Blogger: Wendy Lawton
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As we continue talking about the writer’s journey let’s look at the second step.
Step Two: The Threshold
This is the jumping off point for the adventure. Once past this threshold, the hero enters the unknown—a world filled with challenges and danger. At the threshold the hero encounters beings or situations that block his passage (guardians or gatekeepers). When the hero is ready to meet the challenge the guardians will stand aside or even become a helper or friend.
This is where so many writers get stuck. We receive the call and embark on the journey but once we hit up against the realities of the publishing industry, which include seemingly insurmountable odds and some of the most ferocious gatekeepers, we shrink back.
A popular theme in writers’ blogs is the unfairness of the query system or the difficulties encountered trying to get the proverbial foot in the door. When considered in light of the hero’s journey, it makes sense. Many who answer the call will fail shortly after the threshold—the challenges seem overwhelming.
Tom Hanks was quoted as saying, “If it wasn’t hard, everyone would do it. It’s the hard that makes it great.” How true.
I thought Mark Healy, a columnist for The Globe and Mail offered an interesting premise in an April 21, 2009 article Generation Y Wants it Now:
“There is a generation coming through school now, just starting to hit the workforce, and already a powerful consumer segment, which hasn’t really waited for anything. Ever. And our business world isn’t quite ready for them.
Think about it. This generation — which sails under many flags: Gen Y, Millennials, Echo Boomers, Digitals, etc. — is growing up in an economy which is vastly different from that of Gen X (my cohort), the Baby Boomers, and the Old Guard before them. Millennials discover music they like and download it immediately. They process three or more simultaneous, continuous streams of information and communication — conducting history research, while texting friends, and updating Facebook. The idea of a store isn’t necessarily relevant. Nor is the idea of investing, or putting in your time. So — they don’t wait to communicate, even one-to-many, they don’t wait to accumulate and process mass amounts of information, and they don’t wait to purchase and consume. They are hyper-efficient. And that’s the problem. A lot of our business models either put up with, or to some extent depend on, inefficiency.”
When you realize that the threshold to the world of publishing is populated by gatekeepers who depend on inefficiency to help filter the masses, you can see the conflict. And in publishing, it’s not just the Millenials—I see the impatience cross-generationally.
The reality is that there are far more writers—even good writers—than there are publishing spots. Face it; there are more writers than there are potential readers for that writing. Not everyone who embarks on the journey will make it past the gatekeepers.
It will take heroic efforts.
How about you? Have you stepped over the threshold in your writer’s journey? What kinds of gatekeepers or situations have blocked your passage? What can you do to be ready to meet the challenge? Have you every had a guardian or gatekeeper become a mentor or an ally?
some of the most ferocious gatekeepers
That made me laugh.
Great post, though.
To answer your questions: I have stepped over the threshold and the gatekeepers have not been ferocious at all. They’ve been gracious. Gatekeepers, still, but not mean in any way.
The thing that has blocked my path has not been a gatekeeper but my own writing. I can’t say I haven’t been allowed to send queries. I’ve sent queries that didn’t get any interest. I can’t say I haven’t been invited to send partials and fulls. I’ve sent those and they haven’t been snapped up. It’s not that people weren’t willing to give my work a look. It’s that my work was not ready or it wasn’t tailored properly to the audience I was aiming at.
To meet that challenge I didn’t submit for many years. I read fiction and “how to” books, I went to conferences and always submitted work for critique at those, I studied the publishing industry, and I submitted very lightly. This year (ten years in–I’m a slow learner) I’ve started submitting with fervor. I’m now aiming at a market I know pretty well and at agents I’ve researched pretty deeply.
I have never had a gatekeeper become a mentor, though several have been generous with encouragement. I wish that more agents and editors would be able to find the time to mentor writers.
I almost stumbled on the threshhold but thankfully, I pushed on through. Now, I’m working on accepting criticism and honing my craft.
This is the NOW generation. I speak about this very topic all the time in my Sunday School class.
Love your “hero’s journey approach to this subject.
I feel I’m taking baby steps across a new threshold–writing fiction. At the moment, my biggest obstacles are within myself.
As for an ally, the first person who comes to mind is Nick Harrison. Wendy, I think you’ll agree that Nick continues to champion one of my manuscripts–long after his publishing house rejected it.
I can so relate to all that has been said!
My “gatekeepers” are the various aspects of the craft that keep me on a near vertical learning curve. But along the way, so many in ACFW have been kinder to me than I deserved. I am referring not only to fellow writers, but also to two editors who, instead of sending form rejections, took the time to communicate with me personally, point me to the next step in the journey, and invite me to resubmit. They were not gatekeepers, but mentors.
Great post! I think it helps immensely to look at the agents and editors as threshold guardians. Any time an agent or editor teaches us, blogs, or takes the time in a one-on-one appointment to give feedback, I think they become a mentor. I guess the day one of them offers a contract, they’ll become the hero! The article you quoted sums up the new century so well!
I decided early on to not complain about publishers taking a long time to consider. It usually meant my work had gotten past the guardian of the slush pile and was getting multiple reads. Sometimes I even got suggestions of alternate publishers to query, often ones I had already queried. Sigh. Eventually, a publisher took 4 books, and I have found them very gracious even when they have turned down several things since. A manuscript I am currently trying to place comparing a child with HIV to a superhero says, “Sometimes superheroes have to do things they don’t like. They wouldn’t be superheroes if it wasn’t hard.” I guess that applied to me as a writer too.
As Nikki pushed reluctantly into adulthood, she realized she was not the greatest writer in the world and publishers were not waiting, pens aready, to sign her up on a book contract. Determined and wearing her heart on her sleeve, she wrote and sent en mass. Her file became thick with rejection notes, but some of those notes were encouraging. Occasionally, her hard work was rewarded by the publication of an article. To those waiting for her instant success, the successes were not enough. To Nikki, these successes were by no means small. A writer, she realized, is a soldier boring through the slush pile with a heart revealed to the world’s censure or applause.
Then, one day, she matured. She thanked God she did not get any major publishing contract at so young an age. Her stories became more in depth as trial after trial plagued her life. Writing became her journey, her ministry, and her life. No mountain appeared too daunting to try to climb.
I guess the day one of them offers a contract, they’ll become the hero! The article you quoted sums up the new century so well!
some of those notes were encouraging. Occasionally, her hard work was rewarded by the publication of an article. To those waiting for her instant success, the successes were not enough
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