The Glorious Rejection
Plus Interesting Bristol + a Being Interesting Workshop in Bristol
My mum is a great photographer.
Being Interesting at BristolCon
I am at BristolCon this weekend and past me didn’t volunteer for much. As a result, I’m not sure I will be on many panels. If any of you are coming, do let me know and we can catch up. Comment, email via website etc. Hilton DoubleTree Hotel, Bristol – there’s an informal meeting in the bar Friday 25th October – Barcon - and the main event is Saturday and Sunday.
I am doing my Being Interesting Workshop on Saturday which is how to approach interviews, events, Q+As, and media stuff without feeling you are the most boring person on earth. I’ve had 35 years helping people with the media, including those who are nervous or convinced they have nothing to say. If I can prepare a CEO for Newsnight, I can help you with a reading.
This is also something I can do for groups and individuals online. I welcome bookings.
If you’ve never been to a con, let me know.
Spare a copper for a poor author
You can buy Our Child of the Stars and Our Child of Two Worlds direct from me in the UK, from my website. Also check out my free fiction and creative services.
A Glorious Rejection
Someone senior in publishing passed on my novel Dear Heart. I feel quite chuffed. How can I call this a glorious rejection?
They gave feedback, which raised my morale.
gorgeous, voice led…
it’s a lovely, affecting novel and I really enjoyed it…
I love the gentle relationship between Braddie and Ashton and the way you bring their world to life
This is a murder mystery, remember, and not one which shies away from what that looks like! But it’s also a novel of character.
Senior Person thought they couldn’t take it to the success it deserved. But, they said it deserved success and I should keep going.
Most writers have imposter syndrome, that little voice in your ear which says ‘This is awful’, ‘you’ll never be published again’ ‘what a loser!’
And this hardworking individual thought a book they couldn’t take on was still worth encouraging. Underneath the madness of the industry, you find all these people who care about books and readers and people.
It’s a spooky sapphic Victorian murder mystery. Readers will understand it, and I know some will love it. I just need to work on getting it out.
The next stage
Where now? I haven’t given up on agents but I will send to publishers who take direct submission.
Large traditional publishers generally don’t accept un-agented submissions, except for the odd specific open call.
A new breed of publisher puts emphasis on the digital publication and marketing, while often having paper books as well. They don’t insist on agents though they will work with them. They move quickly and like to publish an author’s books close together. Learning from the digital age, they use nimble marketing tactics – they notice what can work for self-publishers - and the gossip in author land is many authors loving working with them. Their swift publishing model demands authors who meet deadlines, and some only look at strongly commercial work.
Then there are smaller or more specialist presses willing to look at the oddball, out of fashion, specialist, or ‘Marmite’ books. Or just the many books written that could find their an audience but the large publishers didn’t take. They’ll tend to only give royalties – a share of each book sold - rather than advances - a nice lump sum up front. I know a couple I really rate and several I plan to try.
Other Bristol news.
I’m spending a lot of time in Bristol with my lovely, opinionated mum. The one who poopooed science fiction until she read Our Child of the Stars and decided some SF was good, actually.
Bristol has interesting and often disreputable history, its own offbeat alternative side, and some great architecture. I went to a primary school started by a slaver, then to a secondary school whose origins lie in a trading group of slavers, and where two of the school Houses were named after slavers who were also pirates. Every city needs a secretive bunch of rich people hiding behind tradition, and we have something called the Merchant Venturers, who for example, own the vast park at the top of the city, the Downs. My secondary school produced only one Nobel Laureate in Physics, but didn’t mention it as it was in Physics. Now it has and celebrates two.
Two years ago at Christmas my dad died after a year of decline, a loving father who always believed in me. Eight months later my kind and generous mother-in-law died. My mum is now the last grandparent to my adult children and she’s been unwell. It’s definitely time to treasure her.
I was brought up in Bristol, I was eager to leave for university, and now see its benefits from afar. Mum and I have been exploring historic byways, which often turn out to have bizarre histories. For example, Johnny Ball Lane - two steep hill paths, sided with steep walls, joined by a sinister alley. It was the premier place to be mugged in old Bristol, and for a while was a cut-through between a friary up the hill and the Infirmary graveyard down the hill. I think sometimes we fabulists underplay the weird and grim that happened in real life. It is medieval, not that guy off children’s TV (old person reference).
Abuse of Power.
Just contemplating having a legal eye look over my piece on the misdeeds of a former GOSH clinician. It’s growing into a two or three parter, going wider on the issues than this particular case.
Rejection
Looking for art for “Rejection” I found this. The Rejection of Cain’s Sacrifice by Millais. (via artvee, a great public domain art site.) Many authors feel just like this about rejections, but most can also smile about them.
