The story idea about a girl who lives alone in Athens, and meets a girl who looks exactly like her inside her home, had come to me in 2016. I wrote a short story titled "Roommates", which I submitted to a literary magazine. I got positive feedback and I was asked to review and change few things and send it back to them soon.
At that time, I was in my last semester studying Geology and I wanted to graduate as soon as possible, and at the same time, I had applied for an internship at the Ministry of Environment and was accepted. I convinced myself I didn't have the time to revise my story. And having gained my first positive feedback from an editor, I was thrilled. The feedback alone was enough for me. I felt I was on top of the world.
Needless to say, they never heard from me again.
While I was pursuing my Master's degree, I was working as a secretary at the same time. I tried to write a short story or two, but it didn't work. I always blamed my busy schedule. Now, however, I know it was a lack of discipline. I didn't have the courage to sit down every day and work towards my dream of becoming a full-time writer. I thought I had to write only when I was inspired. And when you work and study and you're exhausted, and have no discipline, you don't write. I wrote one short story in my one and a half year of Master's program, and that was it.
Finishing my master's, I quit my job and sat down to write my novelette "Iris Woke Up", which I self published. But "Roommates" sat in my computers files until one day I decided it was time to revise it and take small steps towards becoming a published author.
I revised it and submitted it to a different literary magazine (the previous one had sadly shut down). It was rejected immediately. I sent the email late at night, before I went to bed. And when I woke up, I found the following exact email:
Dear Anne,
Thank you for your submission. I'm afraid it wasn't right for us, but I wish you all the best in placing your work elsewhere.
Kind regards,
I know many rejections don't come with feedback, but, man, was that hurtful. I mean, my story got positive feedback the first time, and then the better version of it was rejected? Isn't the world just cruel?
No.
Moral lesson of the story: never miss an opportunity if it means something to you. Take the time it needs and go after it.
If I had taken the time to revise it in 2016, it would have been published back then. What's the worst that would have happened if I sat down for two days straight to perfect it? Nothing. Really. I would still have graduated, and I would have successfully completed my internship. And above that, I would have my short story published.
So now I had the same story with one positive and one negative feedback (although the second was not feedback), and I didn't know how to feel about it. I read it over and over again. Trying to fix it.
And the more I worked on it, the more the idea grew inside my head.
So in January 2019, I put the story aside and started writing a novel. "Roommates" became "The shadows we live in". And I decided if I was going to make this happen, I had to discipline, no matter what. So in spite of my pursuing a PhD, I did manage to write a novel at the same time.
Although I've written novels before, I only wrote them for myself. This one, I was determined to publish. It took me 18 long, painful and yet strangely fulfilling months and 4 long, painful drafts to write it. I finally got to the point I was proud of it and felt like it was ready to be read by other people.
So I gave it to several people I trust, with a set of questions I wanted to be answered. Like, does the story make sense? That's an important question. I gave them a deadline. They had to give me feedback by the end of August. The two months that passed as I waited were excruciating. I started doubting myself, believing they'd hate it, and maybe I'm not a good writer after all. Or maybe the story just sucks.
When you write something novel-length, I can only think of two possible options. You can either keep it in your bottom drawer, because some things are meant to be written but not read, like my previous novels, or you could give it to the world.
I had already decided this novel was to be published, so the feedback I got from my beta readers meant everything to me. Were there things in the book I could make better, or was the story irredeemably bad I'd have to throw it away?
Fortunately, the feedback came back encouraging. According to my beta readers, the overall story was coherent and grasping and the changes that have to be made on the bigger picture of the storyline are minor.
So what's next?
Come November, I will be revising my novel, line editing it and polishing it as best as I could. In the meantime, I will start my research on agents and publishers. I write in English and I live in Greece; finding the right publisher would be difficult. Most Greek publishers I've contacted aren't interested in publishing work in a different language. So aiming abroad seems to be the reasonable thing to do at the moment. I expect it to be difficult and I expect to fail a ton before I succeed.
So what's next?
Failing and trying again.
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