And the winner is...not me. Obviously.

Hello again web friends,

I knew this post was coming, and perhaps you did too. Sorry to myself (and you, reader, if you care) for the delay.

The New Wrinkle Publishing 2016 Writer's Contest just ended, with Australian children's song and script writer Melanie Schubert named the winner. Read more about her here.

Now, I want you to know that I'm not disappointed. Not now. I was a couple weeks ago, but not for the reason you might think.

A couple weeks ago, NWP offered Lynette Kraft's second book, Archie of Outlandish, for free download, with the soundtrack. Catchy title, nice illustrations, great soundtrack (although I would've liked if they'd noted which scenes or chapters in the Table of Contents to be read with the music), and an intriguing concept. But as I read on, I also found the book dishonest.

My biggest complaint was probably the church- and prayer-related content/themes that abruptly appeared in chapter 6 and increased throughout. As a Christian, I have struggled to find a way to spread the gospel as a writer; I have reasoned, on occasion, that the occupation of novelist (or journalist) is completely incongruous with Christian life, and often still have my doubts. I have been dying to read a modern novel that is at its core Christian, but not poorly written, cliche, cheesy or distasteful to the general, non-Christian public. But this was certainly not it. (I'm not even sure it can be done, though that's not Archie's fault.) The references to prayer, God, church, etc. were totally inauthentic to this story. I think Lynette Kraft did her story, her characters and herself a serious disservice by forcing religion into this book. It would have been a much better book without it, especially this SPOILER! part of the ending:

“I can’t just live with you, Archibald. It goes against my beliefs. You know that.”“No, that came out wrong. I’m not asking you to just live with me, Tallie.” He laughed. “It goes against my beliefs, too.” [...]“Tallulah Z., I was hoping you might agree to marry me.”

I understand people (in real life) who feel this way. Really, I do. And maybe it's not unreasonable to try and plant a perceived moral seed, as a writer. But this is just way, way too overt (not to mention Archie and Tallie's "beliefs" were never specified in such detail until this moment, making their declaration of such awkward and prudish). AND there's no mention of Archie's "faith" or anything of the sort in the book's synopsis, so it almost feels like a trick when you read about it a few chapters in. This is what I'm talking about when I say dishonest.

Since we're talking about honesty and authenticity (and lack thereof), let's talk about those English accents she gave Archie's mom and the book agent; not necessary, inconsistent and totally artificial by the end. (Tallie's life situation also seemed contrived, but it was something where you could "suspend disbelief;" kind of like Carrie's set-up in Carrie Pilby, which, by contrast, is one of my favorite books.) The neat little wrap-up with Archie getting his SPOILER! book deal in the end was also too good to be true. Too many things went right for him (and Tallie, and everyone else in the story) without a hitch.

But there was another important thing I noticed: Archie was most certainly a NaNoWriMo novel.

If you haven't heard of the National Novel Writing Month program, the goal is to write 50,000 words in the month of November. There's a not-totally-fool-proof verification method on nanowrimo.org, along with all kinds of pep talks and networking and message boards to give you ideas; like giving your character an accent. Playing with names. Throwing in curveballs everywhere just to get your word count up. And it's great. It helps a lot of people accomplish things they never thought they would (myself included). But if you can't figure out how to cut that stuff and flesh other things out before you publish it — or get another pair of eyes that can help show you what needs to change — you're not going to be a good author. If you magically find some financial or other kind of success, great. But you're not going to be good. You're not going to be that writer that the world talks about, that schools want for commencement speeches.

That's who I want to be.

So I don't want a company like NWP, as it is now, editing and representing my book, and I realized this weeks ago. I'm so glad I didn't win that contest, not just because I don't trust NWP to put out a book I can be proud of, but because my novel is not ready, and Archie of Outlandish showed me that. That's the great thing about all this: Even though this company and their book turned out to be a disappointment, they showed me how to find those writing tactics and plot devices that, while they might seem "good enough" in the context of my whole story, they're not. They stick out like sore thumbs to readers, and they bring down a novel that has the potential to be great. I saw some of my failings in Archie, and I'm glad for it.

Because like I said, I want to be great. And I'm not sure if there's any point publishing if I'm not willing to put in the time to become great.