The Story Behind The Sound of Creation
Finding a publisher is no easy feat. Add a little global pandemic to the mix and you get fewer opportunities to meet agents and publishers face to face. You also find more people at home returning to their dreams of being published, dusting off those manuscripts and keyboards to fill inboxes with pitches.
This is where I found myself in 2020 when I began the submission process for my debut scifi thriller The Sound of Creation. Without the ability to hone my pitch in person, I went straight into the cold agent emails. And I completely sucked at it. Failure was not an option so I coached myself to persist and to iterate.
But…I still sucked at the email pitch. I’ve raised a lot of capital and I know I’m better in person where I can get feedback in the moment and “feel out” what works. So, I looked far and wide for an in person conference.
I found Writercon in Oklahoma City. It was a hybrid event in a large hotel with windows that opened and strict protocols in place. (spoiler: no one got Covid)
I signed up for five agent pitches, and got some great feedback. One of the speakers, an editor for an established publisher with thousands of titles, did a first page critique for everyone who submitted beforehand. The session was so helpful that I approached her after. She said I should sign up to pitch her, but I told her I was unagented. Luckily, her publisher didn’t care!
I sent off four fulls in total from my pitches. The three agents sent personalized rejections.
Ally Robertson, editor for The Wild Rose Press sent a different kind of note. She loved it! *swoon* She was sending it to committee for approval and they would send a contract if it passed.
The great thing about TWRP is that they guarantee publication within one year from galley approval. I signed the contract in December 2020, worked my tail off with Ally, and The Sound of Creation was born 2-2-22!
There are many ways to go about publication, so explore until you find the right one for you and don’t be discouraged if the “experts” way doesn’t work.
-- Gabriella Zielke
Brilliant and relentless tech CEO Ava Lawson built a system to play the currency market and make her billions. Instead, it begins to play strange music and makes normally level headed people behave irrationally, violently, dangerously.
While on the run from a coup to steal her code, Ava meets an ethereal stranger who seems to know more about her than she does.
The stranger calls himself an apprentice. He pleads for her help to stop what they have started.
“The Sound of Creation is a mind-bending book filled with big questions about our existence. It takes you on a journey disrupted by action scenes and strange characters. You will find yourself floating on dimensions you did not know even existed. This book is a mind game. You have been warned.” ~ George Papa, author of The Manual and The Architect’s typist for The Code
Book Information
Release Date: February 2, 2022
Publisher: The Wild Rose Press
Soft Cover: ISBN: 978-1509239139; 342 pages; $17.99; E-Book, $5.99
Amazon: https://amzn.to/3B8ILUz
Her latest book is the scifi novel, The Sound of Creation.
Visit her website at www.gabriellazielke.com or connect with her at Twitter and Facebook.
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