The dreama bad contract with the wrong publisher, can be fatal. There is more
discussion of these situations later in this book. For now let us
focus on the feelings of anxiety.
What is this anxiety really about? It can be experienced as the
desperate feeling that no one in book publishing cares a damn
about you or your manuscript. One can feel it as anger over slush
piles (stacks of unrequested, waiting-to-be-read manuscripts), fury
over long response times, frustration with uncaring editors or
agents—one can even begin to resent the success of others. What
began as bliss can turn to utter misery.
I would like to suggest that these overt signs of anxiety actually
mask fears of a more fundamental sort. One is the fear of failure, the
terrifying possibility that one has wasted years of one's life. A sec-
ond is the fear of humiliation—so many expectations to fulfill!
Especially one's own!
Most fundamental of all, 1 believe, is the anxiety that derives
from the need for validation. Above all things, writers want accep-
tance. They long to be judged worthy of publication. They want to
be assured that they are not crazy. They need to know that all this
time and effort have not been for nothing.
If the breaking-in period becomes too lengthy or too frustrating,
most writers will sooner or later get desperate. Some will start to
avoid the whole process, refusing to push themselves. Others will
keep at it doggedly but cynically, losing all excitement and hope.
That is too bad, because that kind of burnout can lead to ill-
considered career decisions. And, as I said, these days there is little
room for error in the big, bad world of book publishing.