Five Sure-Fire Ways to Kill Your Writing Career by Connie Berry

Writing is a Craft and a Career

My all-time favorite craft-of-writing book is Chris Roerden’s Don’t Sabotage Your Submission (published originally as Don’t Murder Your Manuscript). I learned so much from that book as a new writer that I’ve recommended it to others many times. The book covers no fewer than twenty-four newbie traps to avoid, including Bloody Backstory, Fatal Flashback, Dying Dialogue, and Killed by Cliché.

While Roerden’s focus is producing the best manuscript you can, I’d like to submit a few lessons I’ve learned about writing as a career. There are more ways to kill a budding career as an author than trying to sell a novel that isn’t ready for prime time.

Five sure-fire ways to kill your writing career:

1. Write in a vacuum.

Is your attitude “I don’t have time for all that. Just let me write.” The English poet John Dunne famously said “No man is an island.” That is certainly true for budding writers. We need the encouragement and inspiration of others. We need to learn and grow. We need to see beyond our own horizons. We need friends and colleagues.

2. Refuse to take advice.

Advice can be devastating, and writers can feel defensive. “What does she know??” The first time I got feedback from a developmental editor, I joked that I was on suicide watch. I wasn’t, but it was definitely a shock. Only when I finally took her advice and the advice of other writers along the same lines did I move forward in my career. Don’t assume you know best, even if you have an advanced degree in literature and writing as I did. You don’t know what you don’t know.

3. Treat other writers as competitors instead of colleagues.

Are you jealous when someone else gets a writing contract? Do you fail to give someone a five-star review because it feels like you’re aiding the enemy? My favorite motto from the writing community is: No one has to fail in order for me to succeed. That deserves to be cross-stitched and hung above our computer screen.

4. Defend yourself when you get a bad review.

This can be hard. When someone levels a criticism, everything in us rises up in defense—especially when the criticism is unfair or unwarranted. I got a one-star review once because the reader read politics into my book. Which was not only untrue but bizarre. Everything in me wanted to defend myself. But I didn’t. Replying in a snarky or self-defensive way to a bad review will only hurt your reputation.

5. Give up when success doesn’t happen quickly.

You know this one, don’t you? Winston Churchill, who knew a thing or two about discouragement, once said, “Never give in, never, never, never, never—in nothing, great or small, large or petty—never give in except to convictions of honour and good sense." The only manuscript you can submit is the one you finished.

How to give yourself the best chance of success

Simply take my five examples and flip them around:

1. Seek community.
2. Be willing to take advice.
3. Treat other writers as colleagues.
4. Let bad reviews die their miserable deaths.
5. Persevere.

I’d love to hear your thoughts!