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Survival of the Fittest

When Determination Isn’t Enough

By Nina L. Diamond

I don't remember who coined that famous phrase, and I admit I might even have it backwards. It might be a quitter never wins, and a winner never quits.

Either way, the point is the same.

I find myself using this tired, but accurate, old cliché every time a writer, an author, or an almost-author whines about wanting to give up trying to sell their book.

Some who want to be published actually quit submitting to agents or editors after only three or four rejections. And, many are ready to give up after less than ten rejections.

After an author we'll call Patricia, (nobody's real name will be used in this article) was rejected by more than 40 agents, she came close to quitting.

It's a good thing she didn't.

Her next response was an enthusiastic "Yes!" from one of the industry’s most prominent agents.

"How long should I keep going before I stop trying to sell my book?" I'm often asked.

"Until you sell it," I always answer.

You can certainly take a break, put the book on the back burner for a while and work on other things, especially if timing isn't a factor for your book.

I pitched a book for nearly a year, put it aside for three years, then pitched it again and sold it quickly. Plenty of other authors have also sold their books after taking a break.

There's a difference, though, between taking a break, no matter how short or long, and giving up.

During the last 20 years, I've interviewed, edited, coached, or worked with hundreds of authors. But, I've only spoken with three who didn't need to be told not to give up.

Sam has had two books published, now has his own radio show, and has become a leader in his field. None of that would've happened if he'd given up.

Carol pitched her first novel for about two years. It never occurred to her to stop, even when she was turned down by more than 90 agents before one agreed to represent her. Her agent sold Carol's book within a few months.

Don has been pitching his first book for more than three years. He spent most of those three years trying out useless shortcuts, and only in the past few months has he been doing what he should've been doing all along: sending out his proposal to numerous agents every week.

"How long do you think it will take before an agent says, 'Yes’?" he once asked me.

"That's like asking 'How high is up?'," I said. "Nobody has either answer.”

He never talks about quitting, no matter how frustrated he gets.

And that's the secret: You have to want it bad enough that you don't quit.

Focusing on your determination is really the only thing that will get you through the process.

Don is determined that his book will be published.

Will his determination lead him to publication?

I don't know. But, I do know that he'll certainly never be published without it.

* * * * *

When it’s applied to publishing, the phrase “survival of the fittest” doesn’t just refer to the quality of the book you’re trying to get published.

In fact, without good publishing survival instincts and tactics, an author stands little chance of getting a book published, no matter how wonderful that book might be.

Determination is at the core of the “fittest” author.

But, it’s really only the beginning.

To illustrate what makes the “fittest” author, let me introduce you to one who is not. For almost seven years, I’ve followed her attempts to get four books published, and wondered if she could ever get out of her way long enough to sell even one of them.

We’ll call her Dawn, the Queen of Self-Sabotage.

Throughout this tale, keep in mind that Dawn is actually a very good writer. Better than she realizes. And that’s the first problem: Her self-esteem is so low that even Oprah would throw up her hands in exasperation and cry, “I give up! I can’t save her from herself!”

Dawn has such a low opinion of herself that she barely believes she deserves to breathe. She was raised by a mother who insulted her and treated her like dirt. And Dawn has believed everything her mother has told her.

Now nearing 60, Dawn continues to believe her mother’s on-going insults, so is it any wonder that Dawn has had a series of abusive agents? Like a battered wife who keeps going back to her psychologically or physically violent husband, Dawn went back not once, but three times to an agent who did nothing but lie to her, betray her, and insult her.

“It’s better than not having an agent at all,” Dawn used to say.

The agent, of course, never sold any of Dawn’s books, and would never even give Dawn a list of the publishers the book had been pitched to. Dawn wasted more than four years with the Meanest Agent on Earth.

Desperation and fear drive all of Dawn’s decisions. And she has never learned from any of her poor choices. In fact, it looks like she goes out of her way to make the same poor choices over and over again.

Desperation drives her to say “Yes” to everyone and everything, almost all of it destructive.

A few months ago, when Dawn embarked on a search for a new agent, she was given a short list of agents to stay away from, and detailed reasons why they were bad news.

“There are hundreds of decent agents out there,” she was advised. “So, just ignore the handful on this list. Don’t pitch to them, and if you cross paths with them, run for the hills.”

So, what do you suppose Dawn did?

That’s right – she went straight to the first one on that warning list, the worst one, and pitched her books to The Agent from Hell.

And, of course, The Agent from Hell wooed her and signed her up immediately.

“Well, it’s better than having these two book proposals just sitting in a drawer,” Dawn replied when a colleague asked her if she’d lost her mind completely.

“But that wasn’t the choice in front of you,” her colleague countered. “You were at the beginning of agent hunting. And you went directly to the one agent you were warned about the most.”

“Well, I’ve always had bad luck,” Dawn sighed.

Incredibly, this is how Dawn sees everything. Every self-sabotaging, poor choice she makes out of desperation she writes off to “bad luck.”

These few anecdotes about Dawn are just the tip of her self-sabotaging iceberg.

She is the poster child for the opposite of “survival of the fittest,” which we could call “extinction of the least fit.”

Despite her excellent writing skills, Dawn hasn’t had a book published in more than 15 years, since she ghosted a book that became quite successful and still sells well.

Of course, Dawn didn’t benefit from that success. Out of desperation, Dawn didn’t contract for a ghost’s traditional percentage of advance and royalties. Instead, she volunteered to write the book for a small, flat fee. She has never been tied to the book’s advance or royalties. If she had been, she estimates that she would’ve received more than $200,000, conservatively, over the past 15 years.

She could’ve contracted with the author for a percentage, but she says that in order to make sure she got the gig she wanted to ask for as little as possible.

“I must be the unluckiest person in publishing,” she laments.

No, she’s not.

Despite her determination, she’s just the least “fit.”

* * * * * *

Nina L. Diamond is a journalist, essayist, and the author of Voices of Truth: Conversations with Scientists, Thinkers & Healers. Her work has appeared in numerous publications, including Omni, The Los Angeles Times Magazine, The Chicago Tribune, and The Miami Herald.

Ms. Diamond was a writer and performer on Pandemonium, the National Public Radio (NPR) satirical humor program, for its entire run in Miami and select markets nationwide from 1984-1998. As an editor, she works frequently with other authors and journalists on both fiction and non-fiction.