I’m ready to leave all this administrative stuff behind me again.
I’m ready to leave the correspondence with publishers to someone else.
I’m ready to jump back into my creative world and leave the rest of the world to fend for itself.
In corresponding with several publishers, it’s become quite clear that they base their decisions on a quick scan of bits and pieces of materials—just enough to see if the book fits their specific need for the moment.
That UK publisher — who saw everything in a negative light and who needed a relationship book — emailed back. She felt our relationship book wasn’t a relationship book… because it included friendship as an important relationship. They’ve been working long and hard on another friendship book and didn’t want to stop work on that one to start all over with ours.
I totally understand where the UK publisher is coming from. I didn’t want to start over and rework a bunch of new book proposal packages… for goodness sakes!
What I find… disheartening… is that she couldn’t see how our book was about relationships. Yes, it included friendship in its relationship spectrum, but why should that prevent the book from being about relationships?
As we explain in our book:
Everyone knows that strong relationships are essential for a healthy and happy life. From the moment we’re born, we begin to learn about ourselves through interactions with those around us. Our very self-worth is tied to what others think, see, and share.
For the majority of us, our first experience with relationships is through family interactions. It is through the family’s bond that we, as children, take our first steps toward physical security and emotional connections. Although these are our first close connections, these relationships are —for the most part — chosen for us. We don’t have an active role in selecting our family.
As we mature, we venture out from the comfort of our family circle. It is during this exploration that we learn more about ourselves and how we affect others.
The first relationship we actually choose for ourselves is a friendship. We actively seek out and develop a close connection with persons outside of our family unit. In friendships, we’re able to explore and cultivate our skills in relating, communicating, trusting, respecting, and sustaining quality relationships. A close friendship is our introduction to developing and sustaining an intimate and lasting relationship.
Sadly, some have mistaken friendships as something to be discarded — like training wheels after learning to ride a bike. Although always beneficial, many treat friendships as something less than a “real” relationship — only to be seen as training wheels to a “real relationship.”
Many don’t even realize how powerful, empowering, and intimate a close friendship can be. They don’t realize how a friendship can infuse a person’s life with the energy, encouragement, support, and love needed to light their way through their darkest hours.
Yes. A close friendship is a relationship that contains the power to do this.
All this makes me stop and think: Maybe this “negative” UK publisher is searching for something more than just a relationship book to fill their publishing needs…
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