Original Pic from Pixabay : artistlike Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve been agonizing over some things that come up in the firs...

When Your Book is Painfully Honest and Politically Wrong

Alexa Mintah

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Original Pic from Pixabay: artistlike

Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve been agonizing over some things that come up in the first few chapters of my book, Low Expectations. I found some plot issues that needed a deep fix, so I went back to rewrite, and my characters... they just spoke to me in a new way, bringing out a lot of new pieces and personalities that I never really noticed before. Plus, there was another issue I’d been ignoring for a while, but came face to face with in the rewrite and had to resolve. The result: first chapters that are more difficult, more intense, and more honest than I ever realized they could be.

They’re also more controversial. There’s some offensive language, violence, and character archetypes some might see as stereotypical or generalizing. I’ve gone over these things in my head 100 million times trying and trying to figure out a way to write these chapters that will be more “user-friendly.” To write them in such a way that no one will have a reason to put the book down, not for my writing, but for an issue they disagree with.

But I couldn’t do that. Or more accurately, I very well could have done that. But Low Expectations came from Sketchy Moments, which came from Take Me As I Am, which came from the heart of a 14-year-old girl who just wanted to tell a story. I’m not invoking the age as a “feel sorry for her/me,” but as a “this is why I wrote it.” I didn’t write it for anyone but us, me at the time and those characters. As much as I wanted then and still want now for other people to enjoy my story, my first priority is and was telling the story that these characters came to me to tell in the best, most engaging, and most true to them way possible. I’ve come to the point where I’m willing to add to my story to make it better, but I refuse to subtract from it to make anyone more comfortable.

I don’t know that this is the right standpoint for everyone. If you want to write to a certain market, you’ll probably make a lot more money than me, lol. You’ll spend less late nights pacing your bedroom, agonizing over whether or not you should remove the time someone called your main character a fag. You won’t worry that someone will consider his best friend a cliche retelling of black side characters when he is so much more than comic relief. You won’t worry about people leaving bad reviews without even finishing, not because of the story or the writing quality, but because of something one of my characters said or did that the reader didn’t agree with.

But this is the position that I have to take because I’m a strong believer in the writer’s right to tell their story and as much as I do want other people to enjoy my work, I started writing for me and for Elliot and for his family, just the way they were and just the way they have slowly revealed the nuances of who they truly are. I’m going to write them honestly and, from there, it’s up to other people to take them or leave them.

And little disclaimer, it’s actually okay if readers leave them. I mean, I won’t like it. It’ll hurt my feelings if someone doesn’t like my characters, or doesn’t really understand them, or leaves a one-star review. But people are allowed to do that because that’s the contradiction of freedom: I have the freedom to write what I want, to express myself and my characters in the best way I know how, and then readers have the freedom to reject that expression (politely) and say it wasn’t for them. I mean, I’ve done it for other books and I believe that those authors probably love their characters as much as I love mine and wrote the best stories for their vision of their characters. But that vision didn’t work for me, just as mine won’t work for every reader who picks my book up.

I’m not pretending that I’ve already come to a point where that doesn’t hurt, but I’ve come to the conclusion that I have to get there if, one, I’m going to get any sleep, and two, if I’m ever going to truly write my characters as they are, let them be taken as they are, and find those people who will see them as I do and love them as they are.

I think those people will make it all worth it. :)

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So do you have any controversial topics in your book? Something else you minorly agonized over or a writing revelation you’ve recently come to? I’d love to hear from you in the comments.

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