The Sound of Silence

I've already spoken of the waiting game - that interminable time between submitting to anyone (be that agent or publisher) and waiting for a reply.

I've been reading of writers who become upset when they receive a form-letter rejection, but to these people I have to say that the knowing is better than the not-knowing. While the old adage of "No news is good news" may well apply in many cases, given that it does actually take time to read a book, there's a lot to be said for a quick, straight-forward, no messing "No thanks".

Which isn't to say that we're only expecting to receive declinations, and is also by no means indicative of any level of impatience. What the last few months have really taught me is that what seems like a long time now doesn't seem so long in hindsight. To have gone from a very loose idea of what a book could be about, to having that completed manuscript being submitted by your agent to multiple publishers in 6 months (and today marks exactly 6 months that the seed of that idea was first planted) is, frankly, astonishing.

But the waiting doesn't get any easier. Nor does it get any easier to explain the lack of response to family and friends, many of whom, I'm sure, see silence as roughly equivalent to rejection.

We are only 10 days into having representation, though that already seems like a lifetime ago, and even if all the editors concerned received the manuscript within a couple of days they are unlikely to have read it yet. If they have, and they want to take it further, then they have to raise the proposal internally. Only on successful completion of that are we likely to hear anything, and that could be weeks away.

But I still jump up in hope every time I receive an email alert.