[Image courtesy of The British Library, from The Novels of Captain Marryat, page 208]
Let's bust up the seven biggest myths about novelists. If you're a novelist, an aspiring novelist, a devourer of novels, or all of the above, may the following illuminate, encourage, and inspire you.
I spent much of my life buying into all those "Truths" about novelists. Some of them were assumptions I made over a lifetime of reading novels, and others I picked up from various books and blogs on writing.
When I started writing, I figured that if I didn't fit into one of those so-called Truths I'd read about, there had to be something wrong with me. It took me a long time to realize that it wasn't a question of right or wrong; rather it's that what works for another novelist might not work for me, and vice versa. Read More