The Easy Part

It sounds bizarre I know, but actually sitting down and writing a book is the easy part in my world as a writer.  Mostly, it writes itself; when a story is good, it takes off on its own.  I sit at the keyboard and the story evolves as though I was reading it.  I’ve always felt that the complete story was already in my head, I just had to download it.  And the downloading; ahhh there is nothing quite like it.  But that is where the fun comes to a screaming halt.  From there on in, you are on an endless merry-go-around of pain, creativity, edit, rewrite, need, rejection, pain.

You linger in bookshops, iPhone in hand making notes on publishers. I trail the YA aisle.  My partner, the adult section in whatever obscure genre he writes in; probably wherever you would find Henry Miller’s “Opus Pistorum”.  Each of us, hunting for a publisher we haven’t sent our manuscript to and although you would figure that list is long and illustrious, it is not quite as long by the time you get in the door, head for Google and track down the never ending requirements, that mile long list of what they won’t take.

And let’s face it; rejection has become our middle name.  You know you have endured and accepted rejection when you can be pleased by it.  I’ve actually heard myself say “that was a fantastic rejection…”

Publishers send refusals, sometimes good ones; sometimes a generic “dear author”; some have held my book for a year only to send a “thanks, but no thanks…”  Agents:  I haven’t contacted many, but the ones I have don’t seem not to bother with a reply.

So I swallow my pride and publish my work on Smashwords.  I may be able to write a book; I have a full time job project managing IT in a network of hospitals – but winding my way through the quagmire of self-publishing; is a whole new ball game.

In truth, it feels like a betrayal.  It feels as though I’m the ugly girl who has bought the beauty queen crown.  It is a hollow victory.  It conjures memory of every scathing comment I have ever made on ‘self-publishing’.

Last night, I read an eBook piece from the Victorian Writer magazine to a friend of mine.  It said “if you write a successful eBook, you will be cool.  If you write a successful print book, you will be retro-cool, which we children of the 60’s think is way cooler!

And that sums it up in a nutshell.

I fight an internal battle with myself each day.  To self-publish a book puts me on a wrung of the ladder of contempt.  That is obviously something I will need to snap out of as I begin the research and quest to get The Zmora out in the world.