Most of writing is just the discipline to keep on putting words on paper. We make our own excitement with the torture and the rewards we devise for our characters. The business of trying to actually sell what we’ve written is usually complicated–query letters and synopses are just a lot harder to write than novels for some reason. And scary.
Occasionally it’s a roller coaster ride.
Yesterday, I checked my inbox to find that there was an e-mail from an agent I’d queried with BLOOD WILL TELL. I braced myself for the rejection; that’s by far the most common outcome and you have to get used to it. Well, it wasn’t a rejection; it was a request for a partial. The first step up that long staircase toward publication.
Woo hoo! When I caught my breath, I celebrated a little, told my nearest and dearest, and then I settled down to prepare and send the requested materials.
I thought at the least I’d have a few weeks to savor the idea, the possibility. If I’d sent it by snail mail, I probably would have. The downside of the internet age is that it doesn’t take any time for documents to reach their destination. The reply was in my inbox this morning and it wasn’t a request for the full manuscript.
Oh well, to quote Dory, “Just keep swimming. Just keep swimming.”
Or, Commander Taggert, “Never give up. Never surrender.”
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