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Good Writers Don’t Fish in Dead Waters

January 25th, 2007 | editing, publishing, subject, writing

Here’s how it works when I go fishing. I put bait on a hook. I cast and wait, recast and wait, recast and wait. Hopefully, I catch a fish. It’s just a matter of patience usually.

Unless I’m fishing in dead water. I did that once when I was a kid . . .

When we lived on the Air Force Academy, my brother and I went to work with our dad one morning, then walked to a small lake near his office. We fished all day and caught nothing. We didn’t think anything about the dead salamanders floating in the shallows. Someone told my dad the next week that the lake was an experimental lake, a closed system used by the science classes. I don’t know what college students can do with a dead lake, but they sure can’t fish in it.

Sometimes writers spend a lot of time fishing in dead lakes. It’s a painful task for an editor to point this out to them. But I’ve done it before. Just a few weeks ago, I was working with a writer on my own time, helping her polish a series of emails into a nonfiction inspirational manuscript.

She asked me, “Am I wasting my time?”

Now, this was a freelance situation. That means she was paying me for each chapter I helped refine. It was in my short-term interest to spew some vague encourgment. Those little checks add up, you know?
But I couldn’t do it. She was fishing in a dead lake.

So I talked about the value of self-publishing. The possibilities of selling her book based on her platform as an inspirational speaker and conference leader. That led to a discussion of self-publishing packages that offer limited editing services—little more than proofing really. It was a hard conversation with a lot of sadness and disappointment between the lines.

But I told her the truth. This project will never sell.

Sure, she could start over from scratch, but then she would be fishing in a new lake, one more likely to have life than these dead waters.

What she needed to do was pack up her technique and her skill and drive to a new lake. She could use the same bait there. She could focus on the same message and the same inspiration, but her words would be renewed.

Who can say what wonders occur to words when they are reborn?

Writers, that last question was rhetorical. This one is not.

Are you fishing in a dead lake?

Viewing 7 Comments

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    Very interesting. Good to be introduced to new worlds. This is one for me. Thanks, Mark.
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    Mark -- What a timely post. Lately I've haven't even been able to get the worm on the hook because I can't decide which lake to fish in. From another angle, sometimes just having the pole in my hand and sitting by the water is all I'm really looking for. I don't even want to catch a fish. In that case, even a dead lake will do.
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    I really like the fishing analogy. There's a lot of waiting once you've cast your line, so to speak. On a dead lake you get clues, like you said: dead fish, stinky smell. So what clues can a writer watch for to know to when it's time to move on to a different fishing hole?
    AMM
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    If a writer is also a speaker (and this goes for blogging too), I think one can "test the waters." I have done and continue to do this. My audiences' reactions are a helpful clue to what is most real, most touching.
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    Marcus

    It takes courage to tell the truth - which you did. Takes loving wisdom to do so kindly - which sounds like you did as well. Very commendable.

    When you fish all day and you don't catch anything (unfortunately, I have way too much experience in this) - sometimes, it's because you're using the wrong bait...sometimes, it's because you need be more skilled in fishing...sometimes it's the wrong time of the year...sometimes it's because you're fishing dead waters.

    Perhaps, most important of all is that you try - you bait the hook, cast and wait....and recast...again and again. With the help of friends who are willing to provide constructive help, the truth becomes evident after a while.
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    Wow, five comments before I've had a chance to put in my two cents! I feel special.

    Ted, thanks for the kind words. I assume you mean publishing is a new world for you?

    Charity, I'm with you. I've stopped pursuing publication much myself. It has to knock on my door almost. I still write, but I try to be careful not to let my writing interfere with my family time.

    L.L., great practical advice. I might add that a blog is a good way to test the waters too. Though it only works for certain kinds of writing. I've learned that people aren't much interested in reading entire novels online. But I'm still stubbornly planning to post it.

    Andre, that's a good point about how much patience these things can take. And it is important just to try. Sometimes if we aren't persistent, our impatience can cause us to miss the life in waters where we just need to go deeper. (To push the metaphor a bit.)
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    A Musing Mom asked, "What clues can a writer watch for?"

    I wrote this post in part out of frustration with a particular project I have. Those who have followed me since HillCountryWriter know about my novel, Into the Mountain. I had given up on the idea of publishing it in its current form. It alternates between two stories in a way that just disrupts the narrative too much. I needed to be free of the project so I could focus on other things. It felt like a dead lake.

    But I sent it out to some agents as a last ditch thing. They all said, "No thanks." But one agent pitched the book anyway. I was happy to learn afterward that she got two bites! NavPress looked at a full half of the manuscript--which means they were at least thinking of taking it to committee, I guess.

    But they ultimately decided what I had already decided. The book just doesn't work. Christian fantasy is hard enough to sell without some odd structural restriction like my alternating first person narratives.

    On compulsion, I'm sending it out to a press that Nav recommended and also to an editor that the agent suggested.

    Is the book really a dead lake? I don't know. It often feels like it. It's not like I haven't been dedicated to it already. (I started it in earnest in Jan. 2001.) It's not like I don't have other opportunities knocking on my door.

    I don't mind continuing to mail it out, but I'm done with significant rewrites until I see evidence of life in that project.

    To sum up: seven years is about the limit of what I will devote to a project.

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