I went on a bit of a vacation last week and got a chance to read some of the free downloads I “purchased” for my Kindle. I sat down and powered through a couple of rough reads, started and then soon trashed a couple more, and thoroughly enjoyed one. As a writer, I would say I gained more from the bad books than I did from the good.
First, I just want to give nods to Peace Warrior by Steven L. Hawk. It was the only good book of the bunch. There were only a couple of typos and the dialogue got a bit cheesy at times, but I found it to be an entertaining read with believable characters and a fun story line. It’s still a free download on Amazon and I highly recommend you pick it up if you’re into scifi and action.
I always thought I had to read good books, great books, to become a better writer, but reading some of the bad surprised me in a good way.
It is pretty much impossible to read your own work objectively. You know the world, the characters, and so when there is a hole in your writing your eyes will glance right over it because your brain can fill in the rest. But no other reader will be able to do that with your work. Missing information or plot is just that.
What these bad books gave to me was the opportunity to see the mistakes in my works through the writings of another. I’m just starting out, and so are most of the independent authors out there. I saw the grammatical mistakes, the repeating sentence structure, the thesaurus-abused descriptions, the lack of relationships between characters, the cliche dialogue, the flat protagonist, the walls of text that made my head hurt…I saw it all as it appeared in my own work-in-progress novel.
It was an amazing revelation. I was all like “That’s terrible! But I did that too!” and “He should have fixed that because it doesn’t work, and I should as well!” The exclamations are necessary because I was genuinely excited as I discovered all of this. The advice and criticism I received on my work only sunk in so deep, but I understand now after having seen it in other places.
I encourage all writers out there to read something crappy. It has helped me immensely. You would think that realizing all the mistakes in my own work would be depressing, but it’s quite the opposite. I have a new found drive to plow through my book again and fix all the bad parts I can now see bright as day.
That’s not to say reading the good stuff is unimportant. It helps teach how to be a good writer. I’m currently reading Zane Grey’s The Last Trail and damn I wish I could describe scenery and build relationships as well as him, but he is teaching me how to do it.
Bottom line: Read everything. The good will teach you skills, the bad will highlight your own mistakes.
I feel as if I’ve taken another step towards enlightenment.
