If you read my post on Wednesday (“Why Write?”), you already understand that I don’t write for recognition or money. Those things aren’t important to me. Good thing. Neither is in sight.
Instead, I write because God has given me the talent and I want to please Him by using it. And by striving to keep improving. Good writers are never entirely satisfied with what they’ve written. They must accept it as the best they could do at that stage of their careers. That’s what I have to do.
It’s hard to turn a manuscript loose, though, knowing it could be better. And admitting that I haven’t reached the point of knowing how to improve it.
So, in a very real sense, every book published, every manuscript completed is an imperfect work.
As I explained on Wednesday, my goal is to both bless and entertain through my writing. How can an imperfect work do that? That takes some work on God’s part. But how can I know I’ve succeeded–at least in God’s eyes and with Him working behind the scenes?
Certainly the number of volumes sold is an indication of the minimum number of lives one of my books has had the potential to touch. Not every person who buys a book reads it, though. Yet because people often share their books, the original reader may not be the only person to read a particular copy.
Feedback from readers is what counts the most. I have a number of faithful fans–Tom D and Sally W are two names that come to mind immediately–and most of the reviews The Devil and Pastor Gus receives on Amazon are not just good, but enthusiastic. That kind of feedback helps me feel my writing is accomplishing something. That it’s touching lives. That it’s both entertaining and blessing readers.
Just within the last week, I’ve received unexpected feedback from two very different sources. The first came from a fellow writer who was reading The Devil and Pastor Gus. She wrote,
NOTE: Various people have complained about not being able to find or leave comments. Go all the way to the bottom of this post, beneath my “Best regards, Roger.” On the very bottom line of that last section just above the previous post you’ll see “Leave a Comment” if yours will be the first or “X Comments,” where X denotes the number of existing comments.
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Best regards,
Roger