Solidarity...or something like that...

I may or may not have reached a turning point in these past few weeks of publishing attempts. At this point I thought I'd received every different kind of rejection letter possible. There are the personal and encouraging ones. The constructive criticism ones, and then there are my favorite, the impersonal "I didn't even read your query" form letter ones.

On Thursday I received a rejection notice that fell into the latter category. Only this time it was different. This time instead of just being sent to me, it was also CC'd to....237 other authors. Bam. Pow. Smack. All of you, all 238 of you SUCK! All of you are rejected MUAH HA HA HA! 

Well, at least that's how I read it. I was on the phone with my mom and was just so astounded by the sheer magnitude of it. My first thought was, well, there's the reason I haven't had any success so far. There are just so many of us. And we all want it, bad! 

Then the emails started flowing. See, now we all had the addresses of 237 other brutally rejected, aspiring authors and everyone was hitting "reply all". Most were poking fun at the assistant who made such a stupid mistake as to hit "cc" instead of "bcc". A lot were simply stunned because that one little mistake proved what some of our deepest fears are. There's really no one out there reading these things. All our carefully thought out queries are just going to lowly assistants at literary agencies and subsequently getting rejected with out any thought or care. Granted, that's not always the case, but it certainly seemed like it in this situation.

But this proved to me that writers are nothing if not resilient. After the shock was over there came poems (hilarious) and then the idea that we should all band together from here on out for support and call ourselves "The 238". Facebook groups were formed and by Friday night we had all been contacted by a small magazine who wanted to run our story of mass rejection. 

So, there has been good out of the bad. I've realized that I'm not alone in this process, and though these fellow authors are my competition, they also are going through the same arduous and often depressing process I am. 

I'm not certain on any of the magazine details as of yet. Besides the name of the publication and when our story should be published, May/June. I've already sent in my own author profile and will be featured among the other 238 members who chose to send theirs in as well. In preparation for this tiny bit of publicity I've created my own author Facebook page, you can visit it here to learn more about what I'm up to lately! Oh and like me!

This could all be the turn of the tide, or it could be nothing. It remains to be seen! I'll be re-writing my synopsis as well this week and need some volunteers to do a little test reading for me!

Thanks, as always, for the support!

Seasons...

I can't even begin to tell you what the beginning of Spring means to me this year.

Let's face it, the winter was long, cold and sucky. Weather-wise it was actually our mildest winter here, but it was everything else going on that had gotten me down. Not anymore! As far as I can see, everything bad that could have possibly have happened, has already happened. So we can only go up from here, right?

I'm kidding, mostly. Anyway, what was I saying? Oh yeah, Spring! It was 67 degrees out yesterday. INSANE. I loved every minute of it. The kids played on two separate playgrounds yesterday because we could not seem to stay indoors. (Of course it's dreary today, but let's just overlook that for now.) While watching the kids play I was actually feeling this strange sense of giddiness and had to check and see what was going on. Oh yeah, that's called HAPPY! It's not that I haven't been happy lately, but let's face it, I've just been trudging along lately.

Ahhh, so hopefully this is the turning of the tide, the change of the season outside and in my life. I'm ready for sunshine and happiness.

Wow, that was cheesy, sorry!

Hiatus...

So, it's been awhile huh? Last week I decided to take a break from things. From publishing, from blogging, from obsessing over all my rejections. It was a good thing, believe me. What settled it for me, was the fact that I got two rejections in one day that just about sent me over the edge. I don't want to be that kind of person. I refuse to let someone else's opinion of my work define my own veiws of sucess or failure.

I think I'm having to come to terms with the fact that publishig just might not happen for me, and that's a hard pill to swallow. At least, I might not get published in the conventional sense. I still plan to pursue things a little bit longer, I promised I'd give it at least six months, it's been three. After that I'll still e-publish for all five of my fans who want it. Who knows what after that. I think I'll have to finish the series, just for my own piece of mind.

Anyway, last week I didn't send out an queries. I didn't write, I didn't think about any of it. And tried to convince myself that it didn't really matter. Of course, it matters, but I don't want publishing to be the only route through which I feel like a usefull and sucessful human being.

Ugh...rambling.

So, it was a good week. It really cleared my head. Saturday I was ready to get back in the game and sat down and wrote about half a chapter. If and when my computer starts working better (I'm on Matthew's now and it doesn't have all my publishing stuff on it) I'll send out some more queries.

Part of me still thinks it will happen, then there's another part of me that's ready to accept the fact that it might not. At this point, it just feels logical to prepare myself for that.

WOW, what a depressing post! In other news, my grandpa died last night so that might explain the doom and gloom around here. What a year. In January I was ready for all the awesome things this year was going to bring, but now I'm sort of afraid of what else might be in store. Not a good feeling. Oh well. Maybe things will turn around soon.

Rejection...

Now that I've hit an even dozen I'm an expert...

How I Deal With Rejection

Step one: Get pissed off.
Step two: Delete rejection email so I don't have to see it ever again.
Step three: Write "no" next to agent's name on my spreadsheet.
Step four: Whine and complain to my husband, my mom, my sister-in-law, all my twitter followers, Facebook friends and random strangers on the street.
Step five: Consider giving up because rejection bites.
Step six: Take a deep breath and forget about it.

How I Should Deal With Rejection

Step One: Console myself with the satisfaction that one day this particular agent will be kicking themselves when my book is on the New York Times' Bestseller list.

Alas, even my confidence isn't that great.

(This was supposed to auto-post on Friday, clearly it didn't!)

Words...

Words my daughter does not understand:

Wait
Be patient
Stop
Don't climb on that
Stop eating your brother's lunch
Don't climb on that
Stop playing in the toilet water
Get out of that box
Don't climb on that
Stop playing on my computer
Get out of your brother's chair
Give your brother his pencil back
Stop writing in Elijah's school book
Don't climb on that


Words my daughter does understand:

Do you want a snack?