Without my friends and fans I would still just be me. Kristin Clark. Not Author Kristin Clark. Without your continued love and support I would not be who I am today. You make writing more than a dream, you make it a reality. I hate the real world. I think it sucks. Since I was a kid I can remember getting lost in a book or lost in my writing, not once ever considering doing this for a living. A published author to me seemed like such a far-fetched idea that I had never even considered it. Then I went to college. Fresh out of High School, my very first class was English 101. During that class we had a creative writing assignment. It was my favorite class and my favorite assignment while in college. I remember getting a 100% on the paper and the professor speaking to me about my assignment. He told me I had a gift and that I should continue writing. I of course laughed. I will be fortunate enough to be in that small percentage of writers who actually get published. So time goes on and years later I had this Title and plot line poke me in the head. Like I have had happen many times, only this time it wouldn’t go away. So I sat down and began writing. That night I wrote the first 3 chapters of The Chosen. It was my secret and I had no intentions of publishing it. It was for me and me only. No one knew I had written it and no one knew that after the coercing of my best friend I decided to try to get it published. I had even joked around in the lunch room at work and said out of the blue, “I’m going to write a book.” I still laugh at the faces my friends made. Little did they know I had already done it. So one thing led to another, I began submitting to agents and in came the rejection letters. This was still a secret. Only my friend Michelle knew what I was doing. Eventually just when I had decided to give up I got a response. Now in the literary world, you start with a query letter. Then if your lucky, they will ask for a partial, which is the first three chapters. And if they like what they read they will request a full version of your manuscript. To have a partial requested is a big accomplishment, but to have a full requested is huge. Now that doesn’t mean that you are a shoe in but it is definitely a reason to pat yourself on the back. Ok who am I kidding, I jumped up and down and squealed which then brought the cat out of the bag. A few of my closest friends at work, Chris, Roberta, Trish and Sharon were there so I finally told them. I felt like I was taking my clothes off in front of them. This was my secret life, my secret world and now I am sharing it with the rest of humanity. It was a pot of mixed emotions. Mostly fear of being judged and scrutinized. Sorry, the happy ending isn’t here. The Agent loved the story, but she had something kind of similar so she couldn’t market both. She told me I have a gift and she wants me to email her directly with my next work in progress. So if you are reading this, it will be coming to you soon! So after that rejection, I was so close I could taste it rejection, I packed my suitcase and locked it on my writing dream for a while. Then after much research and the nagging of my closest friends I decided to give it a go one more time. If I couldn’t get published that was it for my dream. So I stumble upon some smaller publishing houses and check their websites for submission guidelines. Most require an agent. A few I ran across were closed for submissions and one was opening June 1st and would only be open for submissions through the end of the summer. So yours truly submitted with a shaking hand and a nervous click, my query letter at midnight on June 1st. A week or so later I had a request for my full manuscript and after a few more nervous gut wrenching weeks I received that email that changed my life. Can you believe they asked me to If I would sign with them?! It was a day I will never forget. I sat on my daughters bedroom floor crying tears of joy. To have someone who does not know me from Adam or Eve to take a chance and believe in me and my work was one of the greatest days of my life. I still have a long road ahead of me but I can not wait to get there and look forward to living my dreams with some amazing people I have met along the way. So you see, dreams, no matter how big or small, can come true. If you just believe and follow your heart anything is possible.

xoxo

Kristin