The Sweet Agony of Waiting

By Glynn Young @gyoung9751

A publisher asks to see your full manuscript. You read it three more times, trying to eradicate all typos, missing words, unclear passages, and confusing lines. You attach it to a politely professional email, which you hope disguises what you’re experiencing in equal measure: hope, fear, and anxiety.

You hit send.

And then you wait.

Waiting may be as much or more exhausting than the writing itself, but it is a fact of life in book publishing.

I recently finished a manuscript for a historical novel, a departure from the contemporary novels I’d done before. I had one worry: it was different and outside my genre. I’d researched this story for four years; a huge investment of time had gone into it.

A publisher asked to see it, and I lived what I described above.

I waited. Weeks went by. I waited. Weeks became months.

The response arrived by email. Yes, they wanted to publish, and if I was still interested, they would send the contract.

I went for a three-and-a-half-mile walk to clear my head and calm down. When I arrived home, I sent my response.

Yes.

The contract arrived fairly quickly. We had a deal.

Now it was time to – wait again.

I’ve learned enough about this business to know that, while I may think hordes of hungry and desperate readers are lined up to read my story, the reality is they’re not. They don’t know it exists. And while I may think the publisher has gotten their hands on an instant bestseller, the reality it that publishers do have other books they’re shepherding through the pipeline, other demands on their time, and a business to manage with all the hassles and paperwork and tax considerations and employees to pay. My manuscript is simply a very small part of that.

I know this well enough to know what to expect: a lot of waiting.

I’ve been blessed with a publisher who provides periodic updates. A book ahead of mine in the pipeline has proven troublesome and requires considerably more effort than anticipated. Then I learn an editor has been assigned. I wait some more. A question arrives about wanting a final manuscript, to make sure they have the latest version. I send it.

I wait some more. More weeks go by.

An email arrives with an attachment. It’s the proposed cover.

I don’t know if all authors worry about this, but through a total of six previously published books, I’ve worried that the people involved in the production process will miss what I’m trying to do, miss the sense of the story, or get the story so wrong that we’ll be wallowing in polite differences of opinion for weeks or months.

The designer of the book cover got it, and he got it exactly right. The cover is gorgeous. More importantly, it communicates the sense of what the story is about. I’ve sat staring at the cover, feeling some combination of overwhelmed, blessed, grateful, and struck dumb in wonder.

And now, I wait.

The editing is underway. I don’t know what stage it’s at, or what the editor is going to do, but seeing that cover design has convinced me that waiting is worth it.

Meanwhile, I’m focusing on other writing projects, reading, and thinking through what I can do to help market my book-in-the-making. I’ve accidentally stumbled on possibilities for marketing and publicity I hadn’t thought about. A plan is forming in my head, one that will eventually merge with what the publisher plans.

Waiting isn’t all bad.

Glynn Young is a national award-winning speechwriter, communications practitioner, and novelist. He’s the author of five published novels, Dancing Priest, A Light Shining, Dancing King, Dancing Prophet;  and Dancing Prince; and the non-fiction book Poetry at Work.  Visit Glynn on Facebook, LinkedIn, Pinterest, his blog, the Dancing Priest book page, and his business web site.