My lovely publisher Fly on the Wall Press asked me to write a short piece on 'my publication journey.' Here is the piece I sent them ...

I was fifty eightyears old when my first proper novel was published. So it must have quite ajourney then.

Well – not so much.

My problem was asupreme lack of confidence. I never believed anyone would want to read mystories. So I wrote them, and I put them in a drawer, and no one ever saw them.Not even my family. Eventually, one by one, I lost them. A novella about a geneticallymodified marathon runner. A novel about a brotherhood of monks who happen to beimmortal. A half-finished book about a brush salesman who finds himself hailedas a new messiah. A novel in a similar vein about a student doctor who getssent back in time to first century Israel to document the life of Jesus, butcannot find him. Anywhere. He trawls Jerusalem and Galilee looking. One day heuses his twenty-first century medical skills to resuscitate a man in a comawhose body is being prepared for burial. And later to save the life of a child.Oops. ‘I’m not the messiah,’ he tells people. But it’s too late. Already he hasa set of disciples.  And you get the ideafrom there.  A set of short stories. Anovella about the last living tiger ‘Claws’ who has huntsmen clamouring toshoot him. Not all of these were ever finished, some petered out halfwaythrough, but all are dust now. 

It's tough, you see,when novel-writing is your calling. If you’re a painter you can show yourpainting to a thousand people in a single afternoon. They will look at it for twenty-fiveseconds (that’s the average time apparently). It isn’t asking much of anyone tofind twenty-five seconds to appreciate your picture. But a novel asks more. Sovery much more. For a novel I want a week of your time – for two hours a day.Frankly I never had the nerve to ask that.

But of course I didget published. And that is the next part of the journey. I wrote a non-fictionbook (The Good Zoo Guide). I parcelled up the manuscript and posted it toHarper Collins and they phoned me at 9:00 AM the next morning to say they wouldhave it. Gosh. I never thought it would be that easy. In trepidation I sentthem a novel – ‘Daughters of Artemis,’ a sci-fi tale about a worldpopulated only by women. They didn’t want it. So I self-published it, barelymentioned it to anyone, and it is still out there somewhere selling about tencopies a year – presumably to people who buy it by mistake.

Then one day in my midforties I sat at my laptop and wrote a first line. The line was, ‘I amMaximillian Zygmer Quentin Kavadis John Cabwhill Teller. My name includes everyone of the letters of the Roman alphabet with the exception of the letter F. Myfather, it seems, took exception to F.‘ I had no idea what this story wasgoing to be about. I just wanted to start it. Then I discovered that the namelacked a P. So he became Maximilian Ponder. He became a man who had locked himself away to catalogue his own brain.

Well, writing was onlya hobby. The Notable Brain of Maximilian Ponder took me about five yearsto write. Once it was done, I hid it away; as usual. But three years later Icame across it on my hard drive and I sent a copy to my son, Jon, who by now wasworking as a journalist with the BBC. What did he think of it? Of course hetold me he liked it. ‘You must send it away Dad,’ he urged me. But I didn’t.Not for two years. All the same, he pestered, so one day, on impulse I emailedthree literary agents with the manuscript. And I guess the rest is history.There was a publishers’ auction, I sold the book to Orion for a six-figure sum,and it went on to get short-listed for the Costa.  

There is a moral tothis story for young writers (or even for old ones). First – be patient. Yourfirst novel may not be your masterpiece. It probably won’t be (unless you areHarper Lee or Mary Shelley.)  But writingis a craft. The more hours you spend writing, the better you get at it. It’s nodifferent in this respect from playing piano. So go on writing. Enjoy it. Treatit as a hobby, as a way to unwind. Don’t nurture any great ambitions. Lots ofpeople play piano without ever setting foot on a concert stage. If you don’tenjoy the writing, then readers won’t enjoy the reading. So do it because youlove it. Because you have to. Because something inside you makes you do it. Second,when you have a novel that you are genuinely proud of – show it to someone youtrust. Take advice. And if you both truly believe in it, then go out and lookfor a publisher or an agent. Don’t wait as long as I did.

But if you do wait aslong as I did – well that’s not a bad thing either. Because by now you willknow how to write.

Good luck. And goodwriting.

John