When I received the final negotiated version of an eleven
page contract, it arrived via email. It culminated a few days of questions and
answers about exclusive rights and compensation for the development of an intellectual
property, a book I wrote titled 'Fried Windows (In A Light White Sauce)'.
The process was straight forward - largely what I expected.
This was the part where I was supposed to wake up and realize it'd been a
dream, except I was awake. The important defining moment I'd waited for began
ten days earlier with a congratulatory email. Not only had a publisher read the
book I'd submitted only nine days before but also was interested in buying it.
The world around me was finally changing for the better.
Having lost track of many times have I submitted stories and
books for publication only to receive the usual, expected rejection
notification a few weeks (sometimes months) later, I didn't know how to
response. Naturally I read the email several times, checking to make certain it
wasn't some cruel joke. It was real.
What was different was how quickly this response came. One
acceptance compensates for a thousand or more rejections. Paraphrasing the late
Jim Morrison, I've been down so long, it looked like up to me. Anything
positive or encouraging would have been fine, though I'm not sure what my plans
would be had this one been rejected, too.
The funny part about all this is the amount of desperation
in my recent efforts and how serendipitous this seems, the answer to a lot of
hard work and many prayers. After nearly a year and three months of walking on
a tightrope above the shattered glass of broken dreams, something finally
turned my way.
It took a leap of faith, quitting a dead-end job to pursue a
dream, even though I couldn't afford it. Imposing on family to give me shelter,
I became the burden to others I never wanted to be, unemployed, homeless and,
worse, keyless. With fifty bucks and a handful of change to my name, my life
became only about my writing and faith that if I stuck to it I would reach my
goal, eventually.
Would I recommend others to do things this way? No, but
everyone's journey is a little different. Some of the things that happened to
me were necessary for my frame of mind and the proper perspective. There have
been times when all I had to look forward to was writing – entering the fantasy
world my mind creates for my characters to populate as they tell me their
stories.
Foremost among the necessities was dealing with some health
issues attending my over-consumption of alcohol. I don't drink anymore, which
is a good thing. My writing has improved dramatically. Being rid of the baggage
of the past, remnants of a failed marriage and the pressures of a thankless
job, helped. Ties to others needed to addressed if not severed completely.
Determined to see this journey to the end, each day for the
past year and several months, I've been getting up and writing from around
five-thirty until ten. From ten to two I revise and edit things. These were the
priorities. In April some of my writing was to the point of being ready to
upload and offer for sale, mostly things I've submitted previously but received
only multiple rejections from various publishers.
So, by the end of April, while in the daily routine, I
decided to dress up a short story I posted on FanStory a year or so ago.
Usually I deal with novels. It is my comfort medium. Although I write some
poems and scripts, I don't do them often. Sometimes a great idea for a novel
fizzles and produces a short story instead. That's where the majority of my
shorter pieces come from.
Occasionally it happens the other way around, as was the
case with 'Fried Windows (In A Light White Sauce)', a short story that bore a
strange title, and got some decent reviews from fellow writers. This gave me
hope and encouragement. Some suggested I write more of the story – which I did.
But I submitted it almost immediately to a contest and later to a magazine. It
didn’t win; the periodical's publisher rejected it. The fish weren't biting
last summer, which has been the real underlying story of my recent life as a
writer. I archived the story, figuring I'd look at it again in a few months,
dress it up a bit and have a few more rounds with magazines. Yet there were always
those other related short stories I posted after it, the same characters with a
loosely connected story line.
As is sometimes necessary, mentally I disengaged from the
story and went on to writing, editing and revising other projects. Stepping
away from the story for a while is often the best thing a writer can do for
improving it, because when you come back to it you see to with fresh eyes.
Reading it give you new ideas. Eventually, I wrote other chapters and explored
new scenes with the characters, giving the previous collection of short stories
a theme and several threads of continuity. Gradually I built a plot, subplots
and conflicts. It all connected
into several other stories I'd written with the same main character. So, in a
way, the quirky story about a lady living in a house with no windows became an
entry point into a broader world about a guy who straddles the divide between
worlds of fantasy and fact.
Odds were stacked against me ever getting to this present
point with my work of fiction, which makes the events of the past few days all
the more remarkable and humbling. Feeling like I did nothing special other
sticking with it, not giving up, I'm ecstatic to arrive at the threshold of the
promised land of publishing a book. I wrote a strange story – though certainly
not the strangest one I've created over the years. It bears an attention
grabbing title and the story is engaging. It required the editing assistance of
a friend to bring out some of the strengths of the writing. I've learned to
always listen to criticism when it is offer constructively. In writing it must
be about the art, not the ego. A writer who can't take criticism will never
improve his or her craft.
Between shock and euphoria, I was still waiting for someone
to tell me this is a belated April Fools Day prank, but I just read through an
eleven page contract one last time before signing it in the three required
places. Afterwards, it didn't evaporate or crumble to dust. It was real after
all. Upon scanning it into a digital file to transmit via email back to the
publisher, I waited for the confirming 'welcome aboard' email, just received.
Now, I begin this novel adventure, one I hope to repeat multiple times – as
many times as I have manuscripts. We'll see. For now, let's do one book at a
time.
In the next installment I'll cover some statistics on the
publishing business and some thoughts on how social media and modern technology
has changed the industry.
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