Every week now I’m starting to receive requests from people who’ve written a lovely book their best friend read and enjoyed and they want me to tell them which publishers to send it to and how to get it published.

A while back I used to be on an internet forum of published authors and so many of the authors would complain about these emails and I thought they were making a big deal about it.

I thought, ‘What’s the harm? There’s room for everyone’.

Um…I don’t feel like that any more.

It’s like what happens is that instead of people discovering the joy of reading some of my books, they discover that, hey, they’re brown, they’re Pakistani, if I can do it maybe they can too. And it’s got nothing to do with loving books and writing and everything to do with just trying to make a mark for themselves.

For years my attitude has been ‘nothing wrong with that, the more the merrier’, but the only problem is that these are people who haven’t done one iota of research.

They haven’t even checked out my website where I’ve gone to the trouble of writing an article called ‘How to get published’!  http://www.rukhsanakhan.com/articles/howtogetpublished.html

The information’s right there!

I even have links on my website to the same websites, the EXACT same websites, I used to research my foray into children’s literature here: http://www.rukhsanakhan.com/links/writingrelated.html

The best links on there for children’s writers are the Write4Kids site, the Children’s Book Council site and of course the SCBWI site!

Don’t get me wrong.

I have ALWAYS felt that we need a LOT more Muslim authors out there! We need more stories if we’re to humanize ourselves as a demographic.

And I have even gone as far as encouraging certain young writers I know to pursue a career.

But darn if I have time to hold someone’s hand and research which publishers would be the best fit for their manuscript!

How do I know which writers to encourage?

Simple.

They’re writers who don’t look to me for things they can find themselves.

They research publishers. They research agents. They research writing!!!

They take initiative.

They’ve even told me a few things they’ve learned.

And the biggest quality I see in them is that they have the drive, the perseverance to make it in this ‘bunny eat bunny’ world of children’s publishing.

And ironically they are often the ones who have felt too shy to take me up on my offers to read their work and mentor them.

(I really don’t make that offer lightly! I have SUCH limited time! Between the writing, the editing, the blogging and all the business correspondence–PLUS my husband, kids and six grandchildren–I really don’t have the time to make idle offers to mentor people!)

These are people who seem to understand that as an author myself, I have a very limited amount of clout with publishers! Heck, they still reject my stories!

In this business it really isn’t who you know, it’s how good your writing is. (Who you know can get your work looked at but if the work doesn’t stand on its own merit–if it isn’t a piece of highly marketable drop dead gorgeous writing–then it won’t matter!)

The problem is everyone and their aunt thinks they can write a children’s book!

They are short and deceptively simple.

For anyone who is reading this, hoping to get their work published, I tell you I know EXACTLY how you feel!

It took eight years to get my first acceptance letter!

Eight long years of rejection after rejection and even getting kicked out of a writer’s workshop where the teacher thought I was ‘hopeless’.

And that was just to get my first book published!

Now after 23 years of working at this, I have eleven books published.

It’s been a long hard slog, and it’s only getting harder!

If I knew then what I know now, I’m not sure I would have continued, but I’ve invested way too much now to turn back.

And I always say, “If it never gets any better than this…this is pretty darn good, alhamdu lillah!”

I write these blog posts to shed light on the creative process!

I DO want people to learn from the mistakes I’ve made.

And I support the work of many many Muslim authors and artists especially with my Muslim Booklist.

In fact I’m currently reading some novels in the hopes of adding to it, and there are certain Muslim writers whose work I admire immensely! I’m planning on writing a blog post about that.

But I really am sick of emails asking me for information that is readily available on my site.

Do your own homework!

Then write your heart out!

Write something that ADDS to the collective wisdom out there–not just something that will take up space and clutter an already cluttered marketplace with drivel that makes your ego feel good.

And I hope insha Allah, to read your work in print!

I have heard of some authors composing standard replies to such queries.

These are authors who started out by being nice to the people inquiring.

I think the funniest request I received was from this lady who couldn’t spell and used terrible grammar. She said that she had this fantastic idea for a novel series. It would be a bestseller and be sold in Chapters! I could write it and we’d split the money 50-50.

I told her, “Why don’t you write it yourself? That way you can keep all the money for yourself!”

She replied, “My spelling and grammar isn’t so good.”

Oh boy.

 Uh huh. Never heard from her again! Thankfully.

Before, I would often go into autopilot when I’d be praying. It’s hard not to. We memorize the whole prayer, it’s formal and prescribed as such, there’s only a few spots for spontaneity.

I used to wonder why.

But over the years I’ve come to the conclusion that it’s a mercy and a blessing.

God tells us what to say, shows us how to pray, and if you understand the words you’re saying, they’re beautiful and moving.

Oh I make duas/supplications at other times, but the salat/Muslim ritual prayer is pretty much set.

But ever since I got back from Hajj, it’s changed.

So many times I’ll start praying and it’s like my chest opens up and swells with such joy that it gives my spirit a bit of a hiccup.

It’s not something I’ve told many people, and the only reason I mention it now is because one of my friends, who gave me the feedback for the Hajj novel, felt sad and thought I was sad.

And I thought, “Oh no! I hope that’s not the way my posts are coming across!”

I have tried to be totally honest about the creative process I am going through. I’m doing so because I think people who would tend to gravitate to my blog would find that information useful because they’re probably creative types as well.

They might not be writers, and my comments might not apply exactly to their situation, but hey, creative process is creative process and it translate to other endeavours as well!

So much of the creative process is just plain hard slogging work.

And I don’t believe in hiding that.

But that doesn’t mean it brings me down.

Quite the opposite.

These are high class problems to have!

And be under no illusions…writing is HARD work!

The people who succeed are those who do the things that other people don’t want to do.

Many of my stories have taken me ages to write!

And it’s because there’s a stubborn streak in me. When I believe in a story I’ll keep coming back to it.

And I’ve said it before…it’s all about angles! It’s all about voice.

It’s like that moment in My Cousin Vinny when the Joe Pesci character is holding up that playing card and telling his cousin that the prosecutor will try to convince the jury that it’s solid, like a brick, that it has straight sides and all that, so that the jury won’t notice that it’s paper thin and flimsy.

Writers should remember that analogy! It works for stories we write too only the other way around.

Our stories are paper thin and flimsy, but write them right and the reader will feel they’re solid brick!

When we write we don’t have to recreate the whole world of our characters! We simply suggest realities and the reader’s imagination will fill in the rest. Do it well and your story will be so convincing that people will think you really do know what you’re talking about!

Even though you know you’re muddling about figuring things out as you go along.

Every single author I know of, has moments of doubt. Moments when they feel like a complete fraud.

I feel that way especially when I’m wrestling with a new story.

Then it doesn’t matter what I was able to accomplish with past stories, it feels like I’ll never get it right.

What helps though is the school presentations!

They are really really good for my confidence! And it’s because as I’m telling them my stories, doing presentations I’ve done thousands of times before, in the process I re-fall in love with my own stories.

I think, ‘Wow, these really are good. And look how much the kids are enjoying them!’

Hope that doesn’t sound egotistical or anything, I’m just being frank. Those are the reactions I get from the kids I visit.

I just got home from a literacy night and I got to tell two of my favourite folktales.

I’d gone to this school on Wednesday and they invited me back tonight (Thursday night) for a literacy evening where the parents were invited. I told the kids I saw on Wednesday that I’d be telling completely different stories tonight, and I fulfilled my promise.

A lot of them showed up! It was so nice to see so many parents out on a stormy Thursday evening, when it would have been so tempting to just stay home and watch T.V.!

The enthusiasm of those kids helps keep me going!

Basically what I’m taking a long-winded approach to say is this: You need to find your joy wherever you can find it.

You need to let it fill your heart till it feels like you’re swelling to burst open! (In a good way!)

I may relate the difficulties I’m facing in gory detail. (I even had a dream the other night–that same recurring nightmare I often get where the writing thing didn’t work out and I’m back doing daycare to make ends meet!)  But that doesn’t mean I’m not having a great time!

Growing up in that small town in Ontario, growing up being told I was brown because I was dirty and my classmates were white because they were clean, often being ambushed with ridicule because of the colour of my skin and the strangeness of my faith–it is absolutely astonishing to me that I can actually make a living as an author and a storyteller!

And to think I couldn’t even speak English when I first came here! And now I write in nothing else!

I have SO much to be thankful for and I often tell children there’s only one thing in my life that I would change and that’s my weight!

I really need to lose weight.

Other than that, life is good!

And I won’t let myself take that for granted.

All I know is that it’s incredibly frustrating.

I know I gave myself permission to write a lousy first draft, and that I did, but still, I was hoping there wouldn’t be quite so much work to do on the manuscript!

I feel like I should be further along. I feel like one of my friends described, “stuck in a rut with my wheels spinning”.

Make no mistake, the publishing industry is probably at it’s absolute worse right now!

When all this started back in 2008, a colleague of mine said that he thought that with the economic downturn people would be turning even more to books because they provided such value for their money!

I thought to myself, “You’ve got to be kidding!” Books are luxury items.

In an economic downturn what are you going to buy first? Food or a book?

And it really worries me that I don’t seem to see that many people reading any more!

It’s just not something people really emphasize like they used to.

So what’s the answer?

A while back I heard that 20% of people by 80% of the books. And that’s ALL books!

And any hope that I have of getting in on the Muslim niche marketing thingie is kind of gone.

There is a whole field of Muslim books out there, but quite frankly most of them are entirely geared towards only Muslim audiences. They’re completely unsuitable for pluralistic society. Quite frankly they’re far too preachy!

They’re books designed to prove that Islam is beautiful and correct. Nothing wrong with that per se. There’s Christian literature that’s designed to evoke the beauty of Christianity and I’m sure there’s Jewish and Hindu literature that espouses the beauty of those doctrines too, but these are all niche markets and I’m just not geared towards a niche market.

So I announced a few days ago that I finished the first draft of my hajj novel, and now I realize that it really will need a lot of work.

It’s so frustrating!

I knew it would need work, but I didn’t think it would need that much work.

I even went ahead and dropped a hint to my agent to let her know that it was coming together.

Oh well, back to work on it tomorrow.

I have lots of ideas, but unlike the last time that I got feedback on that second project of mine, I’m not ‘excited’ per se. Maybe it’s because of this cold I’ve had. Maybe it’s run me down and I’m tired.

And maybe it’s because of how busy this week is going to be from Wednesday to Friday!

But I definitely feel that it’s one step forward and two back.

I wish it was easier to write a novel that works now than it was when I first started.

But it isn’t.

Oh well.

Went to the doctor on Thursday because the cold was settling into my sinuses and it felt like an elephant was sitting on my face.

Got a prescription for antibiotics but it was funny. The doctor’s office I go to has finally computerized all the files. And my poor doctor was hunched over the keyboard hunting and pecking at the keys. I asked her how the transition was going and she said, “Horrible! Everything takes twice as long as before!”

And I couldn’t help thinking it would be easier if you learned how to type!

She asked me how things were going with me. I told her wonderfully! Then I told her about Big Red Lollipop and the recognition it had received in the States.

Then she grumbles, “Was that the book you gave me?”

I’d given her a copy of Many Windows. She’s Jewish and I thought she’d particularly like the Hanukkah story I’d written in it.

I said no, this was my picture book. Then I told her how it had received more recognition in the States than in Canada.

And she said, “Oh well, you know the States… those people have such poor taste in literature! They like anything.”

Then she glanced at me and said, “No offence.”

I was too stunned to burst into laughing. Although typing this out I am laughing. Hard.

I just looked at her blankly and said, “Of course not.” While it slowly dawned on me that she’d kind of insulted my writing.

Oh well. Everyone’ s allowed to have an opinion. And believe it or not, she’s still one of the better doctors I’ve had.

The best doctor I had was Chinese but she moved back to her native Edmonton, and I miss her dearly.

I’ve also had a doctor who was Muslim, who, when she found out that I was a writer, said, “Oh you know what I  would do if I were a writer?”

“What?” I said.

She said, “I would go up north, lock myself in a cabin, and write a novel in TWO WEEKS!”

I didn’t say anything at the time. My son was just a baby and lying on the examining table. I didn’t want to tick her off.

So I just murmurred, “You would, would you?”

She said, “Oh YES! There’s no reason why you can’t write a novel in two weeks!”

I’m not sure how long she talked about writing during that visit, but it was quite a while.

The only reason I went to her in the first place was because the wait for my Chinese doctor was often two hours. Mind you, when you did finally get in to see my Chinese doctor, she was very thorough and really listened to what was wrong with you! It was a worthwhile price to pay. I ditched the Muslim and went back. I got to the point where I didn’t mind it. I’d just park myself in the waiting room and take a nap. Really. I’d fall asleep and wake at the sound of my name.

At least she didn’t try to hone in on my field of expertise. She stuck to hers and did it well, which was more than enough to earn my respect and gratitude.

Now there’s a field that doesn’t suffer from recession! Doctors!

But alas, I’m not wired that way.

I can never be a real doctor.

I can only play one in a story.

But back to that Jewish doctor. She did say that learning the new skills with the computerized files was good for her because it staved off Alzheimers.

And right then I thought of that movie I’d watched on the omnimax theatre at the Science Centre called Wired to Win, which talked about how creative endeavours always involved creating new pathways in your mind.

And the reason why each story is so darn hard is because each story takes a different path (or else you’re getting formulaic) and that means the brain is creating new pathways with each book you ever write. There is no duplication of process. One book will never help you write the next because it’s got to be completely different.

And I thought, yeah, well, how hard this is also means that it reduces my risk of Alzheimers.

So in that way it’s all good too.

But that doesn’t mean it isn’t darn hard.

And snide remarks from doctors sure don’t help.

Every once in a while, when I’m flicking channels, I come across some documentary that catches my eye.

I’ve always been an extremely curious person. I learn all kinds of stuff, just because it catches my fancy.

A few days ago I clicked on a BBC story about scientists using pressure pads to determine how rhinos feet could support their heavy bulk–not because I’ll ever have a use for it in a story–although you never can tell–but just because I found it curious.

Anyway, I caught this documentary on Scott and Amundsen on some educational channel and since I’ve always been fascinated by the Arctic and the Antarctic, I decided to watch it.

Isn’t it funny? Today happens to be the 100th anniversary of the day Scott arrived at the South Pole. Just found that out while I checked his wikipedia page.

Honest, I didn’t plan that.

Anyway, the story goes that Scott wanted some fame and glory and decided to launch this expedition to the South Pole, but he found the idea of using dogs kind of old-fashioned or something. He wanted to use ponies to pull sledges to the South Pole and he also wanted to get machinery so they could ride their in comfort–with the dogs.

When he got to Antarctica, while they were unloading the machines, one of them fell through the ice–a  bad omen.

Then the extreme cold caused them to malfunction.

The ponies weren’t used to the cold and for a number of reasons the preparations for the ‘Discovery expedition’ were not going according to plan. The main deficiency was where they located a crucial supply point, called ‘one ton depot’ was planted 35 miles north of where it was supposed to be. It was supposed to be at 80 degrees south. But for that single failure, you’ll see that Scott and his men probably would have survived the return journey. 

So Scott gets to the South Pole only to discover that Amundsen, using a team of dogs, very efficiently, and without fuss, got to the South Pole before him and returned safe and sound.

Then Scott and his fellows turn around and start the long 800 mile slog back. Starving and ill equipt, they nevertheless make it to within eleven miles of one ton depot when they’re forced to wait out a raging blizzard for nine days during which they perished. If they’d put one ton depot where it was supposed to be, they would have reached it 24 miles ago.

Scott and the others are buried in the tent in which he died which in turn has become encased in the Ross ice shelf and with the nature of glacial ice being fluid, it’s slowly inching its way towards the antarctic ocean and one day the whole thing will break off and plunge into the sea.

The British, on the other hand, kind of sneered at Amundsen’s victory. They thought it was ‘unsporting’ and one lord Curzon even raised a glass and saluted the dogs that carried him.

But who is the famous one? Who’s the one they made a movie of? Not Amundsen, the winner, but Scott the silly loser.

The Brits turned Scott into this amazing hero. They showered money on the widows of the five men who perished. He was knighted and all that.

I find it simply fascinating.

And it was interesting, a while ago, when I was in Denmark and I got a chance to get to know Barbara Reid better, we had a bit of a discussion about this very topic.

Barbara Reid is an amazing talent! She does the most beautiful children’s book illustration with plasticene!

Her latest book at the time was called Perfect Snow and she said how she’d been so touched by the story of Scott that she’d named her protagonist none other than Scott.

I laughed but she pointed out to the death of Oates, one of Scott’s companions who knew he was dying and knew he was slowing the others down, he said to the others, “I am just going outside and may be some time.”

“Oh brother!” I told Barbara, although deep down I had to admit it was rather stoic and even a bit romantic and I found that irritating.

But still! Why would Amundsen be penalized for being efficient?

Why did the Brits, and it seems the world, cling to Scott’s story as being more intriguing?

I really don’t get it.

I’m thinking that it has to do with the prestige of the British at the time of this event. This was Victorian England and the Brits boasted that the sun did not set on the British empire.

But there’s something to be learned from this. Even when a story has a negative outcome–or perhaps especially when a story has a negative outcome–it can be spun (and let’s not kid ourselves, there’s no better word for what the Brits did with Scott’s epic failure) into a compelling yarn.

Which reminds me of the movie Moneyball.  It’s quite a compelling story, even though it has a lot of information in it.

It’s a little like The Social Network in that regard, that movie about Mark Zuckerberg and the founding of Facebook.

What surprised me about Moneyball was how unrecognizable Brad Pitt was in it. I don’t mean you couldn’t tell it was Brad Pitt, but rather that he didn’t act like Brad Pitt, he acted like this character and he did such a thorough job, you forgot you were watching Brad Pitt and you really were emersed in the story of this character.

Without giving anything away, it’s worth looking at the ending of Moneyball and examining how they couched what really happened in such a way as to make a compelling story.

Maybe there’s a caveat that should be added to the old saying that history is written by the victors.

Maybe we should add that history is also written by those who tell the best tale.

And yet I can’t help it.

This is actually a very good follow up to my post on Perseverance.

Maybe there’s something to be said about January funk, because I was definitely feeling funky last week when I wrote it. (And talking to some friends they were feeling funky too.) You can hear it in the tone of that post, one foot in front of the other, plod, plod, plod.

I can’t remember who said that successful people are people who do the hard things that unsuccessful people don’t. (I’m really paraphrasing!)

After the initial glow of idea, that’s what writing is. Plod, plod, plod.

But last Friday I did something quirky.

I went to Jumaa.

I know, I know, I’m terrible. So many times I’m home on Friday and I don’t bother going to Friday prayer, I just pray at home, comforting myself with the idea that the Prophet (peace be upon him) said that it was better for women to pray at home.

But the funny thing is I often pray the extra prayers more easily when I go to the masjid. And in Ramadan, for taraweeh, there’s no better feeling! (Try praying taraweeh at home where you don’t get to hear the beautiful melodious recitation of the hafizes they import from Muslim countries for the task!  Praying taraweeh on your own? Ugh!)

Anyway, I took my son (he was still off school) and I surprised him by parking the car and going inside with him.

I’m sure it was because I needed to hear the sermon. God meant me to hear it. It was given by an old friend of my husband’s. He talked about humility. About walking on the earth lightly. And he gave the example of two very interesting and selfless Muslims, one man, one woman, who’d worked quietly for their respective communities and made real changes but weren’t particularly famous.

And yes, of course I found it humbling. Especially the woman’s story. It made me cry.

Which is weird because I seem to be getting very weepy in my old age! I cry buckets at the drop of a hat.

In fact I confess it’s been quite a while that I can’t sing Canada’s national anthem without having embarassing tears drip out of my eyes! (I mean who cries at national anthems???!!!)

But ever since I realized that the last part of the Canadian national anthem is more like a prayer than a beating of the chest with patriotic pride kind of thing, it really does move me to tears. I can stand for it, no problem. But don’t ask me to sing it!

(By the way it goes:

O Canada!

Our home and native land. True patriot love, in all our sons command. With glowing hearts we see thee rise the true north strong and free. We stand on guard, O Canada! We stand on guard for thee! God keep our land, glorious and free. O Canada we stand on guard for thee. O Canada we stand on guard for thee.)

Pretty simple and understated, and dare I say it? Down right humble!

Anyway, listening to this sermon just reminded me that I’ve been taking myself WAY too seriously lately.

It brought me down to earth, alhamdu lillah, and got me back to focusing on what’s really important–the STORY!!!

Which comes back to why I’m so excited!

You know that sequel for Wanting Mor that I’ve been spouting off about?

Well yesterday, I finally got to hook up with my Kabuli sister in law, who was kind enough to vet the manuscript and tell me all the myriad places where I’d messed up the cultural customs!

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, just because Pakistan is so close to Afghanistan and we share so many facets of culture, doesn’t mean that even I can take for granted that I’ll get the culture right! And if I can get it so wrong, pity the white people trying to write about Muslim culture!!!!

Anyway, I went over to her house for tea and she explained exactly what worked and more importantly what didn’t work about the book.

And even better, we brainstormed ways in which to solve the things that didn’t work!

Fundamentally she loved the story!

She said how she’s not a reader but something about my work makes her compelled to finish reading. She said she could hardly put it down. (Probably one of the best compliments a writer can receive!)

(She also read Wanting Mor and loved that too! She had told me how she’d gotten the book and had to go to work early the next day and was reading it, her eyes closing because she was so tired, but she couldn’t put it down.)

But anyway, with the sequel, culturally, I’d really messed up.

So armed with all the ways I can write my way out of the conundrums, I can actually go back to the manuscript and fix it.

Why should that make me so excited?

Well because the story can work!

It’ll take work. Real hard slogging, but I can make it work insha Allah.

And I believe in this story so much, I personally love this story so much, and I think it needs to be written so much, that I think I’ve found a way to solve all the problems and make it work!

It’s not glamorous in any way whatsoever, it’s going to be a lot of good hard work, but I can just picture the end result!

Insha Allah it will be magnificent!

Not because I want it to reflect on me. No, not at all!

But because it’ll be a really good story, insha Allah.

And that’s what it’s all about.

Story.

The conclusion of that sermon was stated in a few words from that dying Muslim woman’s life. She said that life came down to serving God, everything else was tangential. (I’m paraphrasing again. Can’t remember the exact words but it was along those lines.)

And one of the reasons I got into writing in the first place was to serve God. To tell stories that would humanize Muslims–and add to the pool of literature that hopefully would help enlighten people.

Personally, I believe that the only reason to continue writing–when it would be so much easier to just read all the delightful stories already out there–is because you have something to say, some idea that desperately needs to be added to the social consciousness.

Leave ego out of it!

Oh it’s so exciting!

Can’t wait to finish this Hajj novel so I can get back to the other project.

And in the mean time I have all the other work on my desk to complete.

Busy, busy, busy.

We’ve all heard of the value of perseverance. Goodness knows I’ve already blogged about the subject enough!

But somehow I keep remembering the story of this guy whose name was Richard Kennedy.

He is a storyteller and he wrote a book that I’d never heard of called Come Again in the Spring.

I don’t usually like stories in which Death plays a character, but there was something about this tale that was really moving.

And I only heard it second hand.

I was at a storytelling workshop, and we were relating some of our favourite stories to each other, and one lady, I recall she was a former librarian, she told this story, and she told it so well that it really touched me. And the funny thing was that the librarian who was telling it had such a hard time because she was trying to recount it word for word–which is actually a no-no when it comes to storytelling. But she had loved Richard Kennedy’s language so much that she couldn’t bear to use her own words.

I thought, “Wow!” That is a good story! It’s the kind of story that should be famous, but it wasn’t and it isn’t. I asked her about it later and she said that the storyteller who’d written it had been disappointed in the fact that it hadn’t received public attention. It had been published and then faded quite quickly out of sight from a fickle and distracted public. Storytellers know of it, but most other people don’t.

Anyways, eventually Richard Kennedy gave up.

I don’t know if Richard Kennedy even tells stories any more.

When I searched the name Kennedy this other storyteller came up. I had to google the rough title I remembered to actually find out his actual name.

I’ve read a LOT of how to books on writing for children. One of the best was written by Phyllis A. Whitney. You might not know her name but I remember her work growing up. She was a specialist in writing mysteries. She started by writing children’s mysteries and then eventually wrote adult mysteries. I still have two copies of her books on my shelf. They’re not very good. They’re two of her lesser known books, but I picked them up somewhere and I can’t bear to part with them.

I credit Whitney with helping me to become a reader. I read nothing but mysteries in my early years–I cut my teeth on them! And although many of the establishment tend to look down their noses at mystery writers, I have nothing but admiration for them. And I loved Phyllis A. Whitney’s books! She took me to places I never dreamed that I’d one day visit! One of her books was set in South Africa and when I finally did go there in 2004, she was uppermost in my mind!

She wrote hundreds of books. Unfortunately she died in 2008 at the age of 104.

Her writing probably wasn’t as good as Richard Kennedy’s, but boy did she never give up!

In her book on writing for children she said she was sitting at an Edgar award ceremony, in the front row, when one lady who was attending the event turned to her (not knowing that she was there for the award) and said something like, “But you know, they never do tell you how to become a famous author, now do they?”

And right then Phyllis A. Whitney decided to tackle it in her acceptance speech. She got up there in front of everyone and referred to the lady’s question and said, “I’m going to tell you how to be an author. You have to WANT it enough! That’s it.”

And she went on to explain that if you wanted it enough, then you did the research, you put in the time, you put in the effort, you dug down deep inside you, past all the pain and the rejection and you pulled out the best story you can make.

And now I have a confession to make.

At the SCBWI convention, when I was getting ready to give my acceptance speech, that’s precisely what I thought of when I was composing it in my mind. I wanted to give all those people in the audience an honest answer to the question, “How did you do it?” Because quite frankly, all those years that I’d been in the audience, that’s precisely what I wanted to know! And very few authors actually answer that question fully.

I would say that unfortunately Richard Kennedy didn’t want it enough.

It’s so sad!

Breaks my heart.

He was obviously such a huge talent! And the pain of rejection and the pain of being overlooked meant he stopped trying.

That’s the thing isn’t it?

There are so many stories out there, we are bound to overlook very good stories.

There are no guarrantees that your very best work will be noticed.

You can’t let it break your heart.

Sometimes when I’m listening to a hit song I’m thinking in the back of my mind, okay this singer is getting the ‘push’.

They’ve got the marketing executives and the music executives and grammy committees and the radio stations all backing this artist, but there must be other artists out there who don’t get the ‘push’, who struggle away in the dark with little to show for it, but who probably produce better art.

They just haven’t been ‘noticed’.

And thinking that of course makes me wonder if I’m in that group.

All I know is that I feel like I wrote my heart out and now I’m back at square one.

I’ve got to do it all over again and completely differently.

In the last two years I’ve written two full length novels that haven’t been published. That would be enough to make some people start feeling desperate.

I won’t deny it’s not stressful, but at the same time, I’m feeling pretty sanguine about things.

I feel like the creative gears are turning, and this fallow bit is necessary.

I may be getting ready to crank it up to the next level, we’ll see.

Right now I’m just getting up doggedly and writing my two pages, every day, two pages. I’m up to over a hundred and seventy pages of the Hajj novel and whether or not anyone else in the world likes it, I like it!

I really don’t want to be a Richard Kennedy.

I’ve seen too many people with exceptional talent go by the wayside because they didn’t WANT it enough to stick it out, to have real perseverance.

Short term was for the next year, long term was for the next five years.

I never did get good at writing them down but that doesn’t mean I didn’t set them.

Tonight I’m having a big shindig in our house. With one of my daughters out of commission (she gave birth to my sixth grandchild less than two weeks ago) and another daughter with a three month old, I’m doing most of the cooking myself.

It’s really just family. Mine, my daughters and their families and one of my daughter’s in-law’s family, a total of about 18 people.

Except for some cupcakes and meat-filled buns, I’m doing most of the cooking.

And considering there are a lot of men coming, and these men like MEAT, I’m cooking a LOT of food.

Oh when I was younger, this kind of event would freak me out.

I’d end up cooking everything the same day, plus wanting the place to look fresh, I’d clean everything the same day too, and basically wipe myself out.

Now I plan.

I had my parents over on Tuesday, only three days before this party, so what did I do? I cooked extra chicken curry and froze it in a serving dish so all I’ll have to do is thaw it and heat it.

Yesterday I cleaned up the upstairs.

Today I bought the meat and the remaining groceries I’d need.

Today I made the beef curry and the broth for the pilau plus the baked chicken and the sauce for the lasagne.

As I cooked, I cleaned, so my kitchen was not a disaster zone by the end of the evening, and while the curry simmered, I watched Fargo,  a good movie that I’d been wanting to see ever since I got turned onto the Cohen brothers’ work. (Highly recommend it. It is bloody, but it’s also kind of funny and quirky.)

Tomorrow I’ll make the strawberry shortcake, put the lasagne together and cook the rice.

I’ll just have to reheat the curries and voila. Dinner for 18.

Writing is like that too.

It takes planning.

I’ve gotten to the point now, that when I’ve got a big event coming up I can automatically plan things without even really thinking about it. I doggedly keep going till everything is done.

Writing is the same.

Right now I have about five different projects on the go. I haven’t listed any steps in terms of how to finish them.

I just tackle them one at a time, give the ones that need feedback to other people to read, while I work on things that have deadlines and insha Allah, I get it all done.

Cooking a big dinner like this is actually a good metaphor for the process.

I find the best thing to do to maximize your time is start things, and get them to the simmer point, and then as they’re simmering on the back burner, get to the other stuff you need to get done.

Back when I used to be a lab technician, it was actually a remarkably similar process, only my ‘recipes’ were the lab procedures, the qualitative analyses and quantitative analyses which would determine if the right drug were in the samples and if it was in the right amounts. Being a quality control technician in a pharmaceutical manufacturing company really wasn’t so different from being a cook. And I’d often apply the same principles.

I’d start something to burn down in the crucible in the fume hood while I’d begin quantitatively titrating a solution to determine the concentration and stuff.

That way I’d get two procedures done at the same time.

I am ALWAYS working on more than one story at a time.

When I tell kids it took me five years to write Ruler of the Courtyard what I don’t tell them is that I was also working on umpteen other books at the same time.

Get stuck on one, push it to the back burner, and work on another.

And yes, carrying this metaphor to the extreme, some stories do get overdone. They get burnt and there’s nothing you can do with them.

That happened with a story idea I had set in Custer, South Dakota.

I even went so far as traveling there and researching all the places that Crazyhorse fought against American forces. All for a novel that never did get published.

But…hey, it’s not done yet. You never know. Maybe one day those figments of story will work their way into a viable form. I actually do have a vague idea for one, but no way can I write it right now.

I like to say that Wanting Mor only took me five months to write. And consciously that’s true, but in reality it probably began when my sister died eight years ago. Reading that paragraph about a girl named Sameela in the orphanage I sponsored the library in, jogged something, but it was still a few years later before I heard Jameela, the main character say the first sentence, “I thought she was sleeping”.

For me, hearing the first sentence is like the smoke alarm going off.

It means something is past done and ready to come off the back burner.

By the time I *hear* the first sentence, the story has basically formulated itself. All I have to do now is hold on for the ride and write as fast as I can.

I did that, and in five months, I came up with Wanting Mor.

Ever since last year, when I went for Hajj and my agent said I should write a book about a kid who goes for Hajj, I stirred up the contents of this story and put them on the back burner of my mind.

Only a few months ago, I started writing it and now I’m almost done.

I had wondered if I’d get done before the end of the year. It doesn’t look like it. But that’s okay. I’d rather do it right than do it rushed.

I do like what’s come out of it.

It’ll need some work, some mixing and stirring to see if the spices are right, but that’s okay. I’m ready for it.

I’m hoping this year is quite prolific.

Got SO many ideas that are bubbling away.

I just hope none of them burn.

Good luck to all of you with your projects and hope this next year is a good one.

2011 was a fantastic year for me!

Now normally, when they feature some celebrity, I tend to turn off the show, but something made me keep watching and as a result I had an epiphany of sorts.

Now I’ve never heard of Nick Carter, but of course I have heard of the Backstreet Boys. Who hasn’t?

And I have two rather odd little connections to them.

First connection was a magical moment between myself and my daughters way back, years ago, before they got all strict and stuff.

We were washing up in my mom’s kitchen, in the house I grew up in, in Dundas. And we started singing that Backstreet Boys song, “I want it that way…”

I didn’t know all the words, I know I messed up in the singing of it, but when they joined in on the chorus, oh it was special!

A bonding moment I’ll never forget.

I’ve got a smile on my face even as I type this.

And even though they’d never sing anything with me like that again (they don’t approve of music) the point wasn’t really the song–it was the harmony.

Pardon the pun.

The harmony between us and I’m sure my niece was in there too, all of us singing at the top of our lungs, “Aint nothin’ but a heartache, tell my why, aint nothin’ but a mistake, tell me why, I never want to hear you say…I want it that way.”

Honestly, the song doesn’t even make much sense. That’s not the point. It’s just a connection I have with the Backstreet Boys.

Then years later, my parents went on a cruise and I think it was around Christmas time and apparently the cruise line helicoptered the Backstreet Boys in to do a song for them. So my parents got a chance to see them live.

Of course everyone on the boat were going crazy. My parents weren’t.

They’re older and more sanguine about silliness like that.

No, I’m not a fan of the Backstreet Boys.

Don’t search out their music and don’t own any of their albums or tunes. But at the same time I’m not immune to their allure.

So Nick Carter comes on, and the show’s about second chances. Apparently he got into the drugs and stuff and now he’s clawing his way back, trying to make it up the charts.

He said something interesting when someone in the

Dr. Phil had him sing a song of course, and the funny thing was you could hardly hear him for all the screaming of all the ditzy ladies in the audience.

Well it seems to me if you like a singer, wouldn’t you shut up with the screaming so you can hear him sing?

And then it occurred to me, they’re not caring about his singing. They’re caring about him being part of the Backstreet boys and maybe each and every one of the screamers has some kind of ‘connection’ to him too.

Some moment in their lives where a Backstreet boy song played and just set the tone and is now forever intimately connected in their memories with the group–and with Nick Carter because he was part of that group.

The show was about second chances, and here was Nick having cleaned himself up from all the booze and drugs, wanting a second chance.

Okay, I thought. Let me see this.

Later on he answered some audience questions and one person asked what his best advice was to someone who was trying to break into the industry.

He said something like, “Enjoy every minute of it because it’s over all too quickly.”

And then that got me to thinking.

Why does it have to be over?

And yet it’s true. So many of these pop bands have such a short shelf life.

They’re hot until the next big thing comes along.

And that got me to thinking about that post I wrote about negotiation.

I also recalled hearing someone say that the hardest work they did was on the way to becoming famous. Once they were famous they could coast.

And bingo! That’s it.

That’s why these pop stars have such short shelf lifes.

You see it in those silly reality star search shows. American Idol, X Factor, America’s Got Talent.

You can’t just do the same schtick all the time, you have to up the ante.

I do believe that a pop star wanes after a while because the folks who paid good money for the tickets, even though they were probably screaming their hearts out during the concert, went home feeling ‘meh’ it wasn’t worth it.

And probably in the pop star’s defence, it would be very hard to have the kind of quiet contemplative quiet you need to create new art, while in such a glaring spotlight.

So what’s the answer?

Develop a discipline where you can drown out the accolades and the hecklers alike.

Focus on the story and only the story.

Not what it might do for you, but how you can tell this story in a way that is convincing and tangible.

After each book I write, each story I fall in love with, part of me thinks maybe this one will be ‘it’. It will be my ‘breakout’ book.

I still wonder about that, but the advantage is that I know so thoroughly that I have no control over that. And it’s on to the next project.

I can’t imagine coasting.

I can’t imagine not pushing to see how I can write better.

And hopefully, I’ll never have to make a ‘comeback’, like Nick Carter, or have to ask for a second chance.

Because honestly, asking for a second chance makes you look a little desperate.

First thing in the morning, I write my two pages of the new novel. Then when I’m done that, I’ve been coming down to my other computer and revising an old work of mine.

Way back in 1999 I wrote my first novel Dahling if You Luv Me Would You Please Please Smile.

I hadn’t read it for years. It received three award nominations and out of the three nominations it won the Manitoba Young Reader’s Choice Honour Award in 2001.

That means the kids in Manitoba liked it so much that among 17 novels it came in second.

It was a pretty big deal for me.

Then I had some pretty bad luck.

When I was first getting Dahling published, I actually had a choice of two publishers.

I remember sending the story out on a Wednesday or something, a few days before we were taking the kids camping. It must have arrived in the publishers’ offices by Friday. I came back from camping to hear a frantic message on the phone from the head of Scholastic Canada. She’d read it the same afternoon she’d gotten it loved it and wanted to buy it, but…with changes.

Dahling  was considered just a touch too risque for Scholastic tastes. They wanted me to ‘clean’ it up a bit.

Pretty soon after that I had another offer of publication from a smaller publisher: Stoddart. Stoddart was willing to publish it as it was.

I chose Stoddart.

Everything happens for a reason. I don’t consider it to be a mistake, and yet knowing what I know now, I probably would have gone with Scholastic.

The book did great in Canada! Sold over 7500 copies, which is considered a very good, if not bestseller, up here.

I firmly believe that Dahling was the reason my New York agent took me on in the first place. (She also represents Lemony Snicket and Christopher Paul Curtis.)

And then things went south for Stoddart and within a short period of time, Stoddart went bankrupt.

This is about the worst thing that can happen for a book!

They call this process ‘orphaning’. Well actually orphaning a book refers more particularly to when the editor who acquired a particular book, up and leaves for greener pastures, and the book is left on the list as an ‘orphan’. With no one to really push for it, because you know the new editor isn’t going to push his/her predecessor’s accomplishment!

When a publisher goes belly up, what often happens is that another publisher will buy all the back stock and try to get the authors to sign over rights.

That’s what happened with Stoddart. All it’s stock was purchased by another company.

It can be in an author’s best interest to just sign over the rights, but it feels like you’ve been put upon, forced into a relationship with this new entity.

The advice I received was to actually let the book go out of print and then hopefully sell it later when my profile rose higher.

For over ten years it’s been languishing and now with teen suicides in the news, it eats at me that this book needs to be out there!

I can’t count the number of people who have begged me for copies of the book and all I can say is that sometimes copies become available on Amazon.

At the urging of my hubby I’ve been preparing the book for epublishing.

Now, here comes the bit about comfort zones!

I have to confess that I’ve always been a bit prejudiced against epublishing. It just seems a bit like self-publishing.

There’s a little voice inside my head that says, “If it was good enough, you bet a publisher would plunk down money for it!”

My hubby’s foray into the epublishing world has been positive.

He can’t understand my reluctance of putting my work out there.

And then of course, I’ve been following the adventures of Art Slade’s epublishing experience. Art has been absolutely forthright about how well his ebooks are doing, right down to financial details! He declared a little while ago that he’d finally earned enough from ebooks to make a mortgage payment (I’m not sure if he’d earned it in one month’s time).

 But I just picture my ebook out there in the ethernet, being shunned and worse, having it out there making it unattractive to any publishers to take on.

I really feel like I’m in a quandary.

By and large, children’s books are still published the old fashioned way. And what I didn’t understand when I was first starting out and chose Stoddart over Scholastic, is that an author rides on their publishers’ reputation to a certain degree.

It’s like a stamp of approval.

When I published Wanting Mor with Groundwood, that was a HUGE shot in the arm! They’re known worldwide for the quality of their books!

Publishing with publishers is within my comfort zone.

Epublishing is not.

But that said, this is a book that has proven its salt.

And I suspect the only reason it’s not with a publisher is because of the orphaning process. Most publishers won’t take it on because it was previously released.

Basically publishers figure it had it’s kick at the can.

So hubby got my son to type it out over the summer holidays. It was my job to just make sure there were no typos.

But of course I couldn’t help myself.

I was very worried about rereading Dahling after so long!

I had written it more than thirteen years ago! My writing must have improved since then.

I was worried. Had it aged well? Was it dated?

Would it make me cringe?

The biggest problem I found with Dahling is that it’s written in first person past tense. Nobody writes in first person past any more. It reads ‘old-fashioned’.

Yes, there were a few moments when I cringed at my turns of phrase but what really surprised me was how much it made me laugh out loud!

And there were moments when I said aloud, “Oh, poor Zainab!”

It really is a shame to let it hide from the light of day.

I went through the whole novel and changed the tenses, making it in first person present. And while I was at it, I tweaked a few scenes.

Cosmetic changes really!

Hubby thought I was dragging my heels. I told him no, that if it were a dress I was updating, I’d really just removed a few tacky frills and adjusted the hemline!

Tomorrow I’ll print it up and go through it one more time.

I’m still tempted to send it to an editor. I really think it’s good enough to be published! But only if I can keep my ebook rights.

I doubt any publisher will agree to that!

Traditional publishers seem to finally be getting the message that ebooks are here to stay.

It’s out of my comfort zone, it’s venturing into new territory, but hey, if I can navigate the London tube system and train systems, this should be a piece of cake!

I think having grown up in such a white bread neighborhood and really having been dominated by white culture through my formative years, it’s given me both a help and a hindrance in my quest to become an author.

The biggest help it’s given me is the fact that I can write stories that lie within the tastes of mainstream/white culture. Basically I’ve got that white bread foundation to fall back on, and it gives readers a kind of sense of familiarity even while they’re getting a taste of the exotic.

I can’t remember where I heard that a person’s taste in music is formed by the music they grew up with. This leaves its impact on a person’s tastes for the rest of their lives and is probably why the older generation really can’t get into the rhythms of rap and other more experimental forms of music.

Despite the way I dress, I am quite westernized in my taste for story.

And yet, I’m finding that this same westernization is starting to chafe a bit.

It started when I tried to watch Moby Dick.

Well, I should say, I tried to read it first. How many times did I read that first line, “Call me Ishmael…”. I even got up to the point where his interesting bunk mate is introduced. The exotic fellow with all the tattoos and darn it, I just couldn’t get any further.

The ponderous language, the ‘atmosphere’ that just reeked of whale blubber, nope. Just couldn’t make myself forge through it.

And yet I felt, as an author, I should read it! I do try to read all the classics. Even when they’re difficult. Goodness, I got through Macbeth, why couldn’t I get through Moby Dick!

And especially when I heard someone whom I respect say that it was a quintessential classic.

So I decided to cheat a bit and watch the movie. The one with Gregory Peck. I made the mistake of watching it while my daughters and their husbands were over. My Afghan son in law stood in the doorway, leaning up against the wall, and asked me what I was watching.

I told him, “Moby Dick.”

“What’s it about?”

I told him it’s about a guy who gets obsessed with a whale that’s chewed off part of his leg.

He actually started to laugh. “What? He’s going after an animal?”

I told him that he didn’t understand. The whale was symbolic of bigger obsessions, yada, yada, yada.

But he kept laughing. He said, “Doesn’t he understand it’s an ANIMAL?! It didn’t do it on purpose! How can you blame it???”

And by that time I started laughing too.

He ended by saying, “How can you watch that white crap?!”

And yes, I gave up on Moby Dick.

And I started to look at many of the things I was in to, with a more ‘immigrant’ eye.

Maybe if I’d seen Stonehenge before I’d been so influenced by my son in law, I wouldn’t have seen it with such a jaded eye.

When I was talking to one of the ladies in Britain, I think it was my home girl Marjorie, she’d mentioned how she’d been writing these fantastic reviews of all these books coming out about South Asian culture and stuff, and she’d gotten a chance to go to San Francisco I believe and she went into a bookstore hoping to find some of the excellent titles she’d been feasting on, only to discover that the shelves were dominated by series like Gossip Girl and Princess Diaries. Only in an obscure corner did she find one or two of the titles she had so admired.

I’m not surprised.

Bookstores have been catering to the lowest common denominator for quite some time. And there are plenty of parents who are just so darn grateful their kid is reading anything that they don’t care what the books actually contain.

Lots and lots of negative stuff out there.

And even with all that, it seems as though the number of books that kids are reading is still diminishing.

I think publishers need to reach out to bigger markets.

There are demographics that are booming. Asian demographics really come to mind.

We have to get less Eurocentric. Less ‘white’.

The stories coming out of America and Britain are getting a bit…hmmm, predictable.

Can’t recall when last I read an American book that really blew me away! And in terms of British books, haven’t read too many of those that were really mind blowing either.

Oh, yes. Now I’ve got it. It was Monster by Walter Dean Myers.  But that was African American, so not white.

Tried reading Going Bovine. It won the Printz for goodness sakes and although I got much farther than I did with Moby Dick, no way could I finish it.

More and more I seem to be gravitating towards ethnic books.

Maybe because more and more they’re becoming better written–and they’re interesting.

They provide a different experience.

I think all of this was influencing my views when I saw Stonehenge. I liked it, but it was quite ‘white’, if you know what I mean.

I don’t mean to sound racist, or offend anyone, but there it is.