This is a tough one. Like most people, I grew up with the idea that "success" meant making money. To a lesser extent perhaps getting accolades or receiving the imprimatur or stamp of approval from industry.
I had a professional career before retiring to pursue writing, so I was used to having a certain level of "success." It can be tough to go from earning a very nice living from your work to, at times, only earning enough in a month to buy a coffee!
The writing business is a different sort of beast than many other businesses. A person can be a highly accomplished writer—accolades galore—yet still have a "day job" to pay the bills. This is true, unfortunately, for a lot of creatives.
At this point in my writing journey, I define success more by how the story is received by my target audience, and by how I feel about the story and my writing. Am I improving? Did I write the story I wanted to tell? Did I tell the "truth"?
Having said all that, I'll admit to one proof of "success" that I'd like to achieve. I love signing books and being on panels at comic-cons. One of my goals is to have a book with enough success that people cosplay my characters. That would be amazing!
To not stereotype. It's easy to follow a trope and write a caricature. But readers want to read PEOPLE, not "characters."
One thing that helped me early on was to write from different perspectives. Both male and female. Young and old. Human and alien! Always working on their backstory, and for all significant characters asking myself, "What needs to happen in this story for this character? What do they have at stake?" While most of this pre-writing work never makes it into the story, character development is never a waste of time. Bits and pieces of that kind of work get threaded into the story, ultimately making it richer.
I do. I think it's important to receive critique. I'm especially interested in trends in reviews. If there are several reviews pointing out the same thing, whether positive or negative, I give it more credence.
No story is for everyone. Some negative reviews I read and think, "Well my book just wasn't for this person." Every reader is entitled to their opinion. Reviews such as this aren't helpful to me as a writer because I write what I write. My style is my style. My stories/style will appeal to some people and not to others. C'est la vie!
Overall I pay attention to what is helpful and ignore the rest.
When I first began writing, I had no "writer's block." I'd had another career before I began writing seriously, so I had a lot of pent up writer energy and ideas! My first three or four novels poured out of me like a faucet that could not be turned off.
Then I experienced my first writer's block (which for me means ideas aren't coming, and my desire to write wanes). I was panicked! "What if I never write again," I thought.
Now, after writing seven novels and writing for more than ten years, I know that this "blockage" happens fairly regularly, at least for me. I now know that it's part of my process.
I'd like to say that I no longer panic when it happens, but that would be a lie! I freak out every time! :-0
One thing that I do to overcome it is to write short things. Just like with exercise, if you quit entirely, you'll quickly get out of shape. It will then take weeks or months to get back to where you were.
It's the same with writing. The writing "muscle" can weaken, so it's important not to stop writing completely.
When the novel feels too hard, or the ideas aren't coming, I take a break. I write short things. I journal. I edit.
Eventually, the novel will start "talking" to me again, and I go back to it.
Excellent cover and appropriate title are essential. If either one is off, it can kill the success of a book.
The cover needs to be eye-catching and fit with genre expectations. The title needs to be catchy and appropriate for the genre.
I've made mistakes with titles in the past. For example, my first novel was titled "Emily's House." It's a YA magical fantasy story. The title is sort of metaphorical.
What did I learn? Don't use metaphor in a title! At least not in a YA title.
I'm re-working that first book, and the new title will be "The Hawk & the Blade."
While a great title and catchy cover won't make a mediocre book a best seller, if either component is off, it could mean that an otherwise good book may not meet sales expectations.
If you self-publish, research, research, research! Spend time looking at titles and covers of the top-selling titles in your specific genre. Be prepared to spend some cheddar on a good cover. This is not an area to skimp.
Yes…and no. I don't write memoir or use my life experiences generally to inspire my writing.
On the other hand, life experience inevitably informs art. For example, in the H.A.L.F. series, parts of it take place in the southern Arizona desert and also New Mexico. I live in Arizona and have been to NM many times. My experience of heat, desert critters, the flora and fauna, the scenery and sights/smells/sounds, etc. all inform the writing.
More personally, during the writing of the second book in the H.A.L.F. series, my mother passed away. I had not planned to write anything about that, and certainly not in a YA Sci-Fi book about alien contact! But when I sat down to write, it came out in the writing and the story took a turn I hadn't expected, but which I think has a powerful impact on the story. My experience of loss is definitely present in various aspects of that series in which several of the characters live through loss.
In the past year, I've been writing more short stories and some of them are outside of my usual Sci-Fi & Fantasy genre. I find that my real-life experiences are more prevalent in such stories as they tend to be contemporary. I've enjoyed this more personal writing and plan to do more of it, as short stories, in the future.
Sci-fi! And not just because that's a genre I write.
Science Fiction is a genre that asks big questions and deals with important contemporary issues. I think a lot of people who don't read science fiction see it (and fantasy stories) as frivolous—as not "serious" fiction. One thing some such folks miss is that a lot of Sci-fi tropes are metaphors. For example, aliens represent the "other," and stories about aliens often have much to say about being human and how we relate to each other. Sci-Fi stories tackle issues of gender, race, class, economics—you name it. It's a rich genre and there are so many wonderful contemporary writers from the latter 20th century forward that are highly worthy of study in schools. And, the best part, is that these stories are entertaining! Robots, aliens, spaceships, alien worlds, wormholes, time travel—very palatable way for young people to explore serious issues.
Write! Write, write, write. Write in many genres. Write short and long. Write not to woo agents or editors or even readers, but write to please yourself; to tell the best story you can. Write a whole story, put it away and forget about it a while, and write the next one. Write always for your own enjoyment, and not to please others.
I wish I'd written more when I was younger and had written in more genres and types of stories. It's never too late, of course, but I wish I'd had that experience and tried more things.
