Ladies, Tigers, and Hefty Magic
April 8, 2002
7:24 a.m.
I finished the book at 3:15 this Saturday afternoon. I left the stack of paper that had been the fourth draft on my desk until this morning, then picked it up and put in the white cardboard filing box that holds earlier drafts. The fifth and essentially final draft remains on my hard drive at the moment--not counting the 101 pages that I did print out so that Lisa could read the major changes. So I guess technically I'm not really done. I'm sure I'll correct whatever typos she finds. Not that I would ever make a typo. But I can no longer really hide behind that fact that the book is pretty much finished as far as working out what the next steps are. That means I'll be working on the dreaded question: agent or publisher? I think this question is like that old situation where a man is shown two doors and told that behind one is the lady of his dreams, behind the other is a week-starved tiger. The only difference is that both doors hold a half-starved tiger and the lady of my dreams ... er ... well ... I assume you get the metaphor, seeing as the real lady of my already lives in my house and all. I know very few writers who really enjoy the business aspect of it all. Some find it intriguing enough to carry a sense of humor into it, others tolerate it well enough, but few seem to actually love doing it. Those who do have gotten far enough into their careers that they don't appear to have to struggle with it. For them, it is a seller's market. But I am not one of those. Despite the WotF stuff, and despite being on a couple preliminary ballots, and in a few major markets, for me the world is still a buyer's market. And so I'm staring at the doors, and thinking about the tigers behind them both. It's all right, you know? It really is. You see, I've got this manuscript now that's sitting on my hard drive. It's a very special item because I've worked really hard for the past year to cast a powerful spell upon it. If my magic is strong enough, it makes me and my manuscript invisible to even the most hungry of tigers. And if this magic is not strong enough ...well, reality says there's always going to be another manuscript. Besides, I've already got the lady of my dreams.  Daily Persistence is © Ron Collins |
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