The Divining Wand

Ever since the week of March 29th The Divining Wand’s posts have been filled with success. New/debut book releases can be found on these pages, fulfilling dreams for authors and rewarding enjoyment for readers….with more yet to come. However it’s a fact that “getting published” doesn’t just happen. Instead the road to publication is a journey down a rather unpaved path.

How do some travel this area better than others? Four more of our successful, published authors answer the questions of how they handled rejection and what kept them going to reach their destination?

Meredith Cole (Posed for Murder, Dead in the Water):

“The publishing process is long–even for overnight sensations. And it’s not for the feint of heart, so you’ll have to be patient. It took me about a year and a half to write a book that I thought was pretty good. I started looking for an agent. Then I joined a writing group that brought me back down to earth. It was going to take a lot of fixing to make it decent. But I had an even better plot idea for the same characters. So I wrote my second book in about a year which became POSED FOR MURDER. I entered it in the SMP/Malice Domestic Best Traditional First Mystery competition, and had to wait 9 months to hear. Meanwhile, I continued looking for an agent and wrote a screenplay. Then I found out I won. But it was another almost two years before my book came out. It took a lot of patience, but I also realized that only one person (granted, an editor or agent) needs to fall in love with your book. You just have to find that person.

“If you do not love to write, don’t become a writer. That doesn’t mean that some days writing feels painful, but something inside you must drive you to continue. You have to believe it will happen and inspire yourself to continue. The only way to guarantee that you don’t get published is to give up.”

Ivy Pochoda (The Art of Disappearing):

“I submitted my book to ten agents and eight accepted it. Then my agent submitted it to twenty publishers and I received twenty rejections. I decided to rewrite the book and finally it sold. It took a year and a half. I never entertained the notion that my novel wouldn’t get published. I just kept going, started writing a new book. And when I began my new book, the original novel sold!”

Allison Winn Scotch (The Department of Lost and Found, Time of My Life and The One That I Want):

“I was writing for magazines before I wrote fiction, so my path has been littered with rejection for years. That said, I wrote a manuscript that got me agent representation but that said agent couldn’t sell. After writing what would eventually go on to be my debut novel, said agent also told me that “it would be doing my career more harm than good,” to go out with that novel, and we promptly parted ways. I found new representation within weeks, and we got four offers on the book a few weeks later. So…all in? From the beginning of my agent search to selling that second manuscript? Hmmm, I’m not sure, but I’d say about a year, a year and a half.”

Wendy Tokunaga (Midori By Moonlight, Love in Translation):

“I started writing novels seriously in around 1994 and didn’t get my book deal until 2006, so that’s a dozen years. And my “debut” novel was the fifth novel I’d written. Several things kept me going. I can’t not write so there is no way I would have stopped. And as I took classes and consulted with teachers about my writing I began to garner more ‘“positive”’ rejections from agents and this showed me I was at least getting somewhere. Supportive writer friends also were a comfort and inspiration.”

Announcement: The winners of Tish Cohen’s The Truth About Delilah Blue are Rebecca and Wendy Kinsey.

AND

Keetha is the winner of Allie Larkin’s Stay.

Congratulations! Please email: diviningwand (at) gmail (dot) com with your mailing address, and the book(s) will be sent out promptly.