A lot of the criticism that ends up in the inbox is based on the misconception that there’s virtue in the mere act of producing something, anything, as though writing an unoriginal, uncreative and uninteresting novel when there are already millions of better ones out there is an act deserving of praise. Maybe if we lived in Europe in the Middle Ages and you were one of the first people to write extensively in the vernacular language of your country you could pull the “at least I’m writing something” card, but we don’t. In the 21st century it’s more respectable (and rare) to have the level of self-control needed to not rewrite Twilight or 50 Shades of Grey purely as an act of self-aggrandizement