Learning From Rats: Cinderella Story Part Two

Jennifer Crusie is a New York Times Bestselling author and recently the source of much inspiration for my critique group. One of our members found this blog post of hers titled "Rats With Islands: How to Survive Your Publishing Career." When I read her essay, I thought of my last post about believing that your Cinderella story can come true with hard work and determination. So, I am not the only optimist out here in the publishing world.

In Jennifer's essay, she talks about an experiment with rats and compares the creatures in this experiment to writers trying to have a successful writing career. From this description of her essay, I realize it doesn't sound inspirational--but it really is. I hope you will check out Jennifer's essay. One of the best parts, and what I tried to show you with J. K. Rowling's story in my last post, was when Jennifer writes about the number of successful authors who did not have an easy time on the road to their success. Crusie tells us about Debbie Macomber, who was featured in the March issue of WOW!. Debbie didn't even own a typewriter--she had to rent one! Now, think about it--we are so spoiled by our computers that we can't even imagine writing on a typewriter. And Debbie had to RENT one.

These are hard times--I know. I recently saw a post on a children's writers' listserve about an author who has still not received her December royalty check. With this post came several stories about companies paying a year late. My own historical fiction book has had the release date moved back due to the economy. Editors are probably less likely to take a chance on new authors if their company is already in trouble. But do you think a bad economy would have stopped J. K. Rowling, Debbie Macomber, or Jennifer Crusie? NO! And don't let it stop you. The bad economy won't be here forever--history shows us that.

Check out Jennifer's essay, and keep your head up. Maybe even become a rat looking for its island. . .

Happy Writing!
Margo Dill
www.margodill.com
Read These Books and Use Them (blog)
photo from Jennifer Crusie's website