You want to publish me?!

I opened my mailbox today to the usual pile of bills, junk mail, catalogs and coupons and was greeted by a huge envelope from Dorrance Publishing. Even though I was walking my uncontrollably, hyper dog, I managed to use one hand to both hold the pile of soon-to-be-recycled mail, and open what I thought would be the most amazing news I'd heard this year.

Let me backtrack a bit.

When I sent my poetry in for Copyrighting, my mailing address was lifted by Dorrance Publishing-- a seemingly well-intentioned company that sent me a Christmas card and offered to read my work for consideration. Well, I'd already decided to self-publish my poetry collection, [If] Life's Rotten, Write to the Core, and after much thought, I'm going to continue the self-publishing route for that project. However, I've been sitting on a novel that I completed last year and figured that since an agent has yet to recognize my genius in the fiction arena, I'd shoot an email to Dorrance. They read my query and were intrigued enough to ask for the manuscript in it's entirety.

"WOW! This is a great opportunity!" I thought, and I shot them the piece right away. Stupidly, I'd also sent it to them before protecting my work, but that's another issue.

Shortly thereafter, I got a mailing from them that stated they were reading the novel, but in the meantime, I should check out other books they have to offer. Hummm, another catalog. Fine, DP, I'll glance. So this catalog has been on the desk for long enough, and this envelope I'd received today would determine whether it would stay there or be retired to my recycling bin.

I opened the envelope.

The opening letter stated that they would love to publish my novel, A Teaspoon of Fiction. I told my dog to take a quick dump so I could read on from the comfort of my own couch. The next page was a detailed summary of my book. Of course at this point I'm stoked b/c they actually read my sh*t.

And here comes the crush...

These flakes want $15,000 to publish my novel. Loads of time, energy, headaches, and editing... just so I could give you all 15K? At that point I was pissed. I chucked the catalog, the letter, the summary, and their damn envelope filled with false hope into the bin.

Strangely enough though, I'm over it. Even if for a short five minutes, I was hopeful that something big was going to happen with this writing sh*t. And that feeling overrides the disappointment that followed reading that last page.

So thanks Dorrance. My pursuit of a reputable agent or publishing company who will actually pay me for my work shall continue. I haven't sent out a query in weeks, and was considering self-publishing. But, I want that feeling that you snatched from me so quickly to be sincere and lasting next time. I'm pretty sure the envelope I'm looking for will come eventually.