Bad Writing, Good Writing And The Truth About Why Writers Struggle

Might not be what you think, but might make sense.

Buckle up, we’re going for a ride. I read a post this morning on Medium, made me shake my head. Every paragraph had a sentence bolded. Every. Single. Paragraph. Every paragraph was 3-4 lines. With one sentence bolded in the middle. Because, you know, as a reader I’m probably too stupid to know the important sentence in each paragraph. Better bold it.

Took one look and closed the tab. Sorry, not doing that to my eyeballs first thing in the morning. Know why it had three thousand claps? Because it’s about sex. Sigh.

The title was clever. And it had a lot of claps. That’s why I clicked. Curiosity. But when I saw the bold, bold, bold everywhere. Nah. I’m out. As an editor I’d tell the writer to cut that shit out so fast it’d make his head spin. Let the reader figure out the important parts. Sorry you didn’t get a read from me, sir. Call me a bounce.

Here’s another one.

I saw a post on notes the other day saying if you need to purge your pain at least make it artistic. Okay, sure. But according to who? According to a writer who thinks bolding a sentence in every paragraph is artistic? Christ. Sorry.

Saw another “note” a while ago that said you don’t have to be good at spelling or grammar to write profound things.

She scene a lite in the woulds and it called two her.

Oh wow, she’s sew rite.

lol. Sorry. This is the world we live in now.

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Noah Lukeman is a New York Literary agent whose taste is killer. His clients include Pulitzer nominees, NYT best-selling authors and American Book Award winners.

He only asks to see five pages. And that’s a courtesy, because he often only needs one page to know if a writer is any good. But more to the point, he’s looking to make sure they aren’t bad. Because good writing is subjective. Bad writing is not.

He says bad writing shows up instantly. First paragraph. First page.

I wrote a post about the 10 ways to avoid bad writing, according to a book he wrote on the topic. The advice in it still stands. Still gets ignored, too.

Here’s the thing. The internet doesn’t care what’s good or bad writing.

America is proud of having a high literacy rate because 79% of Americans “can” read, but the USA ranks 36th in the world for adult literacy. More than half of Americans have a reading comprehension rate lower than sixth grade which means their comprehension is basically a Harry Potter novel.

And I’m not saying that to be rude. Don’t shoot the messenger and all that. But maybe it helps explain 3000 claps for an article that uses boldface like chocolate sauce on a sundae. But hey, it’s about sex. Yay, fifty claps for you!

One more.

When the boost program at Medium was new, the tiny handful of nominators had an actual Slack, with Medium staff, where we could ask questions and talk among each other to learn as we go.

A nominator posted a link. Said it was declined and she wanted feedback from other nominators on why they think it was declined. Silly me thought it was for real so I answered like an editor. Starts in passive voice. Flips from first person to third, sometimes in the same paragraph. Lot of tropes. Conjecture presented as fact.

The nominator said well SHE like it and then blocked me. Wow. lol. Okay.

I will repeat. The internet doesn’t care what’s good or bad writing.

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I read a piece on Substack the other day. Some writer lamenting all the marketers and people with something for sale and disingenuous crap to get clicks.

Because, you know, she writes from “the soul” and that’s what “good” writing is. Go look at the feed and shake my head. It’s all pushing hate buttons. Damn marketers, damn men, damn politicians. I’m thinking — that’s your soul? Yikes.

No end to the ways we fool ourselves. We are mostly content to live in our delusions and yes, I include myself in that. The hard part is seeing our own delusions. Easy to see everyone else’s, much harder to see our own.

You might be able to tell the word “good” gets under my skin.

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Here’s a thing I hear often.

“I’m a good writer, why am I struggling?”

Truth is there’s about a million answers. Are you talking about book good, or internet good? Because if you’re writing a book and submitting it to an agent, you probably want to be sure it’s not filled with bad writing.

But if you’re self publishing on Amazon, meh. More important to make sure you have a launch plan because they start evaluating the minute you hit publish and if other books are going up in sales and yours is sitting still? Not going to fare so well.

But maybe you’re not writing a book. You’re writing on Medium or Substack.

Do you know the little things that help? Do you know how to write a title that gets clicked if Medium shows your title to 500 strangers that don’t know you? Do you open strong and is your topic matter and your approach interesting?

No one says wow, this is boring. Let me get some coffee and dig in.

Let’s pile onto that. A lot of people are mad about the boost program because they think if they don’t get boosted, they’re getting told they aren’t any good. Nope. Sorry. Lots of strong writers and good posts don’t get boosted. Boost isn’t about floating the best to the top. It’s about trying not to let crap take over the site.

I wrote a post that got declined for boost. Got 8000 reads and earned me $500. But the kicker is that boosted posts pay better. If it had been boosted, would have paid more. There’s a real disparity in pay for boosted vs unboosted, and it sucks.

But it isn’t about good. Lots of good writing doesn’t get boosted. I promise you that.

So let’s put the entire concept of “good” aside for a minute, okay?

I’m not telling you to pander to the lowest common denominator. I’m not. I don’t, and I don’t think anyone should. I think we should strive to get better constantly. I think we should strive for “holy crap” as a reaction to our writing.

But we need to be aware of the world we’re writing in.

Because here’s the truth. There are a lot of really weak writers. I get submissions every day that tell me this person didn’t bother to read my 2 minute submission guide. I get submissions every day from people who don’t know they’re, there and their. I get submissions every day that need to be chopped in half to get rid of the fluff.

So if you’re a good writer and you’re struggling?

You need better questions.

Stop asking if you’re good. Ain’t about good. Good is subjective.

Are your titles working for you? Are your topics working for you? Do you open strong enough? Is your approach working? Is your writing style academic or conversational? Are you writing for a publication than can nominate for boost? If yes, are you one of the strongest writers in that pub so they use one of their nominations on you?

If you’re on Substack, are you tagging your newsletter and your posts according to tags you made up in your head or tags that correspond with their leaderboards so they know where to put you? Do you know how to find your readers?

We need to stop using the word good. I don’t know what the right word is, but good doesn’t matter. It’s subjective. Maybe interesting is as good a replacement as any. Lots of good writers struggle. But if you strive for interesting — you got a real shot.

Love to know what you think!

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10 Ways to Avoid Bad Writing According To a New York Literary Agent
This is the piece I referred to in case you want to read it. A few years old, but solid.

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