Tidying things up today after a weekend away. Five more packages in the post, four publishers and one agent. Looking at my list, I see that I have three or four tentative enquiries still to make. This stage of the adventure is nearly over.
When I had finished my first manuscript, which became Inside the Glasshouse, I approached thirteen publishers directly and received twelve rejections. It was my long-shot and the last publisher I approached, Faber & Faber, that pulled me from the slushpile.
To say that it was Faber & Faber is probably misleading. It was one person, Christopher Reid, who saw a spark in my MSS. Had the MSS landed on another desk things might have been very different and my book sunk without trace. So much is down to chance. I'm sure many better books go a begging.
But I don't think it is really any harder now than it was twenty years ago. The adventure goes on. There are new landscapes to explore.
Words are a gift and a price says nothing about their value.
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