Diggle’s
Dilemma: to write or market? Increasingly, I don’t
think I can do both. Find an agent you say? I know that is a good idea… in
theory… but let’s not be diverted by that question.
In the past four years I have written four
novels for children/young people. I am presently re-writing the second one of
these. The other free remain in finished form, but have proved to be
unplaceable to date. I think that they are there or thereabouts, certainly interesting,
one amusing and another uncomfortable and challenging, verging on the adult.
That is Diggle’s
Dilemma. Do I concentrated on finding a home for three or crack on
re-writing the second one I started… or start something completely new?
Unfortunately, I am a finisher, tenacious by nature and nurture.
Why the dilemma? Time and energy. I’d
rather be a writer than a marketing man. Today, you have to be both.
Should I spend time putting my work in
order or crack on with the new, even make a change of direction – write for
adults – NOW!? I think I may have said before that curation might be the
answer. Just put my work up on the web and see how it goes. That seems like a
half-way house and doesn’t really resolve anything.
Time will tell, but I can no longer sit here
doing nothing. One must dismount with purpose rather than just wait to fall off
the horns of a dilemma.