Джудит Макнот

You know, it is precisely the fear of NOT being able to live up to readers' expectations that paralyzes me and makes writing a new book feel like torture. It's been that way since I started writing PARADISE in 1989, and the problem has gotten progressively worse with each successive book--a fact which is evidenced by the increasingly long periods between subsequent books.

The expectations and standards I've always set for myself as a writer are extremely high and very hard for me to achieve, but because of some of the comments, reviews, and critiques of my work on the internet, I've come to believe that my readers' expectations of me are so much higher yet, that they're nearly impossible to fulfill. As a result, the prospect of trying to produce a book that will please everyone is so daunting that I avoid writing for as long as I possibly can, and when I am writing, the doubts and uncertainty slow me down to a crawl and turn the whole thing into a frustrating, gruelling task.

Prior to the internet, I enjoyed the happy illusion that I knew exactly what my readers wanted to read; I thought they thoroughly enjoyed each new book (although naturally they had favorites). I envisioned myself and my readers as a group of intelligent women from diverse backgrounds but with similar tastes and standards for romantic relationships and books in general. Writing has never been easy for me, but even so, I enjoyed writing for "my" group. In many respects, it was truly a labor of love.

My biggest regret when it comes to writing is that I ever read any reviews or critiques of my books, or the posts about them on romance sites. Most writers can shrug off negative comments, even when they're brutal or unjust, and continue writing the next book without so much as a qualm or hesitation. Unfortunately, I'm neither that confident nor that invulnerable, and there are a couple more writers like me. Like me, these writers have also learned the hard way that in order to survive and to write well, they must avoid reading any reviews, critiques, or posts about their books or themselves on the internet. Put differently--reading those things just isn't for the fainthearted. LOL

I need to clarify one thing though: The exception to the "Do Not Read Here" rule for authors is sites like this one, which are devoted specifically to the work of one individual author. Writers can assume that sites like this one are non-hostile environment where his/her readers' are genuinely interested in sharing constructive opinions and, of course, information.

And speaking of information.....Despite the information you have now, I have every reason to believe this book will be out between December and February. It will not be called SOMEONE LIKE YOU, though. I've never been satisfied with that TITLE.

It's already 2 AM, and rather than spend time explaining what I've done to the book that's delaying it, I need to go back to work on it.

One final thing: In case someone here is regretting some negative post or comment they may have made---cheer up, I haven't read them, and I'm not going to. Besides, as I said, this is obviously a nice site, a constructive site, and furthermore, it belongs to you. My site at Random House/Ballentine was shut down because it was hacked and they couldn't repair the damage. They will put together my facebook page, as soon as I'm ready to work with them on it, but has to wait until I've finished this ms.

My warmest regards to all of you..

JM

The reason I replied to that particular post is because an alert popped up in my e-mail tonight, and I clicked on it. I've never gotten an alert before on a post here. Anyway, I just did a 5 second scan of adjoining posts, and it's obvious I need to say that my mother's death was not the only trauma suffered by my family in the last 5 years. In fact, it was the first in a series of very difficult things that either took precendence over working on a manuscript, or else made it impossible to be in the right frame of mind to write well. I don't want to go into detail, but if you add this to the information I provided in tonight's post, you'll have as clear a picture as I'm able to give you.

Good night, all.

You are all very sweet, and your messages today have had an amazing effect. Thank you. I actually started to delete my long message several times for fear I'd been inappropriately frank about personal opinions and issues. I was also worried that you might mistakenly think I was referring to people and posts on this site.

I am really me. Her. No, She. It should be, "I am really 'she'." Right? But though that may be gramatically correct, it feels awkward, pompous.... Let's start over and compromise this way:

Hello, everyone.

It is I.

ROFL And you all wonder why it takes me so long to write a 1000 pages?!

On a more serious note, Book Lady, your friend and you are right to question whether or not I'm really Judith McNaught, the Author. However, I *think* Amazon must have some safeguards in place to prevent imposters from using an author's name as their own ID. The reason I think that is because when I first attempted to register here, one of the menu choices was whether I was a reader, or the actual author, of the books being discussed here. I remember being startled that Amazon had not only anticipated that authors would join their own discussion groups here, Amazon had also provided a menu option to facilitate that. However, the salient point is that after I indicated I was the author, Judith McNaught, I had to go through some sort of additional verfication steps to prove I'm me. She. Her. It. Whatever.

Unfortunately I don't recall what sort of proof I was asked to provide, or if I merely had to check a box on some e-form guaranteeing to Amazon that I'm who I say I am.

You could try to double check my identity by contacting Amazon. It might be fun for all of us to find out how they'd handle that verification request.

And now I absolutely have to stop posting here and get back to work.