<\/p>\n\n\n\n
A headline caught my eye. The story was about a thirty-year-old suicide verdict in the NSW Coroner\u2019s Court being overturned. It was now murder. A gay hate crime. And as I sat thinking about this poor man and his family, I almost wasn\u2019t surprised to feel tears rolling down my face. It brought up all the fears I\u2019d had for my own son.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
<\/p>\n\n\n\n
It also stirred an urge to know more. I tried to talk myself out of it. I was working on a project and I needed to get on with it. But the feeling wouldn\u2019t leave, and I began reading the original articles, then looking at other news about other gay men who\u2019d been attacked and killed. I didn\u2019t even know there was such a thing as a gay-panic get-out-of-jail-free card. And probably because of the police involvement, the story about an Adelaide man stood out. It was like they were all my son, and I couldn\u2019t lose the horrible guilt, the sense of powerlessness, the overwhelming sadness and the anger that was settling over me like a heavy cloak. It was stifling and suffocating and I couldn\u2019t not tell the story that was fomenting in my mind.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n Writing a book is hard. At least it is for me. It takes years. This one took close to three. And at the end of it, you\u2019re not at the end of it. After you\u2019ve finished, you have to get the book into the hands of readers. Traditionally that involves a process entirely outside of the author\u2019s control. In the process, the book goes from being a passion to being a commodity. And commodities are controlled by market forces. And market forces involve a business model of gatekeepers and preferences and quotas and what\u2019s working for us now, and is this on-trend, and teams for selecting and selling what other people think other people might want to read. And sometimes also, whether they think there is enough appeal about the person who wrote the book – a sort of who\u2019s the story behind the story. It has to be compelling.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n In the traditional publishing world, the first hurdle post-writing is the find-an-Agent one. Without agent representation, you, your interests and your novel simply don\u2019t exist. Finding one involves researching what and who they already represent, and what they say they\u2019re looking for, their experience, their successes, the strength of their agency with regard to rights and more. The objective being they will have publishing contacts who like and are looking for \u2018your type of novel\u2019. <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n Sounds like a reasonable and workable model. There are downsides. The \u2018what-I\u2019m-looking-for\u2019 could be aspirational \u2013 they like your work but don\u2019t have the contacts and can\u2019t make it happen, so facing that reality they decline; the similarities they are looking for can result in \u2018I already represent name-of-author or type-of-story and you\/your novel is too similar\u2019 and so declined; and it applies to both agents and publishers and is by no means a complete list of \u2018sorry no thank you\u2019 and \u2018this business is so subjective\u2019. <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n The result is the same. Instead of bursting over the finish line, arms outstretched and breaking through the winners tape triumphant joyful and excited, you\u2019re lining up again at the start without even getting to the end of the sprint. And you do this again, and again till you\u2019re scrambling exhaustedly over more and more hurdles. Finally and more realistically you find yourself crawling across the line, grateful that this run has at last come to an end. <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n After a year of hurdling, I was completely out of breath and willpower and I hadn\u2019t got to the end. But I needed to stop running. I needed to look at my situation objectively. <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n The distance between my first hurdle and the next one, was five months. And that should have told me something. To explain: I had interest in my manuscript very early. It wasn\u2019t even properly polished. It was declined. If I\u2019d paused for breath then, and asked myself why, (you can\u2019t ask them \u2013 because they don\u2019t have the time to explain), keeping in mind the realities of commodification I\u2019d have saved a lot of my own valuable time (and probably a lot of other agents\u2019 time too). I would have realised that having liked the writing and the story, and knowing it would be further polished, had the agent thought there was a traditional publisher out there for it, The Outing<\/em> would be represented and I\u2019d have been working on rewrites and edits, the polishing, with their commercial interests in mind. Happily and willingly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n But I stayed on track, jumping over more hurdles, querying more agents and also submitting to some publishers myself (which is acceptable in Australia where there aren\u2019t many agents). In hindsight that was another clue. If the publishers themselves weren\u2019t showing me any interest, then an agent, should I ever get one, probably wouldn\u2019t get them to take it on either.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n So what now?<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n I have a book, that I want people to read. I want people to know what happened. I also don\u2019t want people to forget what happened to all those men, because today\u2019s freedoms, which are by no means secure, standard, accepted by all, or universal, are necessarily tied to the struggles to attain them. I could keep trying to get an agent, and that agent could keep trying to get a publisher and I could wait for three years, or ten years, or forever. Or I could bypass the traditional model of publishing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n And that\u2019s what I decided to do. Because as much as my ego wanted to walk down the street or through an airport and see my novel in the bookshop window, my heart knew it didn\u2019t matter where people bought the book, as long as they got to read it. <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n Still lurking though, was a lingering doubt. What if my writing was shit (ahem\u2026 simply woeful) and that\u2019s the real reason it didn\u2019t find a traditional home. Several people including some of the queried agents, have assured me it isn\u2019t. Several people have said they \u2018loved it even though that\u2019s not the right word\u2019. They\u2019ve said it\u2019s real and moving and powerful. Those several people weren\u2019t all family and friends, although some of them were. Those were the ones who helped to define and refine The Outing<\/em> during its multiple edits. I\u2019m both honoured and grateful for their support and encouragement, their engagement and insight. <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n Validation and professionalism are still tied into the public perception of being a \u2018real\u2019 author if you have a penguin on the spine of your book and that you\u2019re an amateur playing around, if you don\u2019t. Undeniably, there will likely always be a part of me that holds onto some disappointment that the book didn\u2019t follow the traditional route. At the same time, there\u2019s another part of me is saying that breaking out from under the traditional constraints and perceptions is what this book is about. So perhaps it\u2019s appropriate that a book about that, about changing laws and rules and attitudes follows a non-traditional path to people\u2019s bookshelves. <\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n\n\n\n I won\u2019t say I hope you enjoy the book. It\u2019s not warm and fuzzy and up-lit (that\u2019s scheduled for the next book), but I do hope you enjoy the writing. And I hope you find discovering a different time and experience enlightening. Mostly, I hope the story moves you and that you feel\u2026 Because when we feel something strongly it leads us ultimately, to hope and to love which is all we really want.<\/p>\n\n\n\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" When I started writing The Outing my head was inside a different story. 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