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Hi Lee (I'm a Monk fan and WGA member)
The issue of bad writing is troublesome but it's everywhere anyway and probably always has been but now it's going to be like a fire hose instead of a sprinkler. You're addressing this like a professional. You have been in enough story meetings and butted heads enough times so that you can edit yourself. You've accomplished so much that it's not about ego.
When a newbie comes to this--"Everyone thinks they have 1 book in them" as my ex used to say and actually still does--all critical analysis departs. It's so thrilling, it's so wonderful and what they have to give to the world is so fantastic, why slow down and reflect? Why take advice? Why even send the thing through the grammar checker? Unfortunately it's human nature that people must learn through their own experiences. So they'll learn and hopefully readers will find the right books.
Back to Joe, it was your discussion that prompted me to change the cover of one book, then change the title, and change the cover again. I love this aspect of digital publishing. What I'm doing now is taking one of my backlist books and essentially rewriting it so it will lead into a sequel I would never have dreamed of before this year. It was a YA. Is it still a YA if I advance the characters in real time as many years as have passed between the original publication date and now? They're adults with very adult issues. I told my agent this week no one would consider publishing this but me. It's off-genre, way off. It's only my time in exchange for personal artistic satisfaction.
How many things I've wanted to do over the years and one agent or another said in response to it "I don't handle that." DashingBooks, my publishing "company", will.
Robin
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