About a month ago, I hit my wall. For several years, I had been toiling away in the publishing industry at newspapers, magazines and book publishers big and small. I thought I could keep going that way, but I was wrong.
I was one of those college students who just could not choose a major ... primarily because I didn't really know what I wanted to do with my life. Then, all of a sudden, it became crystal clear to me that publishing was my calling. As a devoted, lifelong bookworm, it only made sense. Books have always been my life -- until about age 10, I didn't really grasp that it was rather socially unacceptable to bury my nose in a book at recess time.
But I digress.
So off I went into the wonderful world of editorial. First I worked as an intern for a major metropolitan newspaper, then for a music magazine and from there I went to book publishing. At first, the experience was joyous and fulfilling.
And then it became something else.
From up in my ivory tower in New York, working at a company that people would trade a limb to get into, I began to realize that books are business. And if you love books --I mean truly, passionately LOVE books-- it's extremely disheartening to watch certain decisions being made and games being played. Particularly in my imprint, there was no joy. Everyone could love an idea to death, but it was all about the bottom line. And it was cut throat. But I stayed for a while, working torturous hours for six to seven days a week.
After a while, I decided to get out of Manhattan and move to Boston. Here I found a job with a small publisher, thinking that maybe it would be different there (earlier in my career I had worked for an independent publisher and loved it). For about a month I did. Then I realized that it was the same game with different rules. Even worse rules because they were non-sensical and non-predictable. So I got out.
And here I am. Living the freelance life I have dreamed of for years, with the requisite writer's dream of writing a novel of my own at some point in the future. It's wonderful to be free of the politics and game playing -- always my most despised part of corporate America. But it's also ... really scary. And while I know the editing game and am a competent writer there are a whole new set of rules which I am only just beginning to learn.
Here we go ...
