Triumph and Tragedy

Why do women feel the constant need for cutting each other down?

That is a rhetorical question which has nothing (or everything) to do with this entry. Recently I received a publisher's response from a house I had honestly forgotten I had submitted to. The fact that is was a negative isn't the story. It's what they said that is the subject of my posting.

Once I read their comments I remembered why I sent a query to them. They promised a honest assessment of their rejection. Now, I'm getting used to the "no thank you" letters from publishers. However, what I am having a problem with is what they said next.

They told me I had no story development in the 50 pages I submitted.

Wow. Low blow.

Now, I will confess the opening is probably the only part of my book even I struggled with. My awesome editor (who shall remain nameless except to say that he is my hero) had me cut a lot of the opening right away. That ended up being about eighteen pages, which I am slowly working out my frustration concerning by blogging. But now, even he admits more needed to be lost. And that's probably my fault.

As a writer, I have a hard time separating myself from what I write. I have spent a long time developing this story. These characters have been living in my head for years and I feel a duty to tell their story as honestly and deeply as I hear it internally. To know that I have to separate myself from this and look at the story from a commercial side is hard.

Which in a very round about way brings me to the opening sentence. Girls, in a nutshell, can be very cruel. It is one reason I am not an extremely verbal person. I've never run in the popular group, most people think I am stuck up when I am actually only paralyzingly shy. Girls are like sharks. They swim around in packs looking for weaknesses they can exploit.

Currently my daughter is experiencing the painful lesson that teenage girls are two faced, and it is painful to see her bewilderment at the sudden changes in those she thought her friends. Why do others have to cut down the smallest in the herd? I tell her to try and let it go, but she is just like me. She takes everything way to personal.

Thin skinned people are in for a hard time in this highly competitive culture we live in . Whether they are writers or painters or poets or twelve year old girls, we have to choose what we allow to injure us and to always remember that it can only damage our souls if we let the barb penetrate that deep.

Women are cruel, publishers are even crueler, but teenage girls are killers.

Why?

I'm frustrated. Why do I never seem to have enough hours in a day to get anything accomplished? I am not just talking about time to write. Some days it seems I don't have time to turn around. When I was younger time management never was important. I could work all day, party half the night and sleep a few hours and do it all over again. Ah, the lost talent of youth!

I'm also stretched a lot more than when I was young. I want to streamline my life, discard things from my memory banks to make room for new information. But how does one decide what stays and what goes? What if I make the wrong decisions?

I have an idea for a new story, way different from CATALYST. This week my goal is to finish sketching out the characters and make a rough outline for the story. Book Two of the Trilogy is stuck at 75% complete. Again - I know where I want to go, I'm just having an argument with my characters about how to get there. I am winning, but they have some smart ideas.

That begs the question - how many writing projects can I juggle at one time and NOT get them totally confused? The new story is far and removed from the world of CATALYST, which should help my thinking remain linear. I would not be amused if the characters began story jumping.

Still waiting to hear from several query letters I have sent out to publishers. It boggles my mind how many publishers don't even acknowledge they received anything from you. Today I got back my query letter in my SASE from a publisher. No note, no "we aren't interested", nothing that indicated these people did anything more than take my letter, open it, put in my SASE and stick it back in the mail. Certainly an easy job - wonder if they are hiring.

And then there are the publishers who think you are "fabulous" and if you will buy a thousand copies to sell yourself they will be glad to publisher me. Call me old fashioned, but I thought I was selling my book to a publisher so that they have the privilege of benefiting from my writing. Why should I pay to get into print? Personally, I think I write better than the average novice author and should be paid - not have to pay.

I need a good ride on horseback through the countryside to clear my head. Of course, we have going into another rain cycle, so I guess watching old movies I already know the ending to will have to substitute. At least for now.

How Did it Become March Already?

I have come to the conclusion I am having problems keeping track of how fast these days are speeding by. Soon the boy will be on his way to Boot camp and the girl will be spending all her time and effort on her horses. The hubby and I will throw ourselved into the opening party season here in Atlanta and I will still be looking for Valentine Cards!

So far my publishing efforts have three publishers looking at the manuscript, one of whom I think is a scam company. A legit publish was looking at the book, but took a pass because I didn't know how many author copies I wanted to purchase. Is there some standard accepted number of copies an author should purchase? I was honest to them in my reply, but obviously they found my reply a downer.

But that was only Round One. I still have query letters out to three publishers, and have a second round ready and waiting for dispatch orders. As the old song from the
70's reminds us, "I will survive, I will Survive.