Tough skin?

Yeah, when an agent who'd had my full for 8 months wrote back and told me, in detail, how my main character was a wuss and spineless and why would ANYONE ever want to read a book about him?

Granted, the book has not yet found a home, but not for that reason. At the moment my entire writing group is head over heels in love with him. And let me tell you, they're a tough crowd.

Nevertheless, it's tough to take when you're hoping hoping hoping FOR EIGHT MONTHS that you'll get "the call," and then you get something as snide and personally insulting as that.

Ouch, Jo. The form rejection would've sufficed, yeah?

Ouch...

It's also for the reviewer who says that she wished the hero killed off the heroine (in a romance novel, of all things!) because she (reviewer) hated her so much. Ouch again...

Thomas_Anderson said:

Published writers, can you share some instances where your tough skin has been needed?

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Reviewers can be pretty brutal. My mom was incensed when she read my first bad review. I tried to tell her everyone is entitled to their opinion and if I was going to get upset over it I was in the wrong business. Didn't help. She stayed mad.

Jersey Chick said:

Ouch...

It's also for the reviewer who says that she wished the hero killed off the heroine (in a romance novel, of all things!) because she (reviewer) hated her so much. Ouch again...

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Painful!

You also have to have a tough skin to realize your words are not perfect just because you wrote them. Agents and editors will make suggestions, and you may have to lose bits you love. Readers will be all over the place-they'll love it, they'll loathe it, they'll be completely indifferent to it, or something in between. If you read some of the threads here on famous authors, you'll get a sense of that.

Thomas_Anderson said:

I've read it takes a relatively hard skin to make it in the writing business. What does that really mean? Obviously it's not literal, I'm not dumb. But are they referring to how you get constant rejections or what?

Published writers, can you share some instances where your tough skin has been needed?

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Your work will be criticized, by agents, editors, reviewers, and readers. Sometimes brutally, and often senselessly (as in, you wonder whose book they read because it sure as hell wasn't yours).

But it isn't just that.

You will be insulted by readers who choose to comment on your author photo, the blouse you chose to wear to a signing, your political views (should you be stupid enough to make them public), and why you made your MC a smoker.

But it isn't just that.

You will likely discover that you, as the creator of the work an editor loved enough to buy, are nothing but a tiny cog in a giant wheel called publishing, and that the vast majority of the people running that giant wheel don't even know your name.

But it isn't just that.

Should you choose to try making a living writing, you will live check to check, the checks will likely be small and infrequent -- and you had better learn to love peanut butter and noodles.

But it isn't just that.

Your family and non-writing friends will ask when you can retire after the first book comes out. Or maybe the second. Because look at Dan Brown and Rowling and King. They'll ask when Hollywood is going to make a movie of your opus. They'll ask why you're still driving your ten-year-old car and living in a tiny apartment. They'll expect you to give them free copies of your book, since they haven't had time to go look for it.

But it isn't just that.

The real reason why you need a tough skin to survive in publishing is really very, very simple. Throughout your entire career, no matter how long or short it is, there will be people who will question your ability to do your job. All the time. With every book. No matter how many you write and publish. No matter how successful your track record is. No matter how many bestseller lists you hit. No matter how much money you make. Your knowledge and skill will be questioned and doubted. Especially by yourself.

Always. Get used to it. Develop a thick skin or a massive ego.

Or maybe both.

Tough skin means that you don't snap when someone says something bad about you.

A good example of tough skin is C. Paloni. His writing is pretty crappy, he has some sentences that are so awful they take me out of the books, his characters do things that aren't true to their character and are used to push his agendas. His villains are cliche and overly stereotyped and talk funny. (I'll crush you puny human!) All this has been pointed out to him many times. Many many times, and yet he still writes. He knows that his story is good, and that people want to read it so he still writes. He has thick skin.

A bad example is Alice Hoffman. She launched over bored on another writer due to a bad review. If i remember right she caused this lady to get spammed by all of her fans over the bad reviews.
Example of thin skin.

Okay I've just decided to forever remain a mystery to my readers. No photos and certainly no going out in public. I'll hire someone to play me.

The thing about criticism is that the pendulum swings the other way. My second publisher loved the story but then the editor nearly had me in a padded cell - she was very strict to follow modern technical writing dictates. I thought this was spoiling the flow of the story in places. So we had standup fights by email. But last Saturday I sold 19 books at a signing and had ten people stop and chat to me because they'd read my books and enjoyed them - and harrassed me for the third in the series but I don't mind that sort of bullying.

Rejection letters are hard to take at first. Reviews that totally misunderstand my way of writing are very annoying, though. In battle scenes and times of mortal danger I make my sentences short and terse. If I want to slow things down, I use longer sentences with longer words (like in Shakespeare's Sonnets). One reviewer commented on places the sentences were long. She didn't get it at all.

But stick with it. Get out there because there are a lot more wonderful experiences when your adoring public run after you to tell you they enjoyed your book (that happened a couple of weeks ago in a shopping mall).

Cassiopeia said:

Okay I've just decided to forever remain a mystery to my readers. No photos and certainly no going out in public. I'll hire someone to play me.

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Good plan.

Wish I'd thought of it.

Cassiopeia said:

Okay I've just decided to forever remain a mystery to my readers. No photos and certainly no going out in public. I'll hire someone to play me.

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This is such an awesome idea! Pen names are for n00bs, pen faces are the future.

Many writers, particularly new and developing writers, have trouble accepting criticism. And that includes criticism that is fair, appropriate, helpful, and to-the-point. The very first toughening of a writer's skin involves getting over one's self -- realizing that there is so much to learn about the writing craft, and that the golden prose that granny and uncle Mitch raved about just may suck so much it requires a total re-write, including eliminating some of the writer's very favorite phrases and passages--the ones that make that writer look so cool on the page.

Aye. I know a 'writer' who's only subbed to four agents and she threatened to give up writing because apparently one of the rejections really ripped into her.

Well, if she'd rather take that as an insult than a spur to carry on and improve, good luck to her.

You just have to accept that if you sub your work to someone, they've got a right to an opinion on it. And not everyone's going to like what you write. Big deal. I can't stand Dan Brown. Millions can. It's all opinion.

... thick skin is good, but not everyone has it. Fortunately simple determination works just as well in seeing one through trying times. If you want something bad enough then no disappointment however greatly it stings is going to derail you from pursuing your goal. You've got a job to do, by golly, and come h*ll or high water you're going to see it through to the end, come what may.

Aye. You need a thick skin for writing but it doesn't mean you'll have it in all walks of life.

Still, this business is full of rejections and if you can't take it, then this isn't the job for you. I've seen too many people take knockbacks personally and to be honest, if they give up writing? Good. Clears the way for less sensitive souls.

Thomas_Anderson said:

Obviously it's not literal, I'm not dumb.

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If you write with a pen you'll need a callus, otherwise you're never going to stop bleeding.

... half agree, half disagree with you SP. A writer needs to be able to deal with rejections and not be overly discouraged by them, but they don't have to be insensitive to the pain or sting of them. Feeling a bit down about rejections is natural and needn't serve as an obstacle or hindrance, so long as one can shake it off in a fair amount of time and get back to business, and I think most people are capable of this.

Yep, skin thick enough to deal with rejection, but thin enough to take on board any valid criticism.

After all, the story's more important than our ego.

... in this we are in complete accordance

Thomas_Anderson said:

Published writers, can you share some instances where your tough skin has been needed?

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As Cheshire Cat said, when the three hundredth person says 'Oh, you're the next JK Rowling then' and I DON'T scream. Seriously, three times just this morning.

Oh and when you get your edits through, and you think 'Holy Batman! I must be awful!'

Or when someone says 'oh well all fantasy is just crap' or similar and I restrain myself from chewing their nose off.

All face-chewing is the duty of AW's Baboonistanian contingent.

scarletpeaches said:

After all, the story's more important than our ego.

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QFT, again and again.

scarletpeaches said:

Yep, skin thick enough to deal with rejection, but thin enough to take on board any valid criticism.

After all, the story's more important than our ego.

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This. Plus everything CeCe said.

Thick skin isn't just about reader reaction, either. It's also the whole professional jealousy part of it, too. When you see another debut writer who got a three figure deal, when yours was two. When someone else signs a new four-book contract, and you're still on sub for the tenth month in a row. When someone's book lands on the bestseller list, and you're toiling away in mid-list land.

IdiotsRUs said:

As Cheshire Cat said, when the three hundredth person says 'Oh, you're the next JK Rowling then' and I DON'T scream. Seriously, three times just this morning.

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Just tell them, "Nope, Rowling is the prototype me."