I would tell myself to just write my stories and not listen to the trends. I've always heard voices in my head, since I was a young child, so writing was a natural fit for me. But, over the years, instead of just telling my stories and my readers would find me, I tried to conform to reader expectations - generically. This lead to a big gap in my writing - where I decided it wasn't working for me.
One of the beautiful aspects of being over forty (okay over fifty), is that I'm very comfortable now in my own skin and my own thoughts. I'm going to write what I want, and hopefully someone else will like it too! It's very freeing!
