blog who enter and request a copy an ARC of the book. Two catches. Know you won’t be reading a truly finished copy. Secondly, you’ll need to drop me a line as to your response to the book. That’s the burden of being an advanced reader.

If you’d like to be considered to receive one of 10 signed Advanced Reader Copies of Catch You Later, Traitor, please fill out the information below. If you are younger than age 13, please have an adult fill out the form for you. Your requests have been received. The giveaway is now closed. We’ll draw 10 names at random and notify the winners by September 20th.

The craft of criticism

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critiqueEmily, from West Newbury, Mass, writes:  “I was wondering how you feel about negative criticism.”

It is hard not to feel bad when you get negative criticism. I think the hardest part is when you have an inkling that the critic might be right. However, well-written, thoughtful criticism can also help you write better. You must try not to be defensive. You must try not to take it personally. There is a skill in writing good criticism. If you as a writer wish to be respected, you must respect the craft of criticism. More often than not, the criticism is not aimed at the writer, but at a possible reader.

The hardest criticism to deal with is when the critic goes after you in personal terms. I can recall a reviewer commenting (negatively) about my photograph on the back of a book. Once, someone published an article about me that was titled, “Reviewing Avi.” Another reviewer wrote, commenting upon a statement I made—in a preface—about the writing of the book, “I don’t believe him.”

These days the most difficult criticism to accept comes from casual, dismissive critics who write in blogs. Not every book is good. Far from it. Not every writer writes well. Far from it.

Nevertheless, virtually all writers, I do believe, work hard at what they do. They deserve, I think, some measure of respect. Sometimes, such critics think the writer has no feelings worth respecting.

All that said, if you are a writer, and you make your work available to the public, you have to accept the fact that there is going to be criticism. I hope that it will be positive. Just know there is insightful, useful, and well-written criticism as well as that which is not—and learn how to tell the difference.

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