I get rejected almost every week, and that’s a good thing. It means I’m trying.
Confession: I am self-published and still looking for an agent and traditional publishing deal. I’ve been writing since I was sixteen and sent my first query in 1996, so I’ve been trying for a very long time. Admittedly, there were decades where I gave up writing and didn’t query at all, and looking back, I kick myself for that weakness. If I’d kept at it, I might have that agent by now.
Being a published author has been my dream since first grade when my book ‘Wise the Owl’ (a funny twist on a wizard at school) won 1st prize in the Young Author’s Contest for my school district. My next book, in 5th grade, was so good the school judges thought my parents had helped and disqualified me. My teacher knew better and got a visiting local author to sign it, which kept my spirits up. My third book, first full length novel really, was a science-fiction, which I wrote on a typewriter during summer breaks when I was going to college. That’s the one I finally finished and queried in 1996, after transferring it to my first Mac computer by laborious scanning and OCR recognition. That one was rejected by Oscar Collier (the agent who’d written the book on how to write a query letter, which I’d studied inside and out). He wrote lots of handwritten notes about how bad the book was. I was demoralized. I stopped writing for ten years. I didn’t query anyone else.
I was so stupid. I should have felt privileged to get a handwritten critique. I should have learned from it instead of hiding my head in the sand.
Writing is something you can’t help doing if you love it. I did lots of journalling, but finally the bug to write another novel struck. I wrote one, a paranormal suspense thriller, that my beta readers liked, and I queried probably two agents at most before I chickened out and decided I needed to get better. No replies. So, I wrote another book. A dark fantasy this time. That one I may have sent to five agents before it was rejected, and I chickened out again.
I’d been blogging and making lots of author friends, which helped keep me encouraged and kept me going. This was 2011, and after seven years of trying to have a baby, I finally had IVF and my son. Thus, I was in hospital and totally missed the blog comment from Hollywood screenwriter Julie Bush (Sons of Anarchy) who said I write well enough I should forget an agent and just self-publish. I really wish I’d seen that comment, because I’d have been perfectly placed to take advantage of the rise of ebooks. Grr!
As it was, months later I was up all night with a sleepless baby and decided for my sanity I needed to write something fun. So, I took the rough idea I’d had for Eva Thorne and turned it into ‘Tangle of Thornes’. I didn’t even try querying. Humorous fantasy/mystery/steampunk/paranormal romance was hard enough for me to explain to readers let alone try to convince an agent! It didn’t matter. This book was all for me and all for fun.
So, I self-published, and five books later I am so happy. ‘Tangle of Thornes’ made it into the top 500 on all of Amazon US (number 1 in Steampunk)! My prequel novella, ‘A Thorne in Time’ made number 1 in its category and also stayed in the Top 10 in Steampunk on Amazon US for six months! Now, ‘Nest of Thornes’ got chosen for a Bookbub New release for Less. I have my fingers crossed it does well, so I appreciate anyone who goes out and buys. THANK YOU!
And guess what, I wrote a whole other series of three middle-grade fantasy books over the last few years, which I’m now querying. I did some great pitches at the Australian KidLitVic conference and had a couple of agents take a look, but it wasn’t right for them. I’ve learned how random it is: you need the right agent looking for the right book for them at the right time. Totally unpredictable.
I’ve decided if it took J.K. Rowling and Stephen King hundreds of rejections (and some people still don’t like their work), then I am aiming for at least 100 rejections! I’m trying three a week, so I’ll get there in a few months and let you know how I go. I may need to write another book and aim for 100 more!
Thanks for reading.
Excerpt:
A flash of lightning sent shadows looming, blocky figures in dark raincoats, as they hefted my steamer trunk from the hold and onto the deck of the airship. Rain pummelled them, driven sideways by the wind. Crew scrambled to tie ropes after several corroded brass moorings tore free of the old dock. The deck swayed beneath me, so I widened my stance. I shifted into a fighting pose and pulled the serrated sword from its bone sheath. My Ashur was the weapon of choice for Solhan ladies, but I was no lady.
“Where do you think you’re taking that?” I asked, my ominous tone punctuated with thunder.
The thugs in raincoats froze, surprised to see me. Someone had drugged my meal and barred my cabin door from the outside. Fortunately, I had invisible Bogle companions following me everywhere, always the first to eat my meals, not because they were official food testers but because they were eternally hungry. They also removed the metal bar from the outside, so I escaped without needing to cut through the cabin wall, which I would have done. I would do anything to protect that trunk.
“No pithy comeback or plausible excuse?” I said, disappointed. “You two really are thick. Who do you work for?”
The deckhands saw my drawn blade and froze too. This old dock was not Highcrowne, likely a pirate mooring off the usual air routes. Either they were trying to find refuge in the storm, or they were in on it too. I didn’t think they were pirates, else they would all be armed and coming at me with swords, but something was off about them. That’s what I got for eschewing the premier airship liners with their security protection, courtesy of Rose Industries. I’d been trying to lay low, but it looked like I would need to be laying low a few bad guys instead.
“We don’t want any trouble,” one of the crew said, raising his hands.
“Untie us and get us back underway and there won’t be any,” I said. I didn’t know how to fly this thing, and so I couldn’t kill them, as tempting as it was. The two holding my trunk, however…. “I told you both to set that down. Gently.”
They obeyed. Never trust anyone who complies so quickly. Not in this line of work. I ignored the crew, their hands full of ropes, their bedraggled clothing too threadbare to hide any weapons, and I went for the raincoats.
One whipped out a flintlock pistol. Fool. It was too wet to fire. The other was slightly smarter, revealing a bullwhip. He was fast too. He struck, wrapping it around the tip of my sword before I got to him.
The one weakness of a serrated blade was how easily it could be caught, but that usually worked both ways. It was fantastic for disarming an opponent, and if it was sharp enough—as mine was—it sliced right through anything, including leather. His whip lost a third of its length, and a heartbeat later I had the tip of my sword pointed at his eye. The one with the useless pistol donned brass knuckles and came for me, but I wasn’t only a good swordswoman, I was a necromancer. Big mistake.
Lorel and Clayton were teen sweethearts, brought together by a fierce love of books (and hormones). Despite being married for almost 35 years, they are still madly in love and still writing. As writing partners, they meld logic, creativity, and genres. Fantasy, science-fiction, mystery, horror, steampunk, thriller, romance, classics … they read them all, and if they can mix them they will!
Still reading? Want to know more?
Lorel has a PhD in molecular biology and Once Upon a Time did cancer research before turning to the dark side (aka marketing), but she uses her powers for good, helping raise funds for charity. She loves books, movies and animals, and would gladly spend all day with a cat on her lap and the wind in her hair (Conan reference there), while tapping out a story on her keyboard. Or maybe a movie script. With coffee of course. And lots of chocolate!
Clayton is a classically trained painter turned digital artist who now glares at the AI generated images currently obliterating the slim chance artists once had of earning a living. Clayton is severely dyslexic but loves books and storytelling. He adds vast imagination and a discerning ear for effective prose to their creative collaboration, not to mention the book cover art.
Born and raised in the western United States, they traveled to Sydney, Australia in 1997 and never left, finding the sunshine and beaches of “Oz” too irresistible.
Look
them up if ever you’re Down Under.
Website: https://lorelclayton.com/
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Thanks so much for hosting me, Serena!
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