My Story

The best gift ever

When I was a discouraged writer, dreaming of having her book published, rejections filling my inbox faster than a firehose fills a bucket, my husband got me the best gift ever.

He started by asking me if he could read my completed manuscript for SUPERS, the first book I had finished writing in 20 years. Thrilled (and terrified) that someone wanted to read what I wrote, I sent him a copy.

First of all, he read it. All the way through. That in itself is a gift to any writer, because we know it takes your precious time and you chose to spend it with our work.  

And even better, he liked it. My husband is the type of person who will tell you straight up. If the pants I’m wearing look bad, he’ll be like, “those pants look bad.” So I knew if my book sucked, he would tell me, “your book sucks.” And if he felt like that was too harsh, he might add something like, “But I think it’s promising. Keep working at it and you’ll get better.”

Which really, is good advice. But (lucky for me) he didn’t think it sucked. In fact, he really enjoyed reading SUPERS. So that was gift #2 – my very first fan. It was the encouragement I needed to reach out (tentatively) to my other fans – Mom, Dad and his partner Angie being the first.

But it gets better. On Christmas morning that year, Kevin surprised me with 12 copies. Of my book. With my name on it – right there under the title.

I couldn’t believe it. He had taken it to an online service, designed a cover, and printed copies for me. It took him hours of time. And it was beautiful.

I did what any writer would do in that situation – I cried. Alarmed and confused, my kids were like, “but Mom, I thought you’d love this!” And of course, I blubbered, “I DO love this!” and then cried some more.

And then we had a discussion about the difference between sad tears and happy tears. I’m still not sure they believe me that happy tears are a thing.

There’s something about seeing your name in print on the cover of a book when it’s been your dream since you were a little kid. After 40 years of dreaming, I had something tangible that I could hold in my hands. I saw that my dream of being a published author was possible. And I wanted it more than ever. But I had to keep writing, and keep trying, especially if I wanted to publish traditionally, which is the route I wanted to go if I could.

Every time I got a new rejection letter, I would have a little pity party, grumble a little about how hard the querying process is, and then looked at my book published courtesy of Kevin Aebig publications. Then I would take a deep breath, look up the next agent, and write another query.

If you want to encourage a writer in your life, use one of these many online services available to publish a few copies of their books. Happy tears (and renewed motivation when the times are tough) are practically guaranteed.

(But…don’t make your home-published books available to the world. It hurts your chances of traditionally publishing later. Just a few copies for you and the other fans in your life who want you to sign it so you can feel like an author).

Thank you, Kevin. For both of my books that you published for me, for your constant support, and as always, for your honesty.

It’s gonna be pretty hard to ever top that gift. Angie still bugs my dad about it to this day. “Oh, that’s a pretty good gift, Tom. But it’s not a book, is it?”

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