Next week, I’ll be at a writer’s conference. My stomach is doing flips just thinking about it. It’s exciting, but I’m currently going through what I hear every writer goes through: the feeling of fraud. I’ve got that lingering in the back of my mind telling me that when I show up, I’ll be out of place and everyone will know it. I haven’t touched my stories in a long time because of this lingering gnat. It likes to remind me of not so encouraging feedback I’ve gotten from people, but you know what? It just reminded me of one I didn’t think was so bad.
A couple years ago, I had a beta reader (someone who writes) read my story and provide feedback. One of the things they said was that I use the word “upon” too much. He felt like he was seeing it too much in the story and when I did the find word search on my manuscript, I didn’t agree with him. He said my story sounded too much like a storybook fable with that word sprinkled throughout the manuscript.
And you know what? It makes sense.
Everyone knows the famous words that begin a story: “Once upon a time…” I really like those words and that’s probably where I got to using “upon” too much. When that beta reader said that, I found I liked that about my story. I liked how it ties to “Once upon a time…” Now, I did find areas where I used “upon” several times in one paragraph and that had to be fixed, but I left the word throughout the story to keep that connection. My novel is a high fantasy, after all, and so many of the classics begin with “Once upon a time…”
So, when the little gnat tries to tell me a fraud, I try to remind it how awesome my story actually is because of it’s little gems and treasures sprinkled throughout. I’m going to try and keep that in mind when I head off to my conference. It might seem “too storybook” for that one beta reader, but others might like it.
nikki diekemper 