Children

My friend’s novel was rejected by a publisher yesterday and she is a bit down in the dumps. Understanding this is a business and it was nothing personal on the part of the publisher, it is personal to the writer.

First of all, we pour our heart, souls, and sweat into our work. We create something out of nothing and the fact that many writers equate finishing a novel to giving birth is no coincidence. I’ve done both and the feeling is similar.

So, we query our child and find an agent who loves our child almost as much as we do. Securing an agent is in a way, validating what we already know about our child. It is good.

Now, the agent pitches our child to the publishing houses. Sometimes our child shines and is picked up right away and sometime our child languishes for months in the hands of editors who don’t care or love our child the way that we do.

Sometimes our child is rejected by the publisher. The shock is swift and severe. Our anger over the unfairness is overwhelming and sometime uncontrollable. How can they not love our child? What do they mean the ending didn’t work? How can they say my characters weren’t realistic and my dialogue wasn’t strong? I must have misunderstood you; did you say my premise was WEAK?

They’ve insulted your child, the fruit of months or even years of hard work.

The meek will take their child into their loving arms, protect it and never allow those evil people to hurt it again. The strong will take the child, evaluate her weaknesses and find ways to improve her. If she is shy, we find ways to make her more outgoing or if she is rambunctious, we find ways to slow her down. If she is awkward, we find ways to make her graceful or if she is angry, we search for the root of her aggression and find ways for her to control it. If she is one dimensional, we find ways to expand her. In short, raising a novel is similar to raising a child.

I know this author is strong and an awesome mother to three children, so I know which path she will take and I know she’ll be successful.

Speaking of children, one of my own, A Day With Pepper, is now published at Penwomanship. Take a look.

Hunting Jack by Colin Galbraith won KIC’s Editor’s Choice for February. Congratulations and it is well deserved.

Yesterday evening was an agglomeration of family oriented tasks so no writing was done. I picked up the kids and after a nutritious dinner of hot dogs and chips, I drove my oldest son back over to the school for his basketball game.

My husband calls from his van, on his way back south to say the van is overheating again and he had a flat tire. The good news was, he’d be home in time to see the basketball game.

I made arrangements with another parent to take my youngest daughter to her basketball practice, but I’d have to pick up the girls after practice. My youngest son also had basketball practice at seven.

The parent picks up my daughter on time and I make it to the school during the first part of the second quarter of the game. I left my wallet in the truck and snuck in through the back door, because I didn’t have a dollar on me for the admission. I tend to yak a lot with other parents so I didn’t notice my son playing right away. When I did notice, I stopped socializing and watched.

My son got the rebound after the other team shot. An opposing player grabbed the ball and it became a struggle to gain control. CRACK! The opposing player flung my 5’ 0" 130 lb son head-first on the gym floor like a discarded candy wrapper. The whole gym went silent as my son struggled to get back to his feet. I saw red and felt angry tears welling in my eyes. THERE WASN’T EVEN A TECHNICAL CALLED ON THAT MONSTER. Well, my protective maternal instincts kicked into overdrive. No, I didn’t run onto the court, but I’m sure the referees heard my futile calls for a technical and for the other player to be tossed out of the game. What a bunch of stupid asses!

My son got to his feet and didn’t even cry, even though I knew he wanted to. He kept playing until half time. My heart ached for him, but he’s almost twelve now and I can’t protect him from the injustices of this world any longer.

I had to leave to pick up my daughter from her practice and I still don’t know who won the game. When I got home, my son had a huge knot on the back of his head and his pupils where a little dilated.

“Mom, I blacked out for a couple of seconds,” he said.

I made him stay up until ten o’clock and then I checked on him every hour of the night. I’m tired but he seemed fine to go to school this morning.

My daughter ran her butt off at practice and whined so much in the shower that I felt sorry for her. She must have slept it all off because her mouth was going a mile a minute this morning.

So, things are back to normal, if they ever were normal.

BK