Manuscript update: I’m at 8,937 words, 1,723 words more than my last post, which was five days ago, so I’m way below my goal of 1,025 words a day. Sigh. To be finished by the end of this month, I have to write 1,150 a days. Don’t know that that’s going to happen, but we’ll see.
I don’t want to seem like I’m harping on rejections after my post “Dealing with rejections” from last week, but in my continued agent research for my completed and edited book (not the one I’m currently writing), I came across a wonderfully inspirational story and wanted to share.
On her blog, Aprilynne Pike, author of New York Times #1 bestseller Wings, talks about her journey to signing with agent Jodi Reamer, of Writers House and the agent of Twilight author Stephenie Meyer. (Click for the full post here, but I’ll give you some highlights.
Aprilynne said she reached triple-digit rejections for her book:
“I had sent this sucker to every agent who might possibly be interested in representing fantasy,” she says.
In that time, she had received two requests for the full and both of them had been out for two months. All the rest were rejections.
Aprilynne doesn’t say if she ever felt frustrated or like giving up. Maybe she did, maybe she didn’t.
But what she does show in this post is how much she believed in herself and her book.
After receiving so many rejections, Aprilynne took out an old critique of her manuscript and spent two months polishing it until she thought it was perfect. She then sent it out again.
In her words:
“But I tried to be hopeful. I did get rejections, and this time it was hard. I really felt them, even if it was just those first five pages. But I had a couple of bites and was happy about that.”
A few months later, she got an email from Jodi, and … well, the rest is history.
There are two takeaways here:
First: Polish your manuscript until it is perfect. That will get you an agent.
Second: Never give up. If Aprilynne had given up after her first round of triple-digit rejections, she never would have become the New York Times best-selling author she is today. Aprilynne’s Wings is scheduled to be made into a movie by Disney, and the sequel novel, Spells, was released today. Wings also was in Publishers Weekly’s top-selling book list.
I love this story, and get so much inspiration from it.
What’s your favorite inspirational writing story?
Write On!
One Response
Thanks for the inspiring story. It’s important to remember as we go through the rejection process. I just saw Jay Asher, the author of Thirteen Reasons Why, speak. He wrote picture books for about 10 years and got nice rejections, but rejections still. His wife convinced him to write this one last book before he quit. He got published and is on the New York Times bestseller list.