Ten minutes to write. Less time to read.

I’m back. Back from a summer’s hiatus. And back with renewed purpose.

Doesn’t that sound lofty?  As if I were revving my engine and ready to start the next race.

In one sense it’s true.  I did rev my engine and am ready to begin again. But not how I’d been writing before.

I’ve spent the past nine months working with a consultant on updating my website, sending out stories with the hope of publication, and contacting agents with query letters ad nauseum. Yes, I’ve had some success; but what this has taught me is that the joy was lacking. I wasn’t writing with passion about what was important to me.

Instead I wrote by others’ marching orders.  Do this if you want to be successful, commanded Writer’s Digest. Make that query letter sing, since it’s really your audition to the literary stage. “Give me paranormal with a twist,” said one agent; and all I could think of was that Laura Ingalls Wilder would turn in her grave at this request. She didn’t do paranormal, and neither do I.

I’m not giving up on finding that special agent or publisher, but if it doesn’t happen I won’t feel like a failure either. I will feel as if I’ve found my audience again.  And that audience is me.