The Struggle with Early Success

Everyone knows how hard it is as a first time author to get your work published. Sure, I’ve had a few non-fiction pieces published but I never wanted to be a journalist or write editorials, what I love to create is fiction.

In 2024 I founded a little writing group with a friend to help keep me motivated as I began my campaign of submitting work to publishers. Imagine my surprise when, only a few months and a half dozen rejection letters later, my short spec fiction piece Racoons was accepted for publication in Wingless Dreamer’s anthology Into the Gloom.

Hurray! I thought, It’s working.

Now, I’m not delusional. I didn’t expect based on one successful submission that suddenly everyone was going to start publishing my writing. But the six-to-one ratio did set an unrealistic precedent. Three months to success, it turns out, is not a very representational timeline. In fact, none of my submissions have made it to print in the twenty-four months since Racoons made it onto the page.

Yes, a couple pieces have been short listed but, that’s about it so far. That’s the problem with early success, it sets you up with unrealistic expectations. Ah, well, so it goes.

Anyhow, you can read Racoons on my Substack here: https://brainsoupfic.substack.com/p/racoons

Meanwhile, I have bought the premium version of ProWritersAid and am using it to go through my finalized draft of Soiled Undies & Other Gorgon Encounters. Turns out I’m really bad with comma usage.

Moving along at a rate of two chapters per day as we draw nearer the time to start shopping the manuscript about. It’s all starting to get real. Stay tuned.