Resisting Temptation

Some of the best advice I can give young ( and not-so-young ) writers is: don't throw out your work! There's always a temptation to toss the less-than-successful stuff you write. Refrain! Many, many times I've gone back over rough drafts, some of them written years ago, and discovered that I actually had something there. Not a finished product, of course, but the germ of an idea, something I could work with, rewrite, revise, or perhaps incorporate into another piece of writing or even into another form.

I think this rule applies to most art forms, whether painting, sculpting, music, or whatever. I can't tell you how many times I was sorely tempted to toss out every shred of Judgment on Tartarus and just forget it. But I held onto it, revised it, labored over it, until it reached its final form. In its first form it was, of course, unpublishable, and that was mighty discouraging. But looking back on the history of Judgment, I can only think there was a good reason for such a doggone long delay in getting it published. Had it been published when I first sent it off to a publisher, it wouldn't have been anywhere near as good a book as it is now. And I probably would never have written the rest of the trilogy: True Son of Tartarus and Ransom of Tartarus or they simply wouldn't be the books they are developing into today.

All for now,

MRTighe