Six years ago, when I started on this journey of becoming an author I had the good luck and honour of meeting a group of like-minded ladies with whom I became good friends. Over the years, we have not only shared our work with each other and helped each other grow as writers, but also our dreams of getting that Holy Grail all authors dream of, "the call." For some of us, getting that call has come in landing an agent (awesome!!!), for others, it arrived in the mail as a contract with a publisher (way awesome!!!!), but for Maya Blake, I am happy to announce the call has come for her in a very big way.
Being a writer has been Maya's passion for many years, and she has had successful releases in the e-pub industry, but while she's enjoyed these successes, she's had a bigger dream that goes back to when she was a teenager and picked up her first Harlequin novel--she wanted to become a Harlequin author.
This was no easy goal.
Writing is a craft that takes lots of time to learn, but writing for a particular line of a particular publishing house takes many years of practice, many hours of discovering what style and conventions are appropriate to use, and many more hours discovering what not to use. It is so easy to get discouraged when you think you've got the writing style down, and you screw up the courage to send off your manuscript, which you've sweated over for hours to make it as polished as you can, to learn --oh no!-- the writing is indeed good, but that story isn't going to cut it, because well, because of a hundred things which you couldn't possibly have known before you tried to put your work to the test, but you sure as heck know now because the end result is a big, fat and tear-inducing...no.
No. Such a small word. But so very powerful. It can stop dreams from becoming reality, if we take it as the final answer. This is when patience and persistence become our very best friends, and surrounding ourselves with positive people who hold us up and keep us motivated rather than bring us down becomes essential. Well, Maya didn't take no for a final answer. She cried, she felt disappointment, she felt frustrated, and there were probably many times when the moments of writing she managed to sneak in between kids, and job, and daily life seemed impossible choices to make for the sake of a dream. But she never gave up. And that's important. That's what makes her story so exciting and pleasurable to tell. She could have given up at any time, but she didn't. She kept that dream alive even, after having gotten very close many times to succeding only to be told "no" again, that doubt crept in to say, "maybe I'm not cut out for this after all." Maybe. If she had given up, certainly. But she didn't. She tried again, and I am overjoyed (seriously, I jumped around the room doing a happy dance when I found out) to say Maya Blake is now a Harleqin author. Her first Harlequin book, The Price of Success, (that title is soooo fitting, isn't it?) will be out in time for Christmas 2012.
Holy awesomeness, Batman!!!!
In the writing world, it doesn't get any better than that.
Unless you find your work on the New York Times bestseller list. And for Maya, I think that's just a matter of time, too.
Thanks for stopping by today!
~Kate
