It's always a pleasure to feature someone else on this blog, especially my friends who I've never had the pleasure to meet in person yet. Last week I was blessed by the posts of Donna Fleisher, author and freelance editor, and Mark Harbeson, an engineer and working on his first novel. Today Rebecca Luella Miller, AKA Becky, who has all kinds of writing and teaching credits in her resume, not to mention her blog "A Christian Worldview of Fiction", has agreed to share some thoughts about her first endeavor in the publishing industry. As to be expected with Becky, you get honesty and spirituality. Always a treat. So, heeerrrreee's Becky!
I wrote my first novel more than fifteen years ago. With the germ of a story idea, I had decided to write in a similar style to one of my favorite books, Til We Have Faces. In that novel, C. S. Lewis used sparse prose with a journaling feel. One thing I did differently was to write in third person instead of first, purely a personal preference.
With something like three chapters completed, I attended the Biola Writers’ Institute and received a critique and advice from none other than the the co-director of the conference. Two years later I returned with a completed manuscript.
The director of the Writer’s Institute liked how different the story was and offered to take it to a publisher. She was not an agent but would receive something akin to a finder’s fee if they chose to publish it. The company? Crossway, who just happened to be the going publisher at the time, as far as fiction was concerned.
This was a dream. And it happened so easily! But then I waited. Not a bad thing, the Institute director told me. Rejections came quickly. Long waits meant they were seriously considering it. And I guess they did, but in the end I got a letter from her saying that the pub board (I didn’t know what that was at the time) decided to pass. Something about their having a similar project already.
I waited and waited to see what that similar project might be. The only thing close was Frank Peretti’s supernatural suspense. Of course, there was no name for the genre back then. And the only similarity to my work was that it showed the good versus evil struggle, mine through symbolism, his through imaginative depiction of angels and demons.
Well, I was disappointed that Crossway had decided not to pick up my book, but coming so close with my first try gave me a false sense of confidence. I never again found anyone who liked the sparse prose style I’d used.
Over the years, the more I learned about writing, the more I changed my style until I finally abandoned any attempt to convey the story through the feel of journal writing. It had been a wonderful, easy way to get the story down, but now was the time to dig in and actually learn how to write fiction. And so began a long series of rewrites.
In the meantime writing changed, publishers changed, the market changed, the business changed, the technology changed. They say persistence wins out in the end, but I only believe that to be true if God so ordains it.
Those years ago, when Crossway rejected my manuscript, I thought certainly another publisher was waiting eagerly in the wings. My confidence was in the work.
Now I understand, at least in part, the way the publishing business works, and I realize how difficult it is to get a manuscript into print. My confidence, however, is stronger than ever because it resides where it should have all along—in God Who makes a river stop flowing, Who causes the sun to reverse its direction, Who brings victory to an army out-manned 100 to 1.
No obstacle can stand in the way if God wants my work in print. And nothing I can do will bring it about if He doesn’t. My job is to write, to build bridges in the writing community, and to let God do what He will so that He receives glory, no matter what.
Father, I know you have good things planned for Becky. You have given her many talents, and she strives to use them all for your glory. Thank you for her heart after you. Please bless all of her efforts done in obedience to you, and keep her steady on your course. Encourage her along the way so she won't grow weary waiting upon you. In the Name of Jesus, Amen.
*Please remember to pray for Kristy Dykes.*