Love Me or Hate Me?

"I don't know the key to success, but the key to failure is to try to please everyone." -- Bill Cosby

I received my contest scores yesterday (no feedback yet, and I gotta tell you, I'm on the edge of my seat). These were the strangest scores I've ever gotten (which is why I can't wait to see the judges comments). Check it out:

Out of a possible score of 100 -

Judge 1: 100
Judge 2: 67
Judge 3: 65

I had a third judge because of the discrepancy of more than 20 points in the first two judges score. And that judge hated me even more than the second!

What's mind-boggling to me about this is that one judge thought my entry was perfect. If I had received say a 91 and a 72, it would have made more sense to me.

Still, what this has done is prove how completely different readers (and writers) personal tastes are. As a writer, I do the best I can with the stuff set in stone (like "no head-hopping"), but the rest is really all about my uniqueness. My voice.

I write kind of humorous stuff. Not rolicking, roll-on-the-floor humor, but I can't ever seem to keep a completely serious face. I suspect that this is part of my appeal -- or lack thereof. Not everybody gets the joke. And for those who don't, my writing slips on a banana peel and falls flat on its face.

I was really bugged at first, but by the end of the day I just shrugged and thought, "That's the business of writing."

Truer words were never spoken than the saying, "You can please some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can't please all of the people all of the time."

Still, I'm dying to know what was so utterly offensive in my entry to judges two and three. Hope it wasn't Maynard, cuz I love that fuzzy little rat.