WAIT!

“Time waits for no man.”

We’ve all heard the quote, but I never thought about it until I became a writer and starting sending out manuscripts. I’d submit, pat myself on the back, and wait for a what I hoped would be a ‘yes’.

Sometimes, I also waited for the right time to submit. For the perfect person to respond. For Virgo and Scorpio to meet in the seventh moon.

Waiting, as it turns out, is a nice way to postpone rejection.

Even when I had success and sold my first short story, I waited for it to come out and millions of dollars to flood in. (Still waiting on that.)

We all do some waiting in life. Waiting for an opportunity, an opening, a call back, an update, a better time, more money….

Our watches and apps keep track of just about everything. What if they kept track of how much time we spent waiting? Would the number shock you?

It shocked me. Because while I was doing all that waiting, time was moving forward.

I lost years to all that waiting.  At some point, I realized I was giving the power and control over my career (and life) to other people. I was putting every egg in one basket. And why? Was there really only one way to success? What if I had more baskets?

So, by January of 2024 when I saw the submission opportunity for Pushkin Press in the UK, I thought it sounded perfect. Like the chance I was waiting for. I finished the manuscript, I threw together a query letter for the editor. (If you want to read my rough first attempt at a query, I’ve posted it at www.marcw349.sg-host.com/blog.  Then I emailed MONSTER DOWN DEEP.

Then I went looking for more baskets.

I crafted new pitches to agents. I hired a developmental editor to help me rewrite. I chose Deborah Halverson who specializes in children’s books. In mid-February, she sent me an amazing 8 pages of notes. She said the manuscript was strong, but thought I could build the subplots and add more conflict.

(I have a simple rule about revision notes and whether to incorporate them:
If the person reviewing can publish the book, I’ll make the changes. If they can’t, I’ll consider it. In the end, it’s still their opinion versus mine. (Even if I’m paying for it.) Too often, I assume someone else’s opinion is more valuable than my own. If you fall into the same trap, let’s pinky promise to stop!)

But I digress. I decided to try the changes on the page–see if they worked. At least I would be working and not waiting. I spent a week adding in a thread of conflict and then half a day pulling it back out. Other changes did work and I was just finishing the rewrites when I got a response from the editor at Pushkin Press.

My heart pounded as I read: She’d received over 200 submissions. She’d narrowed it down to a few authors she wanted to talk to. One of them was me. Would I be willing to chat via zoom?

I would be willing to chat via smoke signals!!

Finally, I had a little hope. We scheduled the zoom.

More on that next month. Stay busy while you’re waiting. I know I will.

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