Author: lleachie

I am an associate professor of human services at a regional Midwestern university. I am also a writer of fantasy and romance, hoping to get traditionally published. I have one husband and am owned by four cats.

Well, Tor rejected my novella of Gaia’s Hands.

The myth of becoming a recognized writer goes like this: a writer writes original work, writes what they love as their friends exhort them to, and after a double-digit number of rejections, finally gets published and makes big splashes in the publishing world. You may recognize this as the storyline of J.K. Rowling, but it’s been told about almost every big writer (“Do you know that Big Name Writer got rejected 23 times?”).

I’m not feeling very optimistic right now. I’ve been rejected somewhere over 100 times; I’ve lost count. I write, revise, submit, and fail. I cling onto the hope that this time would be the time I get published.

You’ve heard this all before. I’ve said it all before.

I’m supposed to write for just myself, and that makes no sense to me. Why would someone write several novels — 80,000 pages apiece — and edit, and polish, so that nobody will read it? If I did this all for myself, I’d write short romances with damn near zero for plots. I’d never get them published because by “romance” I would mean “romance” and not sex.

The optimist in me feels crushed for trying something new. The pessimist in me says “I told you so.” The realist in me can’t figure out how “writing for myself” justifies writing novels nobody reads.

Realistically, I may have to stop writing novels. I don’t know if I will have the motivation to write much if I give up novels, because the possibility of being heard (an antidote to a childhood of not being listened to or believed) was my major motivator, and the reason that not being able to be published is so heartbreaking.

I know I’ve come back before, but right now the thrill is gone.

The Optimist vs the Pessimist

I’m discovering that I am an optimist.

I’m waiting for a few things in the pipeline as I explained yesterday, and I feel good about my possibilities, despite all the times I got rejected before on these very same writings. This is why I keep submitting to agents and publishers. I fantasize about getting published. Again and again, I’m drunk on possibility, captured by potentiality, suspended in rosebuds, surrounded by perpetual spring.

The pessimist in me tries to shut down the optimist to no avail. Optimism provides a kind of high that pessimism can’t compete with. The pessimist in me is in its full glory when I get rejected, and feels no obligation to commiserate with me, preferring to kick me while I’m down.

I’m trying to find a way around the Pessimist’s great timing when I get rejected again, which I suspect will happen (despite the optimism), because realistically, there are a lot more of us writers than there are agents and publishers.

Hiding in Plain Sight

Ther eis one phrase that shows up in every novel I write — “hiding in plain sight”.

This phrase refers to the fact that every novel of mine involves people with some sort of preternatural talent — the strength and teleportation of the Archetypes, the time travel of the Travellers, the Gaia-given talents of those who eat of the Trees, and the inborn random talents of the Prodigies. All of these beings, human and other, live in the world of ordinary people, and all of these people deal with what “hiding in plain sight” means.

Josh, poet and Keeper of the Garden, believes that one can do anything in the open and people will re-explain it as something plausible. He is the only human who believes in humans’ obliviousness to this degree. It could be because his given talent is to have visions, which are not very obvious to other humans.

The Archetypes, immortals in human form, are reluctant to “out” themselves to humans, and so generally don’t teleport or lift objects, nor do they transport themselves in view of others. Usually. Lilly (who lived as a human for 30 years) once teleported a car — with her husband in it.  Archetypes even carry themselves differently around humans — their natural state is to look like superlative examples of humans, so they shake themselves into less beautiful forms of themselves — a kind of reverse glamour.

Meanwhile, the Travellers are the most hidden — they don’t hop out of rooms when non-Travellers are looking, and they stick with their own kind complete with secret societies. If humans understood that the Travellers could manipulate the future by changing the past, Travellers’ lives would be endangered, and they have no non-human strength like the Archetypes.

Prodigies’ talents are most often subtle, and so are often practiced in public. A little emotional manipulation here, a little polyglot talent there — nobody catches on. Except for the man who can cure or kill by touch — he’s very guarded by his talent.

There’s a logic here — a risk/benefit analysis. What is the risk of disclosure versus the benefit? It’s the type of thinking I don’t see in superhero movies, where the heros don’t understand why there’s so much anti-human sentiment.

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*Lilly tends to be impetuous and imperious, like her namesake.

What am I waiting for?

I’m waiting.

What am I waiting for?
The first thing I’m waiting for is 8:00 AM Central (US) Standard time, which is the point at which I can submit the novella of Gaia’s Hands to the Tor Novella program. Remember that Gaia’s Hands is the first book I wrote, the “problem child”, and I took a metaphorical chainsaw to it and reduced it to a little over 20,000 words. I will submit it and then wait some more.
The second thing is the outcome of my latest (and last) Kindle Scout campaign for Voyageurs. I don’t have much faith in this, as Kindle unceremoniously dumped the program on April 3, two days after I got in. They immediately dismantled much of the infrastructure, quit collecting votes, and belatedly let us know that they would choose the winners themselves. Nothing I’ve seen assures me that they’ll choose any of the books, much less mine. 
The third thing is results for a blood test. Nothing scary, I assure you. The test is the HLA antigen test, and if it’s negative, I can become a platelet donor for my local blood bank (apparently I have a dreamy platelet count.) If it’s positive, then I was definitely pregnant at one point in my life. The time I could have been pregnant was 40 years ago, when I was 13, as a result of a rape. (If it’s negative, it doesn’t mean I was never pregnant.) So the blood test has the potential of solving a mystery, one that I’m not sure I want to know the answer to.
Waiting has its advantages. It is ripe with potentiality, a period of time where the optimist can imagine big things to happen. However, I prefer knowing so I can know where to go from here.

Updates and Musings

  1. A question for myself: What is more important — success (not really), recognition (maybe), or skill/talent/competence (heck yeah!) I will always choose improvement and growth, given the circumstances. And I can see many situations where success happens because of factors that have nothing to do with competence and honing one’s craft.
  2. I’m feeling like I have to blow some cobwebs out of my brain. I don’t know if my muse is still on the job (if you’re reading this, Muse, send me a smile!) I need some fantasy, some novelty, some surprise, a little mysticism, fairy wings, talking cats, a rainbow in a dandelion. I need a charge to help put the young love in this damn book I’m working on. 
  3. I will continue writing. I’ve decided what my pdoc was addressing was my sense of perfectionism and inability to stop at some point of “good enough”*. So, although getting published is a nice to have, it’s not a measure of moderate proficiency. While I’m employed, I might have to settle for moderate proficiency, whatever it is. Or maybe not — I don’t have some of the more time-wasting habits like Netflix and excessive Facebook use, so I might have time for both.   
  4. I find out tomorrow or Tuesday about my Kindle Scout submission. I don’t think it will get adopted into the (now defunct) program. Try, try again. I’m not quite ready to throw it in the abyss of self-publishing.
  5. Any love and support  you can give will be appreciated. Even if the only people reading this are actually bots from Russia or Poland.
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* I often can only focus on one thing at a time because it has to be constantly getting better; I can’t stop at good enough. This is why “walk a half-hour daily” becomes “walk four miles a day and eight miles a day on weekends” becomes “walk the Illinois-Michigan Canal in a week”. (Note: Running isn’t part of the plan. In my case, running isn’t part of God’s plan.)

Seed starts

It’s gardening season.

I have spent the whole dreary winter working in my basement greenhouse planting seeds, most of which have grown into cute little seedlings (or in the case of tomatoes, eggplant, and peppers, big monsters.)

I’m trying to find places for all of them in my yard. This is a good problem to have.

I’ve had far worse years for plants. The only seedlings I completely lost were hyssop, purple mitsuba, and Canadian garlic. Most of the herbs that I’d planted last year survived the winter; the exceptions were parsley and rosemary (the sage and the thyme are fine).

I can’t plant the monsterous tomatoes, pepper, and eggplants out till Mother’s Day, nor can I plant their overly abundant basil companions, but I have lots of baby perennials that, in the worse case scenario, can put up with a little reemay over them. Basil thyme and savory; campanula, pinks and yarrow; hablitzia; the humongous perilla (who knew?)

I don’t know if I said this before, but all the things I plant need to be edible in at least one part — the rampion has edible roots; the cardoon has edible leaf stalks as does the surprising fuki that I planted two years ago and just saw peek up from the ground yesterday.

Someday, I will have the urban Garden of Eden I’ve always wanted.

So, what is writing “good enough”?

I talked to my Pdoc (psychiatrist) the other day about how I don’t just want to be good at things, but excellent at them. I don’t just want to write, I want to get published; I want to earn awards at school, which makes me discount when individual students thank me for helping them, etc. (I’m sorry students, it’s not that you’re not important or good enough! It’s my problem!)

Dr. Jura suggested that I look around at what is held as the standard definition of good and then reduce it ten percent.

I would love to be doing things good enough rather than try to be the best, especially as I’m the best only in my dreams. I would love to write “just for myself” — much less strain, much fewer down moments. But I don’t seem to be able to settle for “good enough”, especially to writing. I associate love with accomplishment, and I want to feel loved. (Yes, Richard loves me, but my inner child is a voracious monster who needs love every moment of every day.) I want to earn being loved (I didn’t grow up with unconditional love). I want to —

I obviously have a values conflict here between “I want to win” and “I want to be accepted on my own merits. I need to resolve it.

I’ll be back to creative excerpts tomorrow.

Post-semester crash, or "My brain shut down".

(Note: I love the Victorian way of titling books with the “or” in the middle, such as Syphilis, or the French Disease). So I decided to try it.

My brain, in a word, is empty right now. It’s a form of inertia. It’s what happens if I spend two weeks laser-focused on getting final projects and exams graded — and I fun out of grades. Like I’m plowing a field, but then I run out of field and crash face-first into a wall. 
I’m trying to write on a story, any of my stories, editing, scheduling, ANYTHING.
But my brain seems incapable of creating right now.
I hope it comes back soon.

Autographs

I asked for an autograph from a friend yesterday. I may or may not have gotten it, depending on whether the Instagram post was meant for me.

What my friend doesn’t understand (even if he’s given it some thought) is that I did not ask for the autograph because he was an up-and-coming actor, but because he was my friend.

I don’t like the whole concept of autographs. They disturb my Quaker sensibilities by putting someone else on a pedestal — “I’m so honored to have breathed the same air as you!” They treat famous people like trading cards — “Hey, I got Ryan Reynolds!” “Oh yeah, I have Elvis Presley! Mine’s much more awesome!” And finally, because I’m arrogant, I want to respect the person and want them to respect me as well.

That being said, I think there are reasons for autographs, and I actually have a few. Most of my autographs have been from children’s book illustrators, because I admire the art of translating ideas into pictures. I also knew the illustrators in question, and I wanted them to know I admired their work. I have an autograph from Morgan Spurlock, because I admired his documentary series 30 Days, and because he showed me appreciation for being a college professor.

In other words, I find the relationship between artist and audience not to be that of the little audience in front of the huge stage (ask me how I feel about stadium concerts!) but of connection between a performer or a writer and their audience.

Or maybe I just want to adopt creative people into my life.

PS: Thank you for the virtual autograph. If you didn’t mean it for me, thanks anyhow.