Apparently Ghosted

Help Wanted: An Ending, Part 4

If you read last week’s essay, you know that, in April of 2019, I sent my editor Maggie a new revision with a new ending. (If you need to, catch up on this series by reading part one, part two, and last week: part three.)

And then, my friends, I didn’t hear a word from her for SEVEN MONTHS.

Now listen, as far as I’m concerned, every writer should have a big poster that says EDITORS ARE BUSY hanging above their desks. If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that editors are very, very busy. They are constantly reading books and making them better, or reading books and deciding if they want to buy the book. Their lives are made of P&L statements, galleys, and reading so, so many manuscripts. 

They’re busy.

But also, I know that they are committed to making the books good. And that they’re human! That they want to correspond with authors in the interest of editing and revising, but sometimes things slip through the cracks.

Which is why I checked in with Maggie a few months after I’d sent the original email. And then, a few weeks after that, asked my agent if she had heard anything. We both sent multiple nudge and check-in emails, and heard…nothing. I wondered if I had somehow offended her with my Rooster School ending. I wondered if she hated me and my book and was trying to find someone else to take it. 

I wondered if she was, you know, ok. 

Because it was weird, to have no response at all.

MEANWHILE: Maggie received my Rooster School revision, and sent me an email with comprehensive editorial notes. To which I never responded. So she sent follow-up check-in emails over the summer and into the fall, but never heard anything. She wondered if she had somehow offended me with her editorial notes. Yes, authors are busy, and sure, sometimes we can be divas, but it was weird that she hadn’t heard from me, like, AT ALL. 

That’s right. She hadn’t heard from me either.

In November of 2019, I got an email from her saying she had had a computer virus, where her email sometimes went out, and sometimes came in, but mostly not. So imagine: you’re getting some emails, so as far as you know, your email is working. Some people are getting your emails. But one day you get an email from someone who is upset that you haven’t responded to all of their many, many emails, and you don’t know what they’re talking about. 

When people ask why this book took so long, this is always what I think of, even though it was only seven months of the ten-years-long process. But it felt like ten years all on its own. So it’s like this book actually took twenty years, from book deal to publication, because those seven months were a decade. I remember feeling like this book would never, ever come out. How could it? It had no ending, it had no illustrator, and the editor was ghosting me (or so it seemed).

I’d like to say this is a huge metaphor for something, for the book making process being slow, but I’d really be forcing it. Or I’d like to tell you that it was all worth it because I wrote an incredible ending while I was waiting, but that’s not true either. Mostly I was confused, and waiting, and working on other books.

At this point, it felt good to be moving forward with the story again.

Next: more new endings, and, for the first time, the rest of the book changes too.

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1. If you’re considering buying a book, preordering really does help. It lets publishers and retailers know that there’s interest in the book. If you aren’t going to buy, consider asking your local library to order it. THANK YOU.