Patience is Overrated

Silly me, I thought that when I finally signed the publishing contract my worries would be over; no more long nights awake in front of a screen trying for the hundredth time to send in a query letter. Turns out I’m one of those people that has a hard time waiting. The excitement I felt when I learned that all my hard work was coming to fruition burned hot and fast, which was partially a good thing.

At first there was still much to do. I had to review my entire manuscript and clean up anything I thought needed it before Hidden Shelf Publishing sent it off to an editor. The editor that Hidden Shelf Publishing chose for my manuscript was Arielle Basich and she was wonderful to work with, I really enjoyed her insight. And for a time Arielle and I worked back and forth cleaning up everything that we could, changing what needed to be changed, and overall improving the story. I was so excited that as soon as I got the notes from the her, I crammed in as much editing as I could manage. But eventually, that wasn’t enough for me, I was getting antsy.

This is a part of the publishing process that can really take it out of a lot of authors, the waiting. The trick to remaining sane during these months, or years if you are one of the more unfortunate ones, is patience…

Nah, I’m just kidding. You know how they say curiosity killed the cat, well patience murdered the author. Sitting around twiddling your thumbs is one of the worst things you can do, not only is it detrimental to the novel you are currently trying to publish, but it dulls your writing skills. Few authors can expect to be one hit wonders, so what makes you think you can settle with just publishing one book. If you are anything like me than you have more book ideas swimming around in your head than you know what to do with. Don’t cram them back into the recesses of your mind, get out your laptop, or if you are more old fashioned your pen and paper, and get to it. I was lucky, considering my book is the first of a series I had a clear cut path where to go next, but for those of you who aren’t so lucky it’s even more important that you keep at it.

Starting a new novel can be that breath of fresh air that helps you to survive the waiting game, or as I like to call it, author purgatory. Nothing drains an up and coming author more than waiting for what seems like an eternity before your book finally is released. In this game, you have to keep your mind sharp. No matter how good you think you are, you can always use more practice. And you never know, starting something new might even give you some profound insight about your current novel. There’s always room to edit before print, but after the words are on the page it’s too late. Stay sharp, and happy writing out there.