What Got Me Published Could Be the Very Thing You Need
What does it take to be a traditionally published author? Twenty years ago, I would have said talent and connections. Today only one word comes to mind—grit. If your field is as cutthroat as publishing, here are four ways that helped me develop mental toughness, which could be the very thing you need.
Writing talent and skills are essential and connections always help, but without grit, an enduring writing career, or any career worth dreaming of, is impossible. My third novel and first thriller, MULTO, was published by Agora Books in September 2023. Multo (meaning ghost in Tagalog) follows a Filipino American bounty hunter named Domingo as he looks for the only quarry that has ever eluded him, a biracial Filipina who can disappear like a ghost.
I attribute the publication of all my novels to the following:
#1 Persistence: The manuscript that became MULTO was my first attempt at fiction writing back in 1995! After many revisions, the manuscript was accepted by Maria Napolitano (with Bookcase Literary Agency at the time) , who signed me as a client and sold the book to Agora Books in 2022. It’s been 28 long years from the novel’s conception in 1995 to publication in September 2023. It would have been easier to give up but for this thing called persistence.
#2 Willingness to Adapt: When I wrote MULTO as a literary novel, it didn’t work. I initially wrote it from the point of view of Monica, the biracial Filipina who overstays in the U.S. in pursuit of her American Dream—her American father who doesn’t know she exists. The literary agents who read my manuscript deemed it “uncommercial.” They all said literary fiction was a tough sell, plus my book’s immigration theme and Filipino protagonist made it completely unsellable.
Many years later, I completely rewrote the manuscript using Domingo’s POV. The novel’s structure, tone, and pacing changed organically. Domingo is a wiseass and kickass bounty hunter who, like Monica, believes in the American Dream. Unlike her, he’s a naturalized U.S. citizen. The nature of his job makes them de facto enemies. My revamped novel pits a dogged bounty hunter against a desperate woman in hiding. MULTO became a thriller.
#3 Insatiable Hunger: Have you tried fasting for 24 hours or longer? I’ve done it. I was so starved I could have eaten my big pile of unpublished manuscripts. In almost three decades of writing fiction, I’ve succeeded in getting short stories and three novels published traditionally, but there were many painful rejections and failures between acceptances. Experiencing setbacks is like fasting—it keeps me hungry for publication success.
#4 Choosing Action Over Talk: The world is full of people who want to write, plan to write, and talk about writing. They hardly ever write. Many fizzle out in the face of criticisms and rejections. In the end, nobody ever gets published without doing the hard work of actually finishing a manuscript and rising above every obstacle along the way. It’s as simple as that. Just remember that simple doesn’t mean easy.