P - Publishing

I think when we all start out there is this great dream of publication. We are going to write a best seller, and everyone will know and love us, and we will become rich!

It's a perfect plan!

Then we write our book, and we query it, and nothing happens.
Then we find out about critique partners, writing conferences, and other such great resources, and we discover our story idea was great but the execution wasn't so great.
So we rewrite, polish, get feedback, rewrite again, polish again, and then eventually we get to the point that we feel it's perfect!
Then we query again
And we get rejection letters
and we keep querying ........ and keep querying ...... and keep querying ......

So nobody is picking it up - does that mean we are bad authors? that we did something wrong? That it's not polished enough?

Not necessarily!
Publishing is a very competitive business! There are so many amazing stories out there and only so many agents and publishers to go around.

Many people turn to self-publishing and that works great for them! Some people continue to query and that eventually leads to someone taking on their manuscript! And some people just continue to write because they know that one day someone will pick up their book, and love it, and help it shine!

I think if you work hard enough and keep believing in yourself, practicing to get better, and striving for your goals, then everyone will eventually have their dream happen.

What stage are you in?

Me? Well I'm kind of in between stages right now. But I keep writing anyway cause there is no reason for me to stop telling great stories while I wait to see my dream happen!