My First Story Sale or The Gates Of Heaven Explode!
I wrote an essay the other day, “An Open Letter To Literary Agents”.
Consider this as part two.
In 2016 I self-published a novel called “Confessions Of An Honest Man”. The novel was awarded “Honorable Mention” by Writer’s Digest. This was a huge win for me. WD had some 16,000 submissions that year and my book was reviewed and praised. I put their review of the book on the back cover.
Here it is.
I’ve spent the past two weeks editing and updating the manuscript. I had to reformat it from the earlier version and that involved sitting here and excising all “Tabs”. That part was easy. The other part was to space each paragraph because the readers no longer had a way to know when a paragraph began or ended. That took me a few days. The novel is more than 141,000 words long.
My right shoulder is so sore from this endless tapping of the space bar that I’ve been rubbing it with a miraculous cream called Diclofenac.
Here’s the story of my first literary sale, which came to me like a thunderbolt. A couple of decades ago the literary world wasn’t digitized. Regular snail mail letters went back and forth. I wrote letters to agents so many times that I could paper my bedroom with the polite rejection slips.
“You write well,” they said, “but unfortunately your project is not right for us at this time.” That was the sentence. I got tired of seeing it.
At that time Scott Meredith Agency represented giants like Norman Mailer and Arthur C. Clarke. Though Meredith has passed away the agency continues. At that time they charged a fee for reading submissions. I saved my couch change and submitted a manuscript to the agency with a fee of $50.
I got a response and it was slightly different than the standard “You write well, etc”. A P.S. told me that I could submit another work and it would be read without a fee. I was being encouraged! I submitted again, got rejected again but somehow they held the door open for me. Someone at the agency had spotted me as promising talent. I submitted a short story about a planet where there are six genders. The story survives to this day as a bit of satire about gender identity. Here’s the art work provided by Playboy:
A couple of weeks passed and then an envelope arrived. In it was a check for $1800. Meredith had sold the story to Playboy Magazine. Meredith offered me a two year contract. I was so thrilled!
That story went on to win Playboy’s Best Story Of The Year Award. I was invited to Playboy’s giant anniversary party and had an all-expenses paid junket to New York City. The agency assigned me an editor, a man of astute judgment and discernment. I owe him a lot.
After that I worked on my giant projects, my novels. One of them is autobiographical, and that is “Confessions Of An Honest Man”. Another is what I describe as “A Story Of The Ancient Universe”. A third arose from my research into the former Yugoslavia. That one, “The Shadow Storm” is unpublished. I think it’s great. I would, though, wouldn’t I?
An artist is tasked with a number of things and one of them is to maintain a tireless belief in one’s self. Of course, there is the possibility that I am mediocre and just can’t admit it. I think I’m brilliant. I’m old enough to understand the difference between creative power and strength of character. They are very different things and I have opted for strength of character. I learned in my middle 30s that my creative powers weren’t going to be enough to sustain a life.
Lucky for me I’ve remained creative well into my dotage. Here’s the cover of my fantasy/SF novel, “The Gods Of The Gift”.
I wrote this little essay as I recover from an accident. Two weeks ago I was exposed to an extremely loud sound and lost most of the hearing in my right ear. It’s coming back, slowly. I am a student of piano and I’ve learned something about Beethoven’s heartbreak. To love music so passionately and be unable to hear the results of one’s dedication: how awful! I feel for Herr Ludwig. No wonder he was short tempered.
That, dear friends, is today’s item. I’m lucky to be alive and remain creative. That is the greatest gift.