“Little by little, one travels far.” – J. R. R. Tolkien
The first weekend of October was the annual Moonlight & Magnolia’s conference, a conference in Atlanta hosted by the Georgia Romance Writers every year and one that I attend diligently. Each time I go, I’m surrounded by other people who suffer from the same affliction as me–they hear voices in their heads, can take mundane situations and interactions and turn them into romantic scenarios, and are hopelessly committed to the idea of “happily ever after.”
Each year I attend, I remember my first year at the conference when the only person I knew was my poor sister-in-law, who I pretty much forced to come with me. That first conference was eye-opening—not just because it was the first time I realized it was okay to talk (out loud and to other people) about a crazy story that’s in my head, but because I learned so much about the craft of writing. Now when I go to the conference I am still meeting new people, but I’m also seeing the friends I’ve made over the years. I’m still learning from the sessions, too, but I’m also realizing how much more I know now than when I first began.
I’ve just finished up edits on Book Two of my Heart’s True Desire series and turned them over to my publisher, and I should be getting a publication date assigned soon (likely March or April of 2025). Book Two is called Timeless, and it is actually the first novel I wrote, almost ten years ago (I just checked—I started writing it in January of 2015). I finished that first draft around November of 2015 and sent it to a few unfortunate souls to read to get their feedback. After implementing their comments, I tried to send the manuscript out to publishers and agents. I didn’t get very far with that because, well, it was terrible (I didn’t even know how terrible it was back then, but I do now!).
So, I set the manuscript aside and started working on another story idea, which later became Amulet (Book One of the Heart's True Desire series that published last April after many rewrites). I couldn’t do anything with Amulet at the time, either (because it was also terrible), so I set that one aside and started a third book called Unholy about a vampire hero (I like vampires).
I only wrote about 100 pages of Unholy before I had the idea in May of 2017 to write a book set in ancient times. So, the unfinished manuscript for Unholy was put away for the time being, and I started working on Soothsayer. I tried to get an agent or publisher to pick up Soothsayer for publication, and although that process went better than it had for the other books, in the end no one wanted it. I did get some really good feedback from the editors who read it, though, and that feedback encouraged me to self-publish. So, I did. Soothsayer was published on Amazon in 2020 (thank you, Covid shutdown) as Book One of the Soothsayer’s Path series. It was followed by Admonition (Book Two) in 2021 (which won an award, further encouraging me) and Birthright (Book Three) in 2022.
With everything I had learned, I turned back to my first two stories. After much rewriting and further rejection, I finally got a contract for Amulet (from a publisher who had rejected a prior version of Amulet, no less!). Timeless (originally called Undeserving) was rewritten to be the second book of the series Amulet started, and it was much improved as a result. When I was done reworking Amulet and Timeless, I picked up my vampire story Unholy once more, rewrote those first 100 pages to fit into the Heart’s True Desire series, then finished the manuscript. We’ll see what my editor thinks of this vampire romance when she reads it over the next couple of months—fingers crossed.
Looking back at all these stories and rewrites and rejections, I am filled with joy and appreciation for how far I've come. Although I haven’t reached my destination yet, I’m determined to stay the course, because little by little I'll get there. And the best part is that I’m enjoying every step along the way.
- Kathryn Amurra