A streak of good fortune

With the fate of her new book in the balance, Lorraine Mace threatens to run around in the altogether

You’d think that after being published for over two decades my skin would be thick enough to take any kind of rejection, but I’m not sure that is something any writer ever fully manages. I’m much more philosophical now, but I discovered not so long ago that I still fear rejection when it comes to something that really matters to me. As a novelist, I have concentrated entirely on my DI Sterling series, but then I had an idea that refused to go away for a standalone psychological thriller. The characters and plot were burning into my brain when I should have been finishing book six of the series.

To get it out of my head, I decided to put the story on paper. I didn’t have the time to write the actual novel, but I thought if I put down the main points I could come back to it at a later stage. While chatting with my editor about Love Me Tender (book five which came out in January) I mentioned the outline and she said she would take a look.

Up to that point, it had really just been an extended idea, but no novelist is going to give an editor a list of bullet points and say: I hope you like my next book! From that moment on, the standalone became an all-consuming project. I wrote a full outline and sent it to a good friend who pointed out all the flaws and inconsistencies in the plot that I had missed. I rewrote it and sent it back to her. She loved it and that’s when I started losing sleep. By putting so much of my heart into the outline, it now truly mattered. It was no longer just an idea, but a book I really wanted to write.

I polished it a bit more and sent it off with a quaking heart. My lovely editor acknowledged receipt and then the waiting began. I heard nothing for weeks. And still more weeks. It didn’t help that most of the office was working from home due to Covid-19, so communication between colleagues who needed to discuss my proposed novel was not as easy as strolling from one desk to another.

Eventually, I received an email saying I should hear something soon, but not what that something might be. I read all sorts of things into that single line. I drove my partner insane going over all the ways the words could be interpreted. Something could be an offer. Something could be a rejection. Something could be we like it but it needs changes. Something could be we love it but have something similar in the pipeline with another author. Something could be …

By this stage even I was fed up listening to me droning on and on. When I said (to test if he was listening), ‘something could be me running outside naked and singing the national anthem’ and Chris answered, ‘um, could be’, and then carried on looking at his phone, I knew I’d bored him beyond tears.

Did you know that if you click send and receive on your email programme fifty times in a minute you still won’t get the one you’re waiting for? Why hadn’t I heard what something was?

I was considering psychiatric help might be required to wean me off my email refreshing addiction when a bit of zen came into my life and I accepted that if it was going to be yes, I’d have heard, so there was no point in worrying any longer.

That afternoon (when I hadn’t clicked send and receive even once) there was a ping. Taken completely off guard, I looked to see who had sent me mail and there it was – an email headed: Standalone Psychological Thriller.

With shaking hands, I clicked to open it. Was it a rejection or… It was to say they wanted to make me an offer, but not for one book. The offer was for two – the one I’d sent in as an outline and a second one that needed to be every bit as enthralling as the first. After I came down from a massive high, reality hit. I didn’t have a second book. I didn’t even have the inkling of an idea for another book.

I went to find Chris, looking for reassurance, but couldn’t find him anywhere. I think he might have heard me squealing and run outside naked to sing the national anthem.