2000-09-07
In case you're new here, this incarnation of this journal began as kind of a theme journal, focussing on the process of my trying to sell a novel I finished at the beginning of the year. I chronicled the various ups and downs of trying to get an agent until I realized I just couldn't stomach sharing such a harrowing experience, at which point I pulled all that content. Maybe I'll change my mind -- it is, after all, my prerogative -- but at the moment I feel like talking about what's been going on.
I got an agent, someone fairly high-profile. She thought I was very talented -- how I thrilled to hear that! -- but thought the manuscript could be strengthened and gave me some ideas as to how. I did a quick (three-week) rewrite, with quite a light touch. She read the rewrite, found it improved, not quite as resolved as she'd like. I told her I wasn't sure how much more I could do with it. She sent it out to about a dozen editors.
There was an initial flurry of interest that truly blew my mind. Though there seemed to be some consensus that the ending was weak, quite a few people who read it thought very highly of it. I walked around in a daze for a while. Then one day I called my agent to see what was up and with the exception of one editor, everyone had passed.
Nice passes, some asking to see a revised version, but passes nonetheless. The editor who had not passed, who had from the beginning been the most enthusiastic, was having trouble getting the requisite buy-in from her colleagues. That was almost six weeks ago. Two weeks ago, feeling certain that no news was bad news, I checked in with my agent. Last she'd heard, the editor was still trying and we were to hang in there.
One pleasant side-effect of this protracted process is that I've had no choice but to calm down considerably. I'm just not capable of sustaining hysteria for weeks on end. Life has kind of returned to normal. I've been making some preliminary forays into rewriting. I've found that I have a much better sense than I did before about what needs work.
All this is part of the reason I've been pretty quiet here. I'm not sure what lies ahead. Nothing would delight me more than if this editor made an offer. At the same time, I'm prepared to rewrite and continue on the rollercoaster for as long as it takes. I have a renewed sense of inspiration lately.
This article contributed, for my book is at the opposite end of the spectrum from the ones discussed here; it is small and very human. It veers dangerously in the opposite direction; you could even say it is insufficiently ambitious (and that's what one of the rejections said, that this story was beneath my abilities as a writer). But/and I like this book, I believe in this book, I think this book has merit and I'm committed to seeing it through.
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