Success, Failure, and Small Press Joy
Enjoy Your Candelabra of Ideas
Today, I’m thinking about success and failure. I wrote (and rewrote and rewrote— then scratched and started again) a novel that’s a passion project. I’ve spent many months trying to get some love from agents. They all think it’s interesting, but, in fact, didn’t fall in love with it. No doubt other writers have received the same formula rejection. There's always a sense of crisis at this point. What to do?
At the end of the month, I’ll be talking to an editor about the manuscript. I need to know what doesn’t work. Then I’ll need to decide whether to put it to rest or to go back at it. The truth is, I’m pretty burnt out. Since I’m working on a new project, I may need to abandon this project. It’s a terrible feeling.
At the same time this is happening, I’ve learned that my YA novel will be published by a small press. Not until 2025, but I’m excited about delivering it to readers. This will be my third small press publication. Each has its own joyous aspects.
Add to that the essays and short stories I’ve had accepted, rejected, and those now on submission. Each piece of writing began as an internal flicker. If I’m a tough cactus, I’m the kind that blooms in candelabra fashion.
Related Book Quotes/Writing Prompt
With small successes in one hand (indie publications) and failure in the other (no agent love), I have one writing prompt today for anyone with the same struggles. Try answering these two questions from Cheryl Strayed. I believe I read this in Scratch: Writers, Money and the Art of Making a Living, but I wrote it down and placed it in my desk drawer without noting the source.
“You have to use a different measuring stick for success in the arts. Did you do the work that you needed to do? Did you write the best book that you could at that moment in your life? If you can answer yes to that, then no matter what happens, you succeed.” — Cheryl Strayed
As Long as We’re on the Topic of Measuring Success
In
, Saunders addressed the fact that people often return to themes in their writing. (BTW—if you don’t belong to Story Club, subscribe now. It’s such a great community and Saunders is so insightful and generous.)“I’ve often thought that any writer has certain ‘sweet spots’ – voices or attitudes or topics that just, for whatever reason, open up to her. Given that any talent is finite, part of the writer’s job is to go back into certain rich veins and rework them.”
My own writing often is about girls and women who are, in some way, working to escape the confines of their life. My upcoming YA novel is set in the most patriarchal society I could think of: a polygamist cult where young girls are forced to marry men not of their choosing (often much, much older men).
In 2021, I had a collection of short stories published by Los Nietos Press. The protagonist of each story is different, but they are all trying to break out of some sort of female role. They start young and age as the collection moves forward. To people who ask, I describe it as feminist literary fiction. Having this collection published was cause for celebration. Short story collections are a tough sell for an unknown author, and finding a home for this one filled me with gratitude.
This Wednesday evening I’ll be interviewed about this collection as well as a chapbook at 7 PM PDT. Please join us if you’d like to hear about these small press journeys.
Here’s the link: https://www.facebook.com/LifeOfJem?mibextid=LQQJ4d
A Piece of the Small Press Journey
If you are considering small press publication, there is a lot of joy in the process. I thought it would be fun to look at one aspect today—the book cover as it progressed. We had many conversations around images before simplifying the cover to represent the essence of the stories.
The first images were in no way meant to be the cover. They were just mashups of stock photos to come up with the idea—to decide what belongs on the cover. Here are some (by no means all) of them.
One of the stories is titled “Painted Ladies.” Since all of the stories paint the stories of women, we thought it was a good title for the collection, but ultimately, we changed our minds. The first story includes a mom who carelessly interprets tarot (the nine of swords is featured). This, too, didn’t feel like the right cover. It was too narrrow.
We played with images that might be included in the cover—just a mashup of stock photos in order to get the ideas flowing. A sacred heat and snakes were aspects of the stories. Ultimately, we didn’t go further into trying an actual design because it was too busy.
We decided on a sacred heart as a simple design, but most images gave a religious feel. I didn’t want to mislead the reader—and likely anger some—because this is a far from religious book.
I wanted to see what a sacred heart with a quickly drawn border would look like. The artist Aleta Jacobson made one for us. I liked it, but also felt that the placement of the wound in the heart gave it the aspect of a face with sunglasses—one that was winking at the reader. I liked this idea as a ‘sorry, not sorry’ image. It fit the tone of the stories. But ultimately, we decided to move the wound to lessen the feeling of a face and have a simple sacred heart.
Winking at the reader face:
Final choice:
Libraries
Good News on the Censorship Front from School Library Journal
“Fed Up and Filing Suit for Intellectual Freedom”
“SLJ spoke with plaintiffs in four cases about what led them here, why they pursued this path, and the goal of the legal action.”
In the unlikely event that you are unfamiliar with the ongoing battle over books in the US, this article from The Nation is a nice overview as well as a detailed look at a specific library and the threat it is under.
https://www.thenation.com/article/society/libraries-book-banning/
Lastly—Inlandia: A Literary Journey (online journal) is producing a special issue on librarians and libraries which launches at the end of September. I will have an essay there about my experience with book challenges and removing a book from the collection. I’ll share when it arrives.
I'm interested in what happens to fingers in "Acts of Contrition." Then I began to see the cactuses in your photos as hands and fingers, pink and yellow flowers being finger tips. Some grad student will write a thesis on "fingers and finger tips in the works of Victoria Waddle" someday.
I wonder if there are temporary fashions, fads even, in the types of materials that agents and publishers prefer. Maybe something not thought attractive this year will be met with enthusiasm five years from now.