I think the following can be put into this category. As I rightly recognised in the last post, I have too many projects to think clearly, and I think the reason I have so many projects is because my brain is trying to protect me from the feelings of utter misery and despair about my future as a writer, while at the same time preventing me from getting on with anything..
Now, unlike some people who want to be writers, I can write well, I have a reasonable amount of insight into the human condition, and the persistence to get it down on paper . I have written 4 novels in the last 6 years and chunks of other stuff, including the ill-fated Ransome series Pah! I have done all the things they say you have to do, I have even paid for editorial advice and editing, I have had rave rejections for my first two novels, yet I cannot get any interest in The Malice of Fairies.. I am getting nothing but the standard brush offs...no rave rejections, no requests for full reads. I know this is the second phase, post editing etc. and perhaps I should treat it as a the real beginning. Perhaps I should be more patient, but I cannot help becoming very discouraged.
I have been grown up about this for a long time, I have been realistic, I have been sensible. But I really thought this was the novel that would make agents catch fire...All the efforts I have made to promote it (well, as many as I felt I could get away with without everyone getting sickened by it). If all feels pretty futile.
But then again, 10, mostly N. American, agents, have still got it. There's hope. And there are plenty more to apply to. I suppose one has these phases of discouragement from time to time. But let me run through my fears - that my work is too same-old, same-old to be a cutting edge literary novel, that my writing is better than my story-telling, that my work is too "clever" to be widely commercial, that I have no sense of popular taste, that my age is against me (not that that gets written on submissions.) but that I am somehow beyond the culture.
Some of this misery is clearly connected with my over inflated excitement/expectation about the novel - but everyone has enjoyed it, praised it (all 4 of them) and since 2 of the readers are professional writers/editors then one does tend to take it more seriously. Perhaps if I had had lower expectations for it, I wouldn't feel so awful now. But a part of me felt that if I wasn't utterly wholehearted about it, neither would anyone else be. so I have to carry on brightly cheery and perky about it. Nevertheless, I am feeling unlucky. I don't really know if I believe in luck, I certainly haven't had an enormous amount of it lately. I ought to have more faith really, and just think that for everything there is a season, and this is just not my season yet. The fact is, everyone says, if you have talent and work hard you will succeed... humph, the people who haven't succeeded are curiously silent on the fact. Reluctantly, I have come to believe in astrology - although it's not foolproof, and some of the astrologers interpret things in a weird way. Take the Mars retrograde... a lot of people say everything will slow down, low energy etc. nothing much will happen, or alternatively there's this:
Perhaps there's something in it, the decline in competition and forward urge may give one the chance to re-charge one's batteries, and rest up a bit, and deal with oneself, rather than worrying about the "competition". Which in my case is the other million wannabe novelists who are putting their work into the agents. People always say writers aren't in competition with each other - but I think that's bunk. The fact is, all these other wanabees are clogging up the agents intrays and preventing them from spending more time on MY submissions. And there are only so many people getting published each year, only so many slots at the publishers. So, yes, inevitably there is a sense of competition. But we can all take a back seat, and preen ourselves into a state of glossy awesomeness..
Another factor in my discontent is probably my impatiience, I want something to happen NOW. Because it's feels like it's around for a long time. If I were prepared to take a long term view - that the book will be published, just not yet...it might be easier.
Now, unlike some people who want to be writers, I can write well, I have a reasonable amount of insight into the human condition, and the persistence to get it down on paper . I have written 4 novels in the last 6 years and chunks of other stuff, including the ill-fated Ransome series Pah! I have done all the things they say you have to do, I have even paid for editorial advice and editing, I have had rave rejections for my first two novels, yet I cannot get any interest in The Malice of Fairies.. I am getting nothing but the standard brush offs...no rave rejections, no requests for full reads. I know this is the second phase, post editing etc. and perhaps I should treat it as a the real beginning. Perhaps I should be more patient, but I cannot help becoming very discouraged.
I have been grown up about this for a long time, I have been realistic, I have been sensible. But I really thought this was the novel that would make agents catch fire...All the efforts I have made to promote it (well, as many as I felt I could get away with without everyone getting sickened by it). If all feels pretty futile.But then again, 10, mostly N. American, agents, have still got it. There's hope. And there are plenty more to apply to. I suppose one has these phases of discouragement from time to time. But let me run through my fears - that my work is too same-old, same-old to be a cutting edge literary novel, that my writing is better than my story-telling, that my work is too "clever" to be widely commercial, that I have no sense of popular taste, that my age is against me (not that that gets written on submissions.) but that I am somehow beyond the culture.
Some of this misery is clearly connected with my over inflated excitement/expectation about the novel - but everyone has enjoyed it, praised it (all 4 of them) and since 2 of the readers are professional writers/editors then one does tend to take it more seriously. Perhaps if I had had lower expectations for it, I wouldn't feel so awful now. But a part of me felt that if I wasn't utterly wholehearted about it, neither would anyone else be. so I have to carry on brightly cheery and perky about it. Nevertheless, I am feeling unlucky. I don't really know if I believe in luck, I certainly haven't had an enormous amount of it lately. I ought to have more faith really, and just think that for everything there is a season, and this is just not my season yet. The fact is, everyone says, if you have talent and work hard you will succeed... humph, the people who haven't succeeded are curiously silent on the fact. Reluctantly, I have come to believe in astrology - although it's not foolproof, and some of the astrologers interpret things in a weird way. Take the Mars retrograde... a lot of people say everything will slow down, low energy etc. nothing much will happen, or alternatively there's this:
Perhaps there's something in it, the decline in competition and forward urge may give one the chance to re-charge one's batteries, and rest up a bit, and deal with oneself, rather than worrying about the "competition". Which in my case is the other million wannabe novelists who are putting their work into the agents. People always say writers aren't in competition with each other - but I think that's bunk. The fact is, all these other wanabees are clogging up the agents intrays and preventing them from spending more time on MY submissions. And there are only so many people getting published each year, only so many slots at the publishers. So, yes, inevitably there is a sense of competition. But we can all take a back seat, and preen ourselves into a state of glossy awesomeness..
Another factor in my discontent is probably my impatiience, I want something to happen NOW. Because it's feels like it's around for a long time. If I were prepared to take a long term view - that the book will be published, just not yet...it might be easier.
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