It just takes ONE.

It just takes ONE. There are numerous stories of writers receiving rejection after rejection before someone FINALLY published their work. I believe it was DUNE that was published by a company that made auto manuals? And, of course, Stephen King’s CARRIE was rejected a multiple times before eventually finding a home, thereby launching one of the most prolific writing careers of all time.

Sometimes it’s easy to fantasize about multitudes. It is fun to imagine having an entire plethora of suitors vying for our affections. But really, it just takes ONE person to be the right one (and, personally speaking, as someone who has been through a broken engagement before meeting my husband, one marriage proposal is more than enough).

As authors, we love the idea of publishing houses fighting over our manuscript, resulting in a dramatic auction and the coveted Major Deal. This scenario has happened to several of my friends, and it is exciting when it does. However, it is exceptionally rare, and no one sees the years and years of work and rejection that they have endured to get to that point.

It just takes ONE. And, while I have found publishers for my short fiction and poetry collections—as well as my short fiction and poetry pieces—I am still waiting for that ONE to believe in my YA novel.

In the meantime, I am pursuing an exciting professional writing opportunity, working on my next YA horror novel, taking classes at the University of Pennsylvania, and continuing to have short works accepted for publication (I will post the links when I have them!). In addition to my current YA novel, which is out on submission, my super fun poetry collection about female murderers is heading out the door this week (thanks to my incredible agent, Jennifer Lyons!).

And, of course, I am reminding myself that it just takes ONE.

And so, today I offer a question to you, Dear Reader: what is the ONE thing you are waiting for? Hoping for? Excited about? Already received?

Never give up.

Yours in Terror,

Brooke MacKenzie