Your 1st sale story demonstrates the essential wisdom of the writing career– persist, persevere, and be patient. Timing is also critical– but we just have to have faith that our ms will land on the right desk for the right eyes at the right time. We have no real control over how or if that happens. So we live in hope. . . which makes us better people in the long run. And the writing-reading world is so much richer for the fact that YOU took time to learn the craft and to persevere. Your stories and your enthusiasm and generosity enrich us all!

May PP sell a million!

Thanks for sharing your story – it’s stories like this that keep me going!

Thanks to everyone. Yes, it took me a long time to get where I wanted to be, but I started off very young and despite a degree in Creative Writing, I didn’t know squat about commercial fiction until I joined RWA. A lot of those years were just learning the craft. Then it was all about right place, right time, right idea on the first sale.

Oh, and Carolyn…fear and self-doubt do not lessen when you get published. They get worse. So it’s good practice to deal with it before hand, when no one is paying you money in advance of success that might not live up to everyone’s expectations.

But I’m not complaining! It’s just the way of the world.

But…White Zin? Ugh. Oh, sweetheart, am I going to introduce you to a nice Pinot Noir in San Fran.

This whole business is about perseverance and hard work and not quitting. Of course, so many jobs are. But I’m lucky enough to have a job that I love and that gives me that “first book” feeling at least twice a year. I’m certainly not complaining!

Kristen, I’m a big believer in cheap wine. I also plot many of my books in the shower. I don’t know what it is about the water and the white noise and the heat…when I’m having a plot problem, I’m often the cleanest woman on the planet.

Grace, I still have my copy, too! THE IVORY KEY is certainly a romance classic. I met Rita Clay once and gushed like a moron. She was very gracious!

My father and my older brother read all my books. My mother, who reads very little fiction and is very religious, does not read them. However, she sends many people to my booksignings and will usually be found in the bookstore, telling everyone about how fabulous her daughter is. My younger brothers also buy my books, though they don’t read them. (Wives and girlfriends do, thankfully!) There are just some things they don’t want to know about their older sister, LOL! I am so glad I was able to share that special moment in person with all of them because they’d always been so supportive before.

BTW, I should mention that my older brother’s wife proofreads all my manuscripts and my younger brother’s wife always buys many copies to give as gifts. I’m one lucky woman.

Never once did my parents say “don’t write.” Or even “don’t write romance.” They’re self-made, so I think they totally saw how that would appeal to me. They never put a time limit on my achieving success because the fact that I was doing what I loved was success enough. I can only pray I can be just as supportive with my own child! Honestly, despite many, many rejections and switching genres three times, the only time I thought about quitting was that one time. And I didn’t manage it…quitting just was never an option.

I actually think about it now more than I ever did then. I wonder if it was youth? I don’t have much of that anymore, LOL!

I still have THE IVORY KEY! One of my favorite books, and I’ve reread it multiple times since I bought it all those years ago.

Cher