Please pick meI have been seriously writing novels since I was 21. It might’ve been a year earlier, or a year later. But around then, I began writing my first book for reals. I started submitting it to publishers around 2016. I was 24. (Maybe). Most of the rejections I received are standard form responses. At first, I felt like I was earning my stripes as a writer. All writers have rejections. But how many… she who must not be named loves to w**k on about how she had 12 rejections before HP was published. I quickly surpassed her rookie numbers. Just imagine the above but a f*****g load of times.There was only one rejection that had me doubting everything. I read it sitting in the car before going to the gym in Waverton, Sydney. I remember it being hot. I remember the car being parked on a steep hill. I remember James being so kind to me. I remember going to the gym afterwards and seeing that there were thrusters and toes to bars on the program (kill me.)Sometimes, I think back to James, and how hard it would have been to witness me receive something like this, and because I am so thin skinned, then he had to witness me bawl my eyes out. I mean, f*****g hell, if James received an email like this I would want to kill someone. But I kept writing. This time, historical fiction. I finished The Rules Upheld By No One quickly. Maybe within a year (???). In 2018 I started submitting again.Please imagine the above but a f*****g load of times.This time, however, I had a contact in the industry. I had been interning at a small Australian publishing house, and the editor there took a look at my manuscript. Actually, and this is murky in the memory too, I think I paid them to look at it, as a freelance situation. They gave the book a solid edit, but they liked her! They passed Rules onto their boss and she liked it too. They took her to an acquisitions meetings, where the editorial stuff try to sell the book to the business people.James had left for a conference in Germany on the day of the meeting. I felt alone. I had built this moment up for four years. The day I would finally sell a book. My big break. I had decided that this day would change my entire life. All I wanted to do was be a writer, and I needed someone to choose me, so I could live the life I wanted to live. If I wasn’t chosen, I would have to live a life doing work I hated. A prospect which felt like dying. The meeting time came and went. There was no news. I messaged the editor and felt like an annoying little s**t. Nothing. The evening came around. It was one of the worst days of my life. Eventually, I get a message that the publishers couldn’t decide whether they wanted her or not, and that they’d let me know soon.I followed up so many times after that. I hated myself every time I reached out; I felt so small and so powerless. They never got back to me. It was the cliff hanger from hell. At this point, I was not okay. I feel embarrassed to write that, because we have this narrative that artists need to be okay with rejection. “It’s not personal.” Yes it f*****g is. That’s my whole heart you just cast aside. It is personal. Thick skin? No. I am thin skinned. That’s why I am a creative in the first place. I am an eerily quintessential enneagram 4, my core desire is to be SEEN, my core fear is to be INSIGNIFICANT. Rejection is painful. Being unseen, or cast aside is agony to me. Not insurmountable. But painful. Exquisitely so. I had hundreds of rejections at this point. Why did I keep going? Because I was f*****g stubborn. Because I had an intolerance for a life that didn’t sparkle, and a life doing work that was meaningless. A life without writing books was the dullest existence imaginable to me. Because I had the tiniest flicker of a flame within me that said: I think you have something f*****g incredible to give. From “pick me” to picking myselfI was told, then, by a lot of people to self publish. I was revolted by the idea of having to choose myself. It felt mortifying. Like I was openly declaring “No one wants my books,” “I’m the only one who thinks my novels are any good.” Emotionally, I was not yet able to move forward. I was still pissy. Angry that someone hadn’t handed me the big break, the opportunity I thought I needed. It was journaling that let me see the truth. I could see it on the page.I could see myself sinking into bitterness, victimhood and stagnancy. I knew authors who were angry and bitter. I had met those people at writing workshops and conferences, seen them online. I knew if I let myself go that way, it would destroy me. I did not want that for myself. I wanted to be an author. And so, I needed to do the most nauseatingly powerful thing one could do, choose myself, publicly. I found a journaling excerpt from a few months before I self published “There is nothing much to do, I must simply face my narratives about being a failure, and not being enough. I trust because I know my worth. I ...
Show More
Show Less
Nov 24 202557 mins
21 mins
Mar 26 20251 hr and 10 mins