The general rule for writers is that when someone criticizes your work, suck it up, Buttercup. After all, everyone’s taste is different. Every so often, though, you get a knock that’s almost humorous.
This past weekend, I was at the Rocky Mountain Fiction Writers’ annual Colorado Gold conference. (If you’re in the West and write fiction, check ‘em out. Amazing group.)
One night featured a book signing by several of us, lined up at long tables with our books, all of us casting sidelong glances at the around-the-room line of people waiting to get their books signed by Diana Freaking Gabaldon, who is possibly one of the smartest – and also the funniest – people on earth.
Finally, a lone straggler wandered up to my spot on the table, picked up my fourth book, Reservations, started to read, and immediately laughed.
I knew why she was laughing. If I say so myself, that book’s opening is kickass.
I preened. “The first sentence, right?”
She nodded. Already basking in anticipated praise, I picked up my pen and prepared to write something witty and generous when I signed her copy.
“I guess you have no control over what your editors do to your work, right?”
And with that, she put the book down and wandered away.
I laughed at myself for a long time. But you know what? I’ll be forever grateful to my editor for not touching that sentence. Here it is:
The day that would see Ben Yazzie transformed into shreds of flesh in too many evidence bags began with a rare strong and satisfying piss.
Kickass.
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