Author: dannrobertjohnson

Submitting is Difficult

If that title brings to mind pictures of a preacher holding forth on the finer points of Ephesians 5…let’s reel that imagination back towards something that makes sense in an author blog:

Submitting to literary agents is difficult.

The difficulty is not in following agency prescription lists: query letter, cover letter, first three chapters, any three chapters, first 10 pages, first 50 pages, platform elements, writing experience, how you heard about us, brief selling points, sales handles, back cover copy… no. The difficulty is elsewhere. 

The difficulty is in the waiting. 

More so than even, I would say, in the rejection. The rejection is expected. I’ve accumulated dozens of rejection letters already in my brief non-career. Each one closes one door. One door that no longer requires my attention.

This week I’m blogging for the other aspiring authors out there. (Don’t they say everyone’s got a book in them?) Expect here no expert advice—that’s out there and necessary! appreciated! But I’ll be content for this to serve merely a breath of air. Think of my words as thoughts from someone just a step or two ahead on the publishing path. Thoughts from, Other Writer, someone possibly every bit as green as you are.

The submission process is looooooooooooooooooong.

Prepare yourself. If you are going to try getting a book published as a nobody, it is going to require a lot of your spare time (or sleep time) and a lot of patience.

Nor should you make the mistake of thinking self-publishing is the easy-peasy, lemon-squeezy shortcut to your dreams. You could pay others to do all the self-publishing steps for you (and put your project in a financial hole thousands of dollars deeper than sales of your book will likely ever match) or you could do all the work of educating yourself about layout, cover design, spine thickness, paper thickness, paper color, fonts, ISBN’s, e-pubs, PDFs, kindle formatting, registering a self-owned publishing company, on and on. Or you could hold your breath until mysterious, publishing-savvy new friends fall out of trees and do everything exactly like you like it for free (which has got to be the least reliable of the three).

I, myself, am not self-publishing, though many who ask, “can I read your book, yet?” ask why not.

Because.

I stuck my toe in the waters of traditional publishing, then slipped my whole cold self into these inky waters, so I can wait. Float here for a bit. Just how many times do you think I will get the chance to write and attempt to publish my first book?†

I know the odds are against me.

I might prune completely and still have nobody notice me floating here.

I’m still gonna try.

Back in January and February, I hired a company to make my submissions for me, and through them I queried 25-30 agents/agencies per month. That company’s services weren’t cheap, but I do credit them with showing me how it was done and getting me started, which is nothing to sneeze at. I call those mad days my “shotgun” submissions.

These days I’m selecting my own submission targets, calling these my “rifle” submissions since I research, rank, and particularly choose each agency/agent. Last week I queried three, which some experts say is quite enough at one time. For, should a full manuscript be requested, it’s very possible a several-weeks’-long period of “exclusivity” will be required as well, in which I’d be bound to not give the manuscript to anyone else. 

Which seems a little like—if the logic indeed is to move me towards avoiding too many agents asking for my manuscript all at once—insisting we throw in just one fishing line instead of a dozen, plus a net and a stick of dynamite, when everyone knows the lake was all but emptied of fish years ago.

But such is the prevailing logic, I guess, so other than last week’s three and Jan-Feb’s shotgunners, there’s only been one other agent I’ve queried so far. I wrote her back in May, and the 8-week wait-window has just ended. Now, an agent can always reply after that window has closed, but when the website says, “You can assume after 8 weeks that we’re not interested in your project,” it doesn’t give a realist much reason to hope.

Plus, it was hard enough checking email during those 8 weeks—who needs to pile on the additional annoyance of nursing hope beyond the 8 weeks? Though I guess I’ve just now given myself three fresh reasons for barely-hopeful checking each morning, haven’t I? Just this morning there was an email with “Submission” as the subject line.

It was a soliloquy on Ephesians 5.

Kidding.

It was a rejection letter. A form letter, as most of them are. A leftover from my February shotgun submissions.

I wish everyone would send a rejection letter, though. It’s far easier to bolt a door shut than to, day after day, have your mind’s periphery jump at every squeak, every shaft of light, and forever be wondering if someone’s on the other side of that door about to push it open…

If I’ve learned one surprising thing on this journey, it’s that publishing books is about many things before it is about great writing. Of course compelling writing is fantastic, but it’s far from a necessity. Only one criterion makes it into that category:

Sales.

If an agent can’t see “$$” when they look at your book, it frankly doesn’t matter how well it’s written. Agents weed through endless slush piles seeking the one or two or twenty manuscripts this week or month or year that might have a chance of selling well. Granted, that slush pile is largely garbage, or a few inches north of that, but it contains a lot of excellent writing that will never float its way to the top, either.

Rest assured, however, my certitude (just like absolutely every single author out there) that my own writing is not part of the garbage is unshakeable. Which makes me a little shaky. For I’ve read too many embarrassments who are convinced that poor writing comes only from “other writers, never me.”

But what if I’ve become one of “those” people? Reassuringly, just the fact that I asked made me feel better. I don’t think “those” people ever ask.

Anyway…so after an agent contracts with an author to represent their work, (s)he pitches it to (a) publisher(s). I recently read that some publishers publish 1 out of every 1,000 books they’re pitched.

And out of every 10 books that do get published, 9 will cost (lose) the publisher money.

So everyone’s on a mad search for that blockbuster which can make up for all the lost ground. And it cracks me up how many new authors believe they’ve already written it.

Oh, but it’s only the rest of all them that are crazy! If only I could be discovered, they’d realize I really have written the next [The Shack, Harry Potter, whatever].

Hehehe.

The odds against an unknown, non-famous, regular, without-an-online-tribe writer getting published at all, let alone writing the latest bestseller, aren’t worth the mathematical effort it would take to calculate. Of course it happens; we’ve heard about it in the news. But there’s a reason (or rather, hundreds of thousands of reasons, a.k.a. writers) it’s news.

I’m still willing to be patient.

I can do some waiting.

Just not forever. 

Eventually, I will self-publish. Of course I will.

Because I have no idea if the book I’ve written is marketable or not. I don’t know if it’s unique or not. If it’s too similar to some other story that’s been seen before…it doesn’t stand a chance of being picked up. In fact, unless my query letter jumps—screaming, yelling, and carrying sacks of cash—off a computer screen and into the retinas of an agent (who am I kidding? it’ll be one of their assistants), almost every agency I query stands to read exactly zero of my manuscript. Many won’t make the end of the query letter. 

It’s a tough market. Countless writers more prolific and gifted than I have never broken in.

I still say to You, Aspiring Writer:

Write it anyway. 

That book inside you that has never stopped knocking at your mind’s door? That story that never stops nagging you to get it out of your head and down on paper?

Write it.

Go ahead and imagine the worst: that nary a soul beyond a few loved ones ever reads your book.

Still I say, write.

You’ll be glad you did.

I (non-published, unknown, unread, and unnoticed, too) wrote mine.

And I couldn’t be happier.

OK, a full-manuscript request from an agent would still jack the happiness levels out the roof, I admit.

But it isn’t a necessity.

 

 

 

†You were right to check, but it’s as you thought: one

Why Worry, When You Can Pay?

Doesn’t it go something like that? The song?

Oh, no, it was “pray.”

But I do mean “pay.”

Because there is precious little we can’t pay for, isn’t there? Sure, I don’t mean that everyone can run out willy-nilly and buy anything that strikes their fancy––there are cars that you will never own, boats that will never approach the likes of your budget––but, really: Aren’t most of the people in the socio-economic circles you inhabit able to pay for a whole ream of stuff way beyond necessities?

I’m not rich by my own country’s standards, but I totally know that there aren’t a whole lot of other people that I interact with here in western China who are saving up for a trip to Europe like I just took with my wife. (Though China does have, of course, its wealthy, and wildly wealthy, too.)

You want to go to Europe? (Or somewhere else if Europe’s home?) Chances are you could make that happen. It might take some years of saving; it might mean cutting out cable or buying a junkier car; but a splurge like that is probably not out of reach for a whole lot of Westerners if it’s something they really want.

Or, you could make different choices: keep that cable; buy the new Corvette with CarPlay; go to Disneyland. Whatever. Maybe you can afford all of the above and more. My point, I think, is that pretty much all of us, even though it’s oh-so-easy to solely notice only those above us on the money ladder, have choices.

What about dropping $30 grand on an international adoption? That’s a choice, too. A large one. $30K is such a large amount to so many of us that it becomes an obstacle that keeps many people who would otherwise consider adopting from ever signing up.

We only ever considered the money once: the first time.

And it was an obstacle: How on earth are we going to pay for this?

But the second time, it was completely God’s idea, and so we knew he would have to provide the funds.

Here’s exactly what I said at the time, in quote form and lifted from my upcomingandsoeasytoalwaysquotehereinthisblog book:

“OK, God. This second adoption was your idea. With all due respect, I would like to go on record as reiterating that it was not mine. I am sending you the bill.”

I meant that.

He still surprised us. 

All we were able to raise totaled $8 thousand. Then someone who didn’t know us from Adam gave us $22 thousand. We never found out who.

And now—slap of the palm to the forehead—here we go again, adopting for the third time. [A development that came on the scene, mind you, after our Eurotrip had been planned and largely paid for; otherwise we’d never have gone. For choosing to adopt surely means choosing not to do other things. But by that point it was too late to cancel anything, and we like to believe God did that on purpose for us and let us enjoy that special anniversary together.]

About the same time we were announcing this third adoption to our weekly fellowship, our inaugural round of adoption expenses (home study, background checks, etc.) came due. All told, something in the low $3K’s. One week later, a teenager in our fellowship who has an hourly-rate part-time job walked up to us and handed us an envelope. It was thick enough to feel the bills inside. She said she wanted to participate. God wanted her to give to our adoption. Wow.

Then the woman sitting next to me in the meeting, someone I’d met once, handed me another envelope. This one was ridiculously thick.

What’s this?

“For the adoption.”

I had to ask what her name was again so I could thank her.

Finally, once we were home, neighbors handed us money: “Here, someone wanted to contribute to the adoption anonymously.”

Those gifts totaled in the mid-$3K’s. God one step ahead.

So again I ask you: Why worry, when you can pay? 

Cause when He’s footing the bill, you can pay. You can pay for whatever he says. And often we can pay for a whole lot more. Sometimes it seems we can only pay for “less,” but then he turns our hearts towards those who truly have less, or…he brings the Body around, and everything gets all paid for after all.

Thanks, God.

We know you brought this boy to us, and we know that his adoption is not any kind of burden that falls on our shoulders. 

We are not worried.

What Are You Driving At, Anyway?

WHOOSH. Woosh. Woosh. WHOOSH whoosh whoosh whoosh WHOOSH tinkle clatter Crash.

The scene in my rearview mirror.

Somehow I’d ended up down a lane clearly not meant for driving. One second it was a road, the next it was outdoor cafés. Fancy umbrella-ed tables with silverware and wine glasses.

My wife and I are traveling in Italy right now. It’s our 20th wedding anniversary, and that’s the only reason a whole week went by last week with no updates to this blog (for the first time––not likely the last). It has been a special privilege indeed to enjoy a vacation without kids (thanks to my folks and Ruth, the kids’ Xi’an auntie). At the moment I’m typing on a train somewhere between Florence and Venice, which is just about as lovely as it sounds.

For three days we had a rental car, which we took from Rome to the Tuscan countryside to the sea and then back to Florence. While in the charming city of Siena, we found ourselves between ancient stone buildings on an ancient stone street: lots of people but no cars. Except ours. The people were huddled around their guides, or looking at maps or in our windows as we crept through their midst. The shops were selling gelato and postcards and trinkets. Try as I might, I couldn’t find a way out, and the road wound ever downwards, everything in the bowl funneling us to old city Centro. Every time I tried a turn, it seemed to be a road that was only more inappropriate.

Finally, the warning signs informed me the next pass between stone was only 2.0 meters. I longed for a digital option where the sign told me how wide my car was. At last, around the next bend there was a teeny garbage truck, a handicap parking space, and “P” signs. I wasn’t crazy. “Parking” up ahead. We emerged, blinking, into a large open square surrounded by churches. I saw the green-and-white-striped marble monstrosity on a postcard later.

Off to the side was a pile of compact cars like ours. I pulled up to the bumper of the last one in a row, the final “space” they’d formed in between the two rows of real spaces. At last I felt lucky, and we got out ready to walk around a bit.

I noticed a lady in a nametag watching us. She wasn’t wearing any kind of uniform, but she came towards us a few steps to scrutinize my license plate. “Blah blah blah blassio?” she asked in what I assume was perfect Italiano. “Um…no?” I replied in flawless English.

Thankfully she spoke English, too, and she kindly told me that not only was this resident parking only, but that driving within the city walls of all the cities in the whole region was illegal. Only residents and those with hotel reservations inside the wall.

“Oh.”

“There are cameras everywhere; they will put a €150 fine on the credit card connected to this rental car.”

Oh, my. This wasn’t even my first violation, then. Tickets surpassing our restaurant bills for two weeks was not my idea of a priceless vacation. We thanked her for the information and hightailed it out of there.

That’s when the WHOOSH story came back to me. The WHOOSH story didn’t happen on this trip. But the WHOOSH (an umbrella around a restaurant table spinning and spinning until it fell) story did happen in Italy. I’ve been here once before. For one night. 1994. One year before getting married. Only that time while driving, I’d found myself so deep into old stone roads that I’d left them altogether with only restaurants as far as the eye could see. Plus, that time it hadn’t been a Fiat 500C I’d been driving, it had been a diesel camping van. Six-sleeper.

Like on the current trip, then I had long been stressfully looking for an escape route. At the moment of my umbrella disaster, I’d actually judged the space wide enough, but…I’d forgotten about the double bed cannister above, extending out wider than the driver’s cab. That’s what swiped the umbrella.

It was bad enough to see a couple of Italian waiters running out into the street waving their arms and shouting, even though I got out and even though they told me not to worry. It was far worse, 100 meters later when the road truly became impassable, to have to throw the camper into reverse and go by them again backwards while they covered their mouths in a weak attempt to conceal their laughing.

Did the “beep beep beep” that day really sound like “I.Di.Ot” or is that just my memory?

Here’s what I will say: if those ticket violations from this trip really do show up on my visa card? For my next trip to Italy (which, if things follow the current pattern, I guess will fall in 2036) I’ll stick to trains.