Hope

Today I'm home from work. John is writing his sequel. This morning he wrote back to a young writer who had written to inquire about venturing forth into the world of writing after college. I wrote back to a literary publicist I had contacted. I also reviewed an estimate that Book Masters had sent me and continued to mull over the costs and benefits of using Book Masters over other self-publishing houses. Later I received another polite rejection letter from an agent.

Doing this work without seeing any immediate payoff, always thinking about costs, and wondering if an agent will ever consider his work can be a massive headache. I feel the muscles in my face taut with tension. But I keep telling myself to be patient. There isn't a deadline for success looming over us. I've always known that success (I should say 'Big Success' since we already have had quite a bit of success) in writing is a long, long process, but it's easy to forget when you're putting so much work into it on a daily basis. I'm glad that John has me to work on the marketing and querying, etc. for the book, while he writes his books, because I can see how having to handle all of it on one's own would be a killer for the creative work of writing- the actual work that a writer wants to be doing. Kudos to all of you writers who are doing all of it or almost all of it on your own.