Cream to the Top

Last night I went to a book launch in Aireys’s Inlet. 

I had done the ‘whereis.com.au’ due to the fact that I’m directionally dyslexic.  It said 1.45 from Oakleigh and the same back [note: it was actually 2.15]; which is a long damned day, except it was one of my best friends launching a book, so if the invite had of said “the moon”, although I couldn’t have got an accurate time from whereis.com.au; I’d have still gone.

Book launches for me are like revisiting my youth; just with a different set of worries from what I had in those days.  Then, it was ‘false pretences’; hell, I couldn’t even form the word “writer” in case someone raised a quivering finger in my direction and shouted “imposter!!!!”   Now days, I can quite calmly say I’m a writer, but wonder if I look really old compared to these people that I see only at launches; and that could have been ten years ago.  That aside, I see a million people that I have known forever and a day; fantastic people that due to life, I get to see rarely.  We may not have seen one another for years, but can speak as though it was yesterday.

The launch was held in a tiny bookshop.  Is there a better place?  I may have published my first eBook but at the end of the day, the feel; the look, holding a book in my hand – that is life.  Part of me believes I have to get over the “inferior complex”, part of me still, and always will, believes the publisher path is so much cooler…  And it is after all.  Those of us that publish an eBook do so for one reason; in the hope to be picked up by a “real publisher”.

We went to dinner first and the room was overflowing with would be writers.  And believe me; we are all in the same place.  We have no choice but to write; but if we ‘make it’; it is the difference between squeezing in writing around a real job, and actually just writing.

I have another blog.  It is about my life; relationship… kids.  It covers off the ex-wife (his), and every stupid, horrendous, plain idiotic thing people do in life.  In it, there is not one name; I’m careful about that.

This blog is completely different.  In this, I hope to be able to expand on my journey as a writer.  The pitfalls and trust me, that is using the term loosely.  From the moment you acknowledge a rejection that has your name, rather than “dear author” as a “positive rejection”, I’m not sure you actually exist in the sane world anymore. 

We hit a brick wall every, damned, day.  I have the bruises on my forehead to prove it.  My partner, Chris Quigley, who also a writer; has been very supportive on the eBook path.  I have an inward wry grin that he believes this is a good thing for my book, but I’m not seeing him lining up to do his; I don’t think it is cool enough…

So, the launch last night was for a book called “Tales from the Tower” – Volume One: The Wilful Eye and Volume Two – The Wicked Wood.  Trust me, if you want to see brilliance in action; go buy both of these books.

The books are rewrites of fairy tales; interesting concept and to be honest if I’m ever asked to rewrite a fairy tale, I’m doing it from an opposing view.  Snow White, hell, I would always write as the Wicked Step Mother because she has a tale to tell, that is for sure.    My other choice was Hansel and Gretel – again, the Step Mother.  There could be a theme here…  And maybe I should hope my partner doesn’t read this.

The collection was gathered by my girlfriend, Isobelle Carmody and writer editor, Nan McNab.  The beauty of book one, is another friend, Rosie Borella, has a story in the book and it was wonderful to catch up; even more so as one of her novels had, only that week, been accepted by Allen and Unwin.  She has made it.  Made it not in the “successful eBook” way; but in the super cool “in print” way.  Trust me; she has done it tough, just as we all do.  I know, I have heard every near hit and miss through Isobelle.  But we all know – cream goes to the top; and she wrote cream.

The message here people, is that persistence is the key.

I may have wished the Zmora made it in the “really cool publisher” way; but in some ways, releasing it into the world was cathartic.  It finished it.  I loved the story.  I loved the book.  I still do; but it’s not the one that will be ‘the one’.  And upon release; it meant I could pick up the next.

The next, Moonbears – I face with as much optimism as the last…