Sandstone Press

Trials and Hurdles

Posted by Ron McMillan on 24th April 2010

2010 could wind up being an interesting year. After months of revision and who knows how many drafts and fine tooth comb endurance sessions, yesterday the manuscript for Yin Yang Tattoo was at last signed off. In the coming days it will go to the layout specialists and on towards printing; the turnaround for all this is remarkably short, with the book expected back from the printers in June.

A privilege of middle age is the shedding by the wayside of some of one’s precociousness. Folk who know me will laugh at the notion of Ron rescinding his right to bristle with indignation at even perceived slights and slurs, but the l-o-n-g process that eventually took Yin Yang Tattoo from nascent notion to impending publication has taught this arrogant bloke some humility. Albeit not so very much.

I am embarrassed to think that the novel’s earliest incarnation was formed ten years ago, but glad, so very glad, that the multiple, varied, and invariably involuntary delays built into the process caused the book in its final form to be almost unrecognisable when held up alongside that first effort. Things could have been so very different.

After its first draft was completed in the early part of the new millennium, the manuscript attracted the attention of an up and coming Literary Agent. I was beside myself with glee, convinced that I had arrived. But it transpired that the agent hadn’t yet done enough upward climbing of her own - why else, I wonder now, would she have even contemplated taking on a book so raw? This was surely why she failed to generate any interest among publishers, and the real reason behind her eventual admission that she couldn’t do anything with it.

And so I was let go by the agent - a crushing disappointment for any wannabe published author (one that I have actually experienced twice, the second time with a London agent and connected to a travel book that I so nearly had accepted by one of the biggest publishers in the country; disappointments of a ‘where did I put that bloody gun’ magnitude are a big part of this working life). The lady agent has since gone on to great things, and the London agent has disappeared from my radar, but I wish them both well, and remain grateful for the lessons in humility.

About a year ago, The Laird of Sandstone Towers surprised me with a request to see the manuscript. Sandstone was moving into the fiction zone, and Yin Yang Tattoo, despite embracing parts of the globe and targeting market sectors that were seemingly alien to the publisher’s fine work to date, was apparently of some interest.

Programmed by now to accept, even expect, failure, I waited for the kind let-down. Yet, as if at the same time harbouring a parallel, non-concentric mindset, I also managed to remain doggedly optimistic. (Not that there was any justification for such optimism. Unsuccessful exchanges with fiction publishers went so far back that communications involved, gasp, actual paper and - you’ll never believe this bit - stamped, self-addressed envelopes).

Still, I began to wonder about how much work the manuscript might require.

The answer when it came, was heartening. Yes, we’re interested.

But there was, of course, the less heartening corollary. It needs a lot of revision.

So many requests and firmly-worded suggestions for changes were made that I forgot all about humility and spent a few dark weeks brooding and bristling like the Ron of old. (Alright, I admit it, just like the Ron of today can still be). I finally sought counsel from a respected friend and writer in Seattle. Should I let my creation take this much of a beating, should I be bullied into making so many changes? Weren’t these requests stifling ‘my’ work? What did Charlie in Seattle think?

Charlie wrote back: I think you’re lucky to have such an editor. Shut the fuck up and get on with the revision.

So I did. And here we are, with a book that pleases me - and a publication date looming. All is well for now.