How #Authors Can Turn Rejection into Growth by Josh VanBrakle @joshvanbrakle #writetip #amwriting

The Query Blues: Turn Rejection into Growth

You’ve put your heart into writing your first novel: years of your life, uncounted long nights, and even more uncounted tears. Finally, you’re ready. You put together a brilliant, personalized query letter and send it to an agent. Days pass, then weeks. Nothing. Not even a form response.

What a cold, cold thing to do to a writer. You’ve written a masterpiece, and some schmuck in New York won’t even return your email. I know that feeling. My first novel, The Wings of Dragons, was rejected by not one, not ten, but over fifty agents. Most never replied at all. A few wrote me that they really liked my book, but they weren’t confident they could sell it to an editor “in this market.”

Every one of those rejections hit me hard. They made me feel like all the work I’d put in - over two years - was wasted.

Somewhere in the middle of all those rejections, though, I had my epiphany. I could see the rejections as an annoyance, as some suit in some distant agency not giving my book its due, or I could recognize them for what they were: opportunities to improve. These agents, whose job it is to sell books, were telling me something valuable. “Do you want to sell books? Then go back and spruce up this manuscript.”

So that’s what I did. I studied what those agents were looking for: fast-paced plots, a beginning few chapters that screamed “Keep reading me!”, and above all, sympathetic, multi-layered characters. Agents look for these traits, because they’re what make a book stand out. With that knowledge in hand, I knew where to focus my revisions.

In the end, no agent picked me up. I had no credentials, and my only publishing credits were a couple scientific journal articles, hardly gripping reads. No one would take a chance on me, so I took a chance on me and indie published. It’s paid off; my book became a #1 best-seller in its category on Amazon. Even so, I don’t laugh at the agents who rejected my work. I thank them. They were right to reject it. It wasn’t finished yet. If it had been published, or if I’d indie published without trying the traditional route first, I would have been unsatisfied with the result. I would have known I could have written a better book. A big part of why my book succeeded as an indie is because I tried the traditional approach first, and then I used what I learned to make my novel the best I could write at that point in my life.

It’s easy to let rejection convince you that your work is garbage, or worse, that your work is awesome and agents are too stupid to see it. Instead, see rejection as someone in the industry who knows a lot about what sells giving you free advice on how to make your book even better. Kick your ego to the curb and use that advice to grow as an author.

From fantasy author Josh VanBrakle comes an epic new trilogy of friendship, betrayal, and explosive magic. Lefthanded teenager Iren Saitosan must uncover a forgotten history, confront monsters inspired by Japanese mythology, and master a serpentine dragon imprisoned inside a katana to stop a revenge one thousand years in the making.

Lodian culture declares lefthanded people dangerous and devil-spawned, and for Iren, the kingdom's only known Left, that's meant a life of social isolation. To pass the time and get a little attention, he plays pranks on the residents of Haldessa Castle. It's harmless fun, until one of his stunts nearly kills Lodia's charismatic heir to the throne. Now to avoid execution for his crime, Iren must join a covert team and assassinate a bandit lord. It's a suicide mission, and Iren's chances aren't helped when he learns that his new katana contains a dragon's spirit, one with a magic so powerful it can sink continents and transform Iren into a raging beast.

Adding to his problems, someone on Iren's team is plotting treason. When a former ally launches a brutal plan to avenge the Lefts, Iren finds himself trapped between competing loyalties. He needs to figure out who - and how - to trust, and the fates of two nations depend on his choice.

"A fast-paced adventure...led by a compelling cast of characters. Josh VanBrakle keeps the mysteries going." - ForeWord Reviews

Buy @ Amazon & Smashwords

Genre – YA epic fantasy

Rating – PG-13

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Connect with Josh VanBrakle on Twitter

Website www.joshvanbrakle.com

The Curse Giver by Dora Machado @DoraMachado

Chapter Eight

PROPELLED BY SHEER WILL, BREN GRABBED his saddlebags and made it to the top of the stairs. His blood pounded in his temples. The scar on his face burned like a glowing chunk of coal.

Eleanor had a way of stirring his angry blood into a rapid boil. He was tired of listening to her complaints. No matter how much he allotted to Tolone, it was never enough.

Even so, he was used to enduring her gripes. It was her daring that perturbed him most. She should be smart enough to refrain from tempting him, but she had always been even bolder than all of her audacious ancestors put together. If it would have been in his power, he would have released her from her obligations years ago.

He shouldn’t have come, but a man was entitled to a dry bed and a warm meal, especially if he was paying generously for it. The rainy season had made a mess of his camps and his men deserved a proper roof and a dry pallet every once in a while.

There was also the matter of the woman. She shouldn’t have to spend her last days on a wet horse and her last nights on the soggy ground. She didn’t deserve to be murdered coldly in a back alley among paupers and whores or in the forgotten wilderness of a wind-swept ridge.

There he went again, trying to justify the absurd delay. But he was done delaying. Eleanor’s lewd dance had stirred up his wrath. Wrath was good, the ultimate motivator. A stoked up man was the most efficient killer, a hunter worthy of Laonia and the house of Uras.

He had to do it, now, before he changed his mind.

He entered the room he kept at the seed house of Tolone and dropped his saddlebags by the door. The chamber was still warm, but the fire had died down into a pile of glowing embers. The chamber’s gloom matched his bleakness.

Not for the first time, Bren wondered what type of weakness had earned his father the curse that plagued his house. He might never know, because his father was dead and so was the rest of his line.

He wasn’t feeling very merciful tonight, a change that was bound to help. He came upon the bed in two strides. There was no point in explaining, no benefit to warning, coaxing or compelling. He was angry—at himself, at his fate. He clutched the hilt of his sword and ripped off the blankets from the bed.

The woman was gone.

He stared at the empty mattress in disbelief. A most improbable line was neatly written on the sheet, a flowing trail of ink on white linen.

Whether it was kindness, courage or charity, I thank you, my lord. Farewell. L.

Award-Winning Finalist in the fantasy category of The 2013 USA Best Book Awards, sponsored by USA Book News

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Genre – Fantasy/Dark Fantasy

Rating – PG-18

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Website http://www.doramachado.com/

Dora Machado – The Story Behind The Curse Giver @DoraMachado

The Story Behind The Curse Giver

By

Dora Machado

The Curse Giver was an accident, a professional indiscretion, if you will, conceived during one of my little escapades, and born out of unchecked passion. Yep, I might as well come clean. Even the most disciplined writer can be unfaithful to her projects, and no matter how thoroughly taken one is with one's current novel, the danger for a tangent is always there when venturing into the world of research.

So there I was, researching one book, working hard to finalize the Stonewiser series, when I came across this insidious little idea that kept disrupting my train of thought.

Now, to understand the story behind The Curse Giver, you must understand my writing habits. I'm not easily distracted. When I'm writing a novel, my brain goes into hyper mode. I'm disciplined, motivated and focused to the point of obsession, which is why The Curse Giver was such a surprise to me.

The subject of curses has always fascinated me, not only because curses are such a vital part of magic and fantasy, but also because they are so prevalent to the human experience. To be honest, I had always been intrigued by the subject. Then I found them, one night, very late—or was it very early morning?—when the wind rattled my window as a coastal storm blew in from the sea.

The clay tablets that popped up on my screen dated from 600 BC and were part of the library of Nineveh, the oldest surviving library of cuneiform tablets. This is the same collection that gave us the famous Gilgamesh epic. Visually, the tablets weren't much to look at, chicken scratches on clay. But the translated words had an impact on me.

"May all these [gods] curse him with a curse that cannot be relieved, terrible and merciless, as long as he lives, may they let his name, his seed, be carried off from the land, may they put his flesh in a dog’s mouth.”

I know, hardly an inspiration for most. Me? I immediately thought of the man who had been thus cursed, of the pain and hardship such curse would bring upon him and his people, of the character that eventually became Bren, Lord of Laonia in The Curse Giver.

From there on, the curses flowed before my eyes, mysterious ones from ancient civilizations in Egypt, India and the Far East; thin lead tablets dating from the Greco-Roman world, judicial prayers, secret invocations, warnings and love spells that streamed into my consciousness. I knew I should get back to my original research, and yet I was smitten with the subject.

There were curses quoted from the Bible, medieval curses, real and forgeries, Viking, Celtic, Germanic, Visigoth, Mayan, Incan, Hopi, you name it. There were ancient curses but also modern curses, some associated with Santeria, voodoo and the 21 Divisions, religions that are common in the Dominican Republic where I grew up.

Who would cast these curses and why? What kind of creature could be capable of such powers? What would motivate a person to curse another one? As I explored these questions, a character profile began to emerge in my mind, someone whose understanding of good and evil was very different from my own.

Sorting through the research, I could see that some curses had practical applications to make sure people did what they were told. They served as alternate forms of law enforcement in lawless societies. Some were obviously malicious. They were meant to frighten and intimidate. Some were more like venting or wishful thinking. It turns out that mankind has been casting curses since the beginning of time and will probably continue for as long as we have the imagination and faith to do so.

A new question formed in my mind. Once cursed, what could a person do to defend himself? A third character emerged from this question, Lusielle, a common remedy mixer, a healer of hearts and bodies, someone who didn't realize the scope of her own power until it began to transform her life.

Eventually, I wrestled myself out of the trance. I had a book to write and a series to complete. I had deadlines. But my little detour had made an impact. The concepts were at work in my subconscious, coalescing into a new novel, fashioning these powerful characters who demanded their own story. My encounter with curses had been but a slight detour from my research plan, a tiny deviation, an indiscretion to my schedule, but the seed had been planted and The Curse Giver thrived, even if I didn't know it yet.

****

Dora Machado is the award-winning author of the epic fantasy Stonewiser series and her newest novel, The Curse Giver, available from Twilight Times Books. She grew up in the Dominican Republic, where she developed a fascination for writing and a taste for Merengue. After a lifetime of straddling such compelling but different worlds, fantasy is a natural fit to her stories. She lives in Florida with her husband and three very opinionated cats.

To learn more about Dora Machado and her novels, visit her website at www.doramachado.com or contact her at Dora@doramachado.com.

For a free excerpt of The Curse Giver, visit: http://twilighttimesbooks.comthingsTheCurseGiver_ch1.html.



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Suggested tags:

Dora Machado, The Curse Giver, fantasy, dark fantasy, romantic fantasy, fantasy romance, romance, epic fantasy, paranormal, paranormal romance, romance writing, fantasy writing, Twilight Times Books, Stonewiser.

Lusielle’s bleak but orderly life as a remedy mixer is shattered when she is sentenced to die for a crime she didn’t commit. She’s on the pyre, about to be burned, when a stranger breaks through the crowd and rescues her from the flames. Brennus, Lord of Laonia is the last of his line. He is caught in the grip of a mysterious curse that has murdered his kin, doomed his people and embittered his life. To defeat the curse, he must hunt a birthmark and kill the woman who bears it in the foulest of ways. Lusielle bears such a mark. Stalked by intrigue and confounded by the forbidden passion flaring between them, predator and prey must come together to defeat not only the vile curse, but also the curse giver who has already conjured their demise.

Award-Winning Finalist in the fantasy category of The 2013 USA Best Book Awards, sponsored by USA Book News

Buy Now @ Amazon

Genre – Fantasy/Dark Fantasy

Rating – PG-18

More details about the author and the book

Connect with Dora Machado on Facebook & Twitter

Website http://www.doramachado.com/