Wednesday, July 24, 2019

Delight in Your Uniqueness by Lindsay A. Franklin

Sometimes people ask me what piece of writing advice I would give if I could only give one. Ten years as a professional in the publishing industry, and I’m only allowed to pick one? That’s such a hard question!

And yet every time, I come back to the same thought: you do you.

Don’t get me wrong. Studying craft and improving your writing mechanics are both very important. The freelance editor in me implores all new writers to dig deeply into fiction craft books, glean wisdom from those who have walked through the publishing fires before you, and sit at the feet of brilliant artists to better understand why what they do works.

But after you’ve honed the tools in your toolkit and built yourself a solid writerly foundation, you have to tell stories in the unique way only you can.

God created a very specific you. He could have given you any personality, any set of gifts, any imagination, any artistic passion, but he chose the ones you have. All of these unique factors combine to form you, the writer. You, the artist. Only you can tell a story from that space. So why squander that special, God-crafted niche trying to tell stories like anyone else?

I spent far too many years trying to make my voice sound like a “fantasy voice.” I thought my stories needed to sound like C.S. Lewis’s or J.R.R. Tolkien’s. It took writing a YA contemporary novel with no fantasy elements to discover who I actually am as a writer—to find that space where my passion for fantastical stories was being poured out in a way that was uniquely me. The Story Peddler was the first fantasy novel I wrote following this discovery. And it was the novel that finally got contracted.

Embrace the specific you God made and delight in your uniqueness. God certainly does.


Embrace the specific you God made and delight in your uniqueness. God certainly does. via @LinzyAFranklin #SeriouslyWrite #amwriting


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Lindsay A. Franklin is a best-selling author, freelance editor, and homeschooling mom of three. She would wear pajama pants all the time if it were socially acceptable. Lindsay lives in her native San Diego with her scruffy-looking nerf-herder husband, their precious geeklings, three demanding thunder pillows (a.k.a. cats), and a stuffed marsupial named Wombatman.