Hi Bob

Cue for long and boring answer... I often get asked this by young
aspiring writers, and the answer is slightly embarrassing, especially
with the young, because I've not done any of the things an author is
supposed to do, so it's not as if I can give them good advice. I have
never in my life submitted a manuscript to a publisher.

The fantasy novels got published by sheer dumb luck. I started writing
them when I found I had crossed some invisible Rubicon and was
suddenly unemployable (up to a point I had always been able to get
casual work quite easily, but maybe my habit of dropping it as soon as
I had something else to do gave me a bad name). And we were very broke
at the time. Until recently, we have always lived from day to day (my
husband is a writer too) and it's impossible to fall back on social
welfare - neither of us have for decades - because sometimes you do
get money, and the bureacracies simply don't allow for weirdly
unpredictable income. So you get these awful gaps, where you wonder
how you're going to feed the children next week... And I started
wondering if I could write something that would sell. At the same
time, my oldest son got old enough to start reading the fantasy novels
I used to read as a kid, Le Guin and Tolkien, and I remembered how
much I loved them, and how writing them was in fact, when I was 10, my
first writerly ambition. So, thinking why not?, I began one of my own.
It was the one kind of genre novel I felt I could write honestly, and
the one thing you can't do with genre is write it cynically. Very few
of even the most awful genre writers are cynical about it, and those
who are don't last. Readers know.

I had written about 80 pages, which was a lot for me, and had really
no idea what to do with it, or even if people read this stuff much any
more (I was a bit out of touch). This is where the luck comes in. My
first book of poems was published by Penguin Books here, so I rang up
the publisher and told him I was writing this thing, and I didn't know
what to do with it, and would he read it and give me some advice? He
nicely said to send it in. I didn't hear anything for a few weeks, and
had basically forgotten about it, when somebody rang me up and said
they would like to contract me. So that's how it happened. Basically,
I bypassed by the slush pile. I doubt that I would have completed it
without a contract - each book is about 500 pages - so even though I
signed what I found later was a disadvantageous contract, I was still
incredibly lucky.

That was in 1999. A couple of years, Penguin brought out the first
book. They weren't that interested, truth be told, and certainly made
no effort to sell it on. The next big stroke of luck was an English
editor reading that book, totally by chance, and really liking it. She
worked for Walker, an excellent and much more careful publisher, and
that's how the series ended up being sold - much quicker than is usual
- to the UK and the US, and from there to other countries. The rest
has been basically word of mouth, so far as I can tell. Certainly
there's been no hype. It's when I found out how important independent
booksellers are. One particular shop in the UK sold over 200 copies of
the first book alone because a woman who worked there liked the books.
Once the books were selling overseas, Penguin here woke up, and
reissued them with better covers.  They're still selling well, enough
to make me a decent living. I don't know how long for, and it might
all dry up tomorrow, but I'm enjoying it while it lasts.

It feels like an honest way of making a buck, and it's been liberating
in ways I really didn't expect. And I do enjoy it, though it's a
monumental labour. I was never more relieved than when I finished that
series and I doubt I'll ever do another one. But I certainly will
write other novels, because they're kind of addictive. It's all that
space...

xA



On Thu, Jun 3, 2010 at 10:17 PM, Bob Grumman <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
> Robin told me about Alison's success in science fantasy, and I've been
> trying to make myself remember to get one of her books (which I expect I'll
> like simply because such books are a big part of my fun reading--I read an
> average of one a day while substitute teaching in middle and senior high
> schools where they make up a large percentage of extra credit reading for
> students).  One question for Alison, because I tried her route to a day job
> I'd enjoy unsuccessfully: how did you manage to first get a novel published?
>  I failied commercially with a children's book (tested in various schools by
> friends who taught with great success), plays, a tv script I had a tv
> actress friend fail to help me get looked at by a studio, a couple of
> x-rated (very bad, I have to admit) novels, and now, a science fiction
> novel.  I think my problem was lack of perseverance.  Maybe lack of talent,
> but looking at the stuff out there, it's hard to believe any literate person
> could write worse than half the "successful" writers out there.  Not in any
> way to suggest I don't have great admiration for the good ones in commercial
> writing, many of whom I consider extremely good and as valuable to our
> culture as any poet--Rex Stout, for instance.
>
> --Bob
>



-- 
Editor, Masthead:  http://www.masthead.net.au
Blog: http://theatrenotes.blogspot.com
Home page: http://www.alisoncroggon.com