{"id":534,"date":"2010-06-02T09:57:29","date_gmt":"2010-06-02T13:57:29","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/?p=534"},"modified":"2010-06-02T09:57:29","modified_gmt":"2010-06-02T13:57:29","slug":"how-does-a-writer-get-better","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/?p=534","title":{"rendered":"How Does a Writer Get Better?"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>How does a writer get better? This is a question I ask myself. I have a few answers that I&#8217;ve come up with over the last twelve years, but if anyone else has an idea, I&#8217;d love to hear it.<\/p>\n<p>This question is on my mind today because tomorrow I hope to receive the latest batch of notes from my editors. And the question remains: once TO BE QUEEN is back in my hands, how can I make it better?<\/p>\n<p>This is a question I return to, again and again. As a writer and a published author, with all the added pressures of marketing and sales and speaking engagements,\u00a0 how do I continue to bring my focus back to the work, not to maintain the status quo of my abilities but to make them stronger?<\/p>\n<p>Hard work is the only answer I&#8217;ve come up with so far. Revising the same work, again and again, until it is better than it was when I started. Taking every note from my editor and my assistant editor, and making sure that I answer the questions they pose, and work on the problems they find, until those problems are smoothed over and gone.<\/p>\n<p>Writing a novel is like honing a jewel&#8230;each facet is drawn from the stone itself through hard work and power tools, and the jewel, while beautiful at every stage, finally meets a moment of completion that only a master jeweler can see. A point at which the carving stops, and the jewel exists as a work of art.<\/p>\n<p>Well, I am no master yet, but I have a lot of tools at my disposal. My work ethic, two editors who love my Eleanor as much as I do, the years I have spent honing my voice, the willingness to hone my voice and make it better. I believe all of this will be enough, and that in the final product, when TO BE QUEEN reaches all of you, it will be the best I can make it. There is satisfaction in that. And hopefully, I will keep growing as a writer, and my books to come will be even better.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>How does a writer get better? This is a question I ask myself. I have a few answers that I&#8217;ve come up with over the last twelve years, but if anyone else has an idea, I&#8217;d love to hear it. This question is on my mind today because tomorrow I hope to receive the latest &hellip;<\/p>\n<p class=\"read-more\"> <a class=\"\" href=\"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/?p=534\"> <span class=\"screen-reader-text\">How Does a Writer Get Better?<\/span> Read More &raquo;<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/534"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=534"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/534\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":537,"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/534\/revisions\/537"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=534"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=534"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.ChristyEnglish.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=534"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}