Looking Up

Don't you hate it when you get sick and you feel as if you've been taken out of time and space and dropped back down in the wrong spot? That's how I feel today. Add to that the fact that Julia is up bright and early (BRIGHT AND EARLY), and is running around telling knock, knock jokes.

Anyway, I was thinking about my book and how much of a struggle it has been to try to get it published, how it may never get published. When I started querying a year ago, the book was not ready. Like many new authors I thought it was, and I unfortunately burned through many agents with a bad query letter and a poor manuscript. After many rejections I asked for critique from beta readers. I took their suggestions and tried to strengthen the opening of the book and query letter. More querying. More rejections. I revised the book again—best thing I've ever done—but it still led me to more rejections. I tweaked again, more beta help, more tweaking. More rejection. Finally, I set it aside and except for a few small entries, have pretty much decided to let it go.

So what have I learned from all this? Well, mainly that none of it was in vain. I may have met tons of failure with this book, but it was good for me and taught me so much about the writing process as a whole. It taught me how to take others' advice but still listen to my original vision, because no matter what happens, you should love your book. And I do. I really love my book.

I figure I've come out on top really. Because of all the good things I've learned, and wonderful people I've met, it's not a failure at all and is, instead, a great success. Yes, I'm still sad about the death of the manuscript, but oh well. It's future may go in the route of a small publisher or I might self-publish. That way a few people like me will stumble across it and have a good time and find a little joy. I think that's a fairly positive thing to do and there's no shame in that.

Thanks for being here, take care, and have a great Labor Day!