My Dad jokingly asked me to contact any publisher for giving those 28,000 words(= 110 pages) a form of a book. The joke turned out to be the destiny of those 28,000 words. I tried my luck by contacting the publishers of several fiction books that I encountered in the last few days. I sent them a mail telling them three points :
- I am an avid blogger.
- I have written a short-novel in a blog with over a thousand readers till now.
- The novel is short - just about 28,000 words. Do you guys publish such a short novel?
I waited for two days. I was not hopeful at all. I was too young to get published, that's what I kept hammering my mind. Two days later, I got up late and as per my habit, even before brushing my teeth, I switched my laptop on. There were six mails waiting for me in my mailbox - five of them were notifications of comments on the novel-blog and one was from the Srishti publishers.
They asked me for - Resume, Synopsis of the novel and any two chapters of the novel. I sent them, being skeptical throughout. The resume contained my phone number too. They didn't reply for the next 4 hours. In the evening, I was just going out to play football when I received a call. A call that changed the course of my life. I was on cloud nine. They liked my writing style, were ready to publish my work but there was one problem.
The Problem
I had to add another 28,000 words in the novel making the total word count to be in the range 55,000-60,000, because that's what is an ideal size of a novel. The slim books get lost in the market. That was not a good news for me, since I was already feeling liberated after finishing a BIG task, and adding another 28,000 words meant another 1 month of scratching my imagination, wit and patience. Plus, extending an already completed novel seemed to be tougher job than climbing Mt.Everest backwards. I so much wanted to give up but the thrill of getting my name published overshadowed all my negativism.
I worked, this time not tirelessly, but at ease; being careful not to hamper the flow and storyline of the novel. In the blog, the novel dealt with just the date part while I extended it to the part I - dilli-ki-hawa - and part II - The advent of 'SHE', which turned out to be better than what I had expected, and I submitted the manuscript to the publisher on 27th Jan, 2009.
The publisher asked me to change the title of the novel - make it 19 characters in length - since 19 characters title is their lucky charm. I changed it to 'Oops! 'I' fell in love' that was in synergy with the protagonist's character in the story.
About publishing I just want to say that don't expect too much. It's a struggle, you need to be really good in writing as well as you should have a helluva self-confidence to keep your vigour alive. Persistence will triumph soon. But this 'soon' can be from days to years.
P.S. Only the prepared ones can be lucky.
P.S. Click here to go the next part which describes one unique aspect of the novel i.e. The Ambigram
They asked me for - Resume, Synopsis of the novel and any two chapters of the novel. I sent them, being skeptical throughout. The resume contained my phone number too. They didn't reply for the next 4 hours. In the evening, I was just going out to play football when I received a call. A call that changed the course of my life. I was on cloud nine. They liked my writing style, were ready to publish my work but there was one problem.
The Problem
I had to add another 28,000 words in the novel making the total word count to be in the range 55,000-60,000, because that's what is an ideal size of a novel. The slim books get lost in the market. That was not a good news for me, since I was already feeling liberated after finishing a BIG task, and adding another 28,000 words meant another 1 month of scratching my imagination, wit and patience. Plus, extending an already completed novel seemed to be tougher job than climbing Mt.Everest backwards. I so much wanted to give up but the thrill of getting my name published overshadowed all my negativism.
I worked, this time not tirelessly, but at ease; being careful not to hamper the flow and storyline of the novel. In the blog, the novel dealt with just the date part while I extended it to the part I - dilli-ki-hawa - and part II - The advent of 'SHE', which turned out to be better than what I had expected, and I submitted the manuscript to the publisher on 27th Jan, 2009.
The publisher asked me to change the title of the novel - make it 19 characters in length - since 19 characters title is their lucky charm. I changed it to 'Oops! 'I' fell in love' that was in synergy with the protagonist's character in the story.
About publishing I just want to say that don't expect too much. It's a struggle, you need to be really good in writing as well as you should have a helluva self-confidence to keep your vigour alive. Persistence will triumph soon. But this 'soon' can be from days to years.
P.S. Only the prepared ones can be lucky.
P.S. Click here to go the next part which describes one unique aspect of the novel i.e. The Ambigram
Thanks a ton buddy!!
ReplyDeleteHi...what's the final word count of the book?
ReplyDelete