Still waiting...

There are many personality traits a writer must have. Talent, yes. Persistence, for sure. An active imagination, a given. Thick skin, akin to an alligator's, most certainly. Huh? What does thick skin have to do with writing? Rejection, my friend. As a writer, you should expect to be rejected. In fact, you'll probably be rejected so many times that you'll need that alligator skin.

Take Stephen King (12 rejections), Margaret Mitchel (38), Ernest Hemingway (rejected by "The Saturday Evening Post") and Thomas Wolfe, for example. Great names all and yet all faced multiple rejections. Only a minute number of authors are snatched up the first time they submit. You're more likely to be struck twice by lightning while cashing your twenty-nine million dollar lottery winnings check. Catch my drift? Kurt Vonnegut, author of Slaughterhouse-Five, had a large box full of rejection letters. Thank God he never gave up. Rejection is part of a writer's life.

So is waiting. When a writer submits a query and sample of his or her writing to an agent, hoping for representation, that writer should expect to wait months for a response. Once you have an agent and your manuscript is finally being "shopped out," expect to wait some more. Editors at large publishing houses often take months. One had The Phantom Lady of Paris for ten months. Small publishers have a shorter turn-around. God bless them.

Once you've been offered a contract, expect to wait for the actual contract to arrive. The waiting continues through-out the process. Publishing dates get pushed back. The release date of November 9th as stated on my contract did not materialize. Things happened and, so, I am still waiting....