Attention.

It's come to my attention that some people who read my blog seem to think I am very hard on myself. I want to share with everyone something that my favorite author told me. (OK, he wrote it in a book and I read it - really it's the same thing) He said:

"Writers have to simultaneously believe the following two things:

1. The story I am now working on is the greatest work of genius ever written in English.

2. The story I am now working on is worthless drivel."

He suggests this is true because you need to believe #1 when you decide whether to mail a story out, #2 when revising the story, #1 when choosing where to submit it, #2 when it's rejected, and #1 when you send it back out again.

Orson Scott Card (my favorite author), speaks to my heart. I have always believed both of these, but being told that it's OK makes me feel slightly less crazy. So, now I hope it makes a bit more sense as to why I am harsh on myself. And I know what some of you may be thinking, "Tina, you don't act like you believe #1." My answer to you is this, by writing this blog and telling you that I wrote a novel and am getting ready to send it out to agents I am fulfilling that belief. I would never tell anyone, especially ALL of the internet (hey, they can read it if they want to) that I am writing a book if I didn't believe I was pretty damn fantastic, original, and that I will have a book on your hometown bookstore shelves some day soon.

The book I referred to above is: How to Write Science Fiction & Fantasy -by Orson Scott Card. It's pretty amazing, as are all of the books by him that I have read.