Thursday, February 7, 2013

Standing On the Shoulders Of Others

I work hard. Insanely hard. And my success did not come easily. Although good things are coming now, great things even I worked very hard for them and I deserve them. I often say my career can be best summed up by the actress Holland Taylor's acceptance speech for her Emmy she earned on 'The Practice', overnight ;).

I'm no spring chicken and I two years ago about this time I had manuscripts, some half-finished, some done, scripts too. And whenever I would venture to send them out I got big fat rejection letters. Finally a friend and fellow author Pamela Turner told me about Savvy Author's Digicon. I went. I pitched. Three publishers and an agent asked for my work. All of them accepted. I chose MuseItUp Publishing, where the author is nurtured and shown the ropes. It's been crazy ever since.

I went to Fandom Fest on a tip from Pamela, (who is the author of the fabulous Death Sword and several shorts featured in anthologies by Rayne Hall and Family Tradition, an ebook from MuseItUp Publishing). There I met Frank Hall of Hydra Publications. Who picked me up as an author with my books Bounty Hunter, the Breath of Life series, the Gunpowder & Lead series, and my short story Set Fire to the Rain. Which brought me the attention of the people running the Creatures, Crimes, and Creativity Conference. In turn I checked them out. They ran a publishing house Intrigue Publishing which specializes in Mysteries & Thrillers. Which...you get the point.

So I owe a huge debt of gratitude to Pamela Turner. She works hard. Insanely hard. I think we're both a little insane to be honest with our work schedules.

Lea Schizas of Muse, (Another Way to Die, No Ordinary Love, GLADIATOR, & ORACLE) made me a better writer. Frank Hall of Hydra (I mentioned the titles at his house) gave me my first print and audio deal. And Denise, Austin, and Sandra of Intrigue gave me my first advance for Sin Of My Father.

I've won awards, GLADIATOR was an Amazon bestseller, and I was on the cover of Target Online Magazine. If it can make it anyone can. You just have to be insane enough to keep pushing at the wall when it feels like it will never move.

2 comments:

Marian Lanouette said...

Great advice.

Author B Swangin Webster said...

Wow...you keep on giving us things to think about.