Carole Mertz
Let the Horse Run—Encouragement for New Writers

1. Trust Your Beginnings

When Carol Smallwood and Christine Redman-Waldeyer broadcast a call for submissions to their planned collection that eventually became Writing after Retirement, I was a writing novice. I’d completed a 16-month course on writing fiction and nonfiction with the online Long Ridge Writers Group (now defunct). At that point, I’d published only one story and one poem.

Retired from a prior profession, I thought I might have something useful to contribute to the editors’ projected anthology. I began writing and submitting various versions of my essay to Redman-Waldeyer. Being the patient guardian of literature that she was (and is), she prompted me toward continued editing and revision. She’d return my work and explain that readers benefit from the take-away value a writer offers. “Take-away value?” I’d never heard the term.

Continuing to submit my revisions, I learned how to employ sections, sub-headings, and bulleted points. Six months passed and I’d had no further response. I again contacted the editor. I had begun to think, I’m never going to reach the writing level required by the two distinguished editors of this volume. I can’t do it. But my husband encouraged me. “Of course you can,” he said.

Then I received a response, and a new round of revisions changed hands with Redman-Waldeyer and me. Here was what I learned: At first, I’d thought of myself as a “puny, know-nothing novice.” As soon as I changed my attitude to one who understands what a commitment to writing entails, or one who had at least a beginning of that understanding, my writing changed. I began to write in the voice of authority.

Here are some questions to ask yourselves, dear writers:

• Do you sense you have something vital to say?
• Have you invested time and effort into learning at least a modicum of the elements of craft, and have you practiced those elements in your writing?
• Do you respect the quality and expertise of those who mentor you?
• Are you persistent in your writing endeavors?

Your affirmative answers to these questions will secure your writing success. By trusting your beginnings and adding one literary building-block upon another, your literary structure and presence will grow.

As an 85-year-old, I remain grateful for the wisdom, patience, and editorial expertise Carol Smallwood and Christine Redman-Waldeyer offered me ten years ago. Inclusion in their prestigious volume swept my literary horse out of the starting gate with a bang.

2. Further Reflections on Beginnings and How They Affect New Authors

When I decided to enroll in an online writer course, I had no idea where the effort would lead. Fifteen years ago, I’d not yet identified preferences for one genre over another. I’d enjoyed reading in a wide range of matter, from biography to history, from novellas to elegies, from biblical to 21^st C. free verse. But writing, as opposed to reading, is a horse of a different color.

As a published writer, poetry is the genre of my primary choice. But I continue to write essays, short stories, devotions, and brief historical accounts. As a new author, you may want to give yourself a period of “free rein,” not directing yourself too strongly in one direction or another. I’ve found writing in one genre to be complementary to writing in other forms, for the stimulus created by the shifting from one to the other is the spark that sets my horse’s legs afire.

Consider these questions:

• In what genre were you writing when you published your first works, if any?
• Did these accomplishments, i.e., your first publication(s), define your initial intention in writing? Or were they serendipitous?
• Is writing (without publication) reward enough in exchange for your expended efforts and time spent in the literary world?
• Do you write toward trending needs, as defined by surveys, publishers, and agents of the day? Or do you write chiefly in areas, subject matter, and genres that interest you? Why, or why not?
• If your first published successes occurred in a specific genre, do you intend to focus chiefly on writing in that genre only? Do you seek or value possible benefits accrued from more flexible writing approaches?   

Answering self-addressed questions such as these may help you direct your attention to discipline, craft practices, and achievements you may not otherwise consider. If you wish to write poetry, in classical forms, for example, you can hardly do so until you know the variations in form that allow you to create a sonnet as opposed to a ghazal, or an abecedarian as opposed to a ‘golden shovel.’ These, then, become the necessary disciplines a poet needs to learn and practice. (Apply this to the genre of your choice.)

A final word: beginning my study in writing by selecting both fictional and nonfictional prose in no way hampered my eventual entry into poetic writing. (I’ve learned that some writing tips transfer to all genres—the importance of brevity is one such.) I close with a final tip: follow your nose and write in the forms which offer you the most fun. Let your literary horse run wild.

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Carole Mertz is the author of the full-length poetry collection Color and Line (Kelsay Books, 2021) and the poetry chapbook Toward a Peeping Sunrise (Prolific Press, 2019). Born in Quakertown, PA into a PA Dutch family, she now resides with her husband in Parma, OH. Her published works of stories, essays, poems, and reviews number in the several hundreds. Her story “One Soldier’s Afflictions” was a finalist in the 2024 Short Story Contest at WOW! Women on Writing.

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