Jinxed?

I must be jinxed in my journey to publication. I sure hope not, but it’s starting to look that way.

First, let me point out something that all aspiring novelists already know, or will find out after the completion of their first novel. That finding an agent or a publisher is next to impossible for an unknown writer.

But I managed to do both, and here is what I’m talking about.

After a long search for an agent, Anita Kushen of the AKA Literary Agency signed me to a contract. OK, I got an agent. Great, right? Well, not so fast. Six months later, Anita retires, and hands over the reins of her literary agency to her associates. OK, but then the agent, (Ange Tysdal) who took over my book, KILLER OF KILLERS, also leaves.

So now, AKA is in the hands of a single agent, the overworked and overloaded Terrie Wolfe, who even now I’m not sure has ever read my book.

And after a not so long search, as I’ve documented, I sought out and found a publisher for my second book, THE VASE. It was Dave Law the Chairman of Virtual Tales who signed me up. I was thrilled. But yesterday Dave just sent word through the VT contributors’ forum that he is resigning his status as chairman and moving on to other projects. It’s business as usual, otherwise, he said, and I was hoping that it was just another Anita Kushen thing.

But no. Shortly after Dave’s announcement it was announced that Virtual Tales is going out of business. Which means it’s back to square one for me.

Coincidentally, I just said in yesterday’s post that I saw the light at the end of the tunnel. How strange, it turned out that same day the tunnel collapsed. Lights out!

But that’s life! You move on! There were other publishers interested in THE VASE, and last night I emailed most of them with the news that THE VASE is available again. Two of those publishers have already responded telling me their offers still stand and to send in my full.

And there’s that first publisher who offered a contract... I remember one of the things that made me hesitate to sign it was I had to find my own editor. Well, as I’ve documented on this very blog, THE VASE has been edited! Hhmmnn…

Still, I will examine all my options. It’s nice to know, however, when I turned down that first contract, the very nice man in charge said he would leave his “door open” to me.

You never know…