I can’t believe June July is almost over already! I’ve realised that I need to stop planning entries and then leaving them for too long. Eventually I’m just not in the same headspace to write them when I finally get around to it. Not only that but I end up having to give a recap as to what’s going on in The Life and Times of Melissa because it’s been so long between entries. Speaking of which…

January was mostly a wash. I was really burnt out, especially on the creating front and wasn’t taking care of myself so Stephan helped me get back on track. I honestly can’t remember what I got up to in February and March (which is honestly sort of alarming, but hello ADHD brain!) but in April, I was working very hard on edits for draft five of Keystone Calamity. I finally finished editing on May 5, which was a deadline someone had set for me! The amazing thing was that finally, finally it seemed ready. I wasn’t hit with the same dismay when I read it around the last time I’d thought it was ready for me to query. It actually seemed ready.

I spent May researching agents again and cracking out the query letter, which is basically like a personalized cover letter to the agent you’re seeking representation from. This has always been a very difficult part for me, as you can see from my eight billion previous attempts:

This, of course, doesn’t include the other six billion hand written attempts I would do whenever I wasn’t near a computer.

Eventually, I came up with something that I was okay with and on May 26, 2024, I queried my first few agents. Now, I was in a new place I’d never been in before: querying. I was getting panic sweats when I sent them out. It’s kind of like applying to a job and I would maybe even liken it more to applying to university. You’re going into another phase of your life and you really have no idea when you’ll receive a response — or if you’ll even receive a response.

The expected response times are all over the place. Sometimes you’ll hear back in two days and other times, it might be a month. I started leaving my phone in the other room so I wasn’t obsessively checking it or jumping out of my skin whenever I got a notification.

Finally, I started getting rejections. It makes sense. Every agent will have something different they’re looking for and my book won’t be everyone’s cup of tea. It’s all subjective, like most forms of art. Man, it’s still hard, though.

I’ve been trying not to wait around to hear back. I’m currently working on my synopsis and fixing up my query so it’s even better to get ready for round two of querying. However, some days, I’m in this freaky limbo where I’m overwhelmed by being in this scary new place and I have to just lie on the floor for awhile so that the panic doesn’t consume me. I’ve worked for years and years on this and it’s been a lot of work and hardship and even just being in this place where I can send my work out to an agent and maybe make a connection with someone… It’s hard! It’s scary!

That’s why I think it’s okay if you need to lie on the floor sometimes. Just zone out, let gravity press you into the scratchy carpet and let your cat try to eat your hair (do other people’s cats do this? I can’t tell if he’s trying to groom me or if he just thinks I’m delicious). Don’t think about anything. This isn’t a place for crushing despair or boundless hope. This is a place where you can just be for awhile. It’s almost like meditation and it calms me down when I really need it.

I’ve struggled with depression for a good chunk of my life. I’ve been through good times, bad times, and hard times. Though this space — this weird freaky limbo — is scary and difficult and sometimes even soul-crushing, this is hardship I can handle because this is so important to me. This isn’t the same brand of depression; it isn’t an all encompassing dismay and I am in a much better place than I was even last year.

While I work on my synopsis and round two of queries, I’m also thinking of what I want to write next. While there’s some inklings of a space story, I’ve been hankering to write in the first person again. I don’t even know how long it’s been since I’ve written a longer story in the first person. I do have some ideas knocking around in my head but they haven’t completely formed yet. We shall see.

I wanted to leave you with one of my favourite quotations — the Litany Against Fear from Frank Herbert’s Dune:

I must not fear.
Fear is the mind-killer.
Fear is the little-death that brings total obliteration.
I will face my fear.
I will permit it to pass over me and through me.
And when it has gone past, I will turn the inner eye to see its path.
Where the fear has gone there will be nothing. Only I will remain.

Tagged in:

Writing