Alas, I am not Spartacus. I am Sisyphus, doomed to an eternity of pushing my books uphill towards the summit where the rewards of being published await in the impenetrable ivory towers of the publishing industry, only to have the boulder repeatedly roll back to the bottom.
It's too easy to imagine some Zeus-like figure of the literary heavens, deciding I have done something to merit a punishment similar to Sisyphus. For there is no punishment more cruel than continuously coming so close to your goal only to have the bottom fall out, forcing you to start over once again.
Okay, this sounds a little overly pessimistic, but what struggling author hasn't felt similar frustration at some point?
Any journey towards publication is a long arduous task. We've heard all the difficulties most successful authors have had to endure before attaining the ultimate reward.
My latest Sisyphus moment occurred last week, when my agent, who I thought loved me, decided it was time to part ways. Only last year I sat with her in a hotel lobby restaurant in Portland, Oregon, pitching my brilliant idea of a young adult dark fantasy series pitting the world of tattooing against the world of piercing. She loved the idea, relating between mouthfuls of succulent grilled salmon, that just the week before she had conversed with a prestigious editor about the lack of piercing and tattooing stories in the YA market. Of course, piercing, tattoos and teens are a match made in heaven.
With her encouragement, I dedicated the next eight months to drafting the first book in the series that was sure to be the next TWILIGHT. Giddy with enthusiasm after completing my masterpiece, I rushed a copy to her e-mail. Weeks of silence followed. Something was not right. I could sense that as clearly as a seagull sensing a storm.
My vision of her staying up through the entire night, eagerly turning page after page to get to the thrilling conclusion, seemed less likely now. Okay, maybe she was so overwhelmed with the genius of the story that she needed a few weeks to digest the enormity of it before moving forward. Yeah, highly unlikely.
As the days passed, in which I obsessively checked my e-mail hourly for her thoughts, I finally found the nerve to send her a 'what's up?' message. Hours later I received her answer. With sweaty hands I clicked on the inbox and my deepest fears were realized.
She had given my novel plenty of thought and decided she did not feel passionate enough about it to fairly represent it. Fair enough. But my heart sank as I watched the boulder, so close to the illustrious summit, start to roll backwards.
If the aforementioned story gives the impression that I'm venting, I apologize. This blog really is about perseverance. I point to my friend and fellow writer, Sean Ellis, as a good example of this. He's been through the ups and downs; the rejections, bad agents, and through it all he's remained a prolific writer. Did he break the cycle of his personal Sisyphus hell? Well, his book, The Shroud Of Heaven is being sold in bookstores across the nation as I write this.
The Shroud Of Heaven
Like Sisyphus, all any of us aspiring writers can do is put our shoulders to the boulders once again and begin the push back up the hill, hoping this time it will actually make it to the top.
This blog is not meant to be my personal lamentation. I want this to be a call to all struggling authors to persist and persevere. Maybe after hearing my Sisyphus Chronicles, you'll see your own travails as endurable and keep on plugging away towards the dream of publication. I can only hope so. The writing dream is too valuable to throw away.
Check out the link below to AgenQuery.com. I recently joined. It's a good resource where publishers, agents and writers can interact. I hope to see you there.
Visit my writer's profile on AgentQuery.com for a preview of the prologue and first chapter of my young adult dark fantasy series Piercing Through.
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