It’s really strange how perspective can shift.
I’m just like everyone else, and, as a consumer of music or literature, I love new stuff and am always seeking interesting new things. When something shows up for the first time on my radar, I think of it only in the context of it being brand new to me.
That’s Overnight success, that is!
As a new writer I now know what a lot of work goes into producing a book that’s available for people to buy. What the public see will be a brand new first book that’s appeared “overnight”. (If any of them do see it. They may not!)
My book is a kid’s picture book. Ostensibly I think the majority of the public would think it is relatively easy to write.
It’s true that it doesn’t take as long to write 1,300 words as it does to create a novel. But, of course like most things “there’s more to it than that”.
Anyway, as most people will never know the “backstory” of a work, the first thing they do see is the finished product on display. They never know the effort, trials and tribulations that brought it to be.
10,000 Hours
It makes me think of the “overnight success” phrase and how that juxtaposes with the “10,000 hour” adage. (If you are confused, Malcolm Gladwell proposes – in “Outliers” – that it takes more than 10,000 hours of work to become a “master” at any given craft.)
I’m not proposing that I am a master, by the way. But I think my little story is good. Other people – some of whom ARE experts in the field – have said it is very good.
Now that the story is about to come out into the harsh light of the public gaze, I am worried and excited at the same time. But I am also wondering how I’ll feel if it becomes successful, and whether I’ll resent the tag of overnight success if it’s applied.
Perhaps I won’t even have to worry about that.
I am going all out to try to make it happen though – the resounding, massive, unequivocal success, I mean. Not the “overnight” tag.
don’t worry. be happy!
If that does happen, then I’ve just decided that I won’t resent it – or the implication that it’s all been easy and blind luck.
I’ll categorise it in “Good Problems To Have”.
We all want those, don’t we? ☺