How to be published: everything you need to know, plus a really great surprise

The HarperCollins Canada 2014 catalogue!

The main reason for this post is to share a great blog post on writing and publishing. 

“25 steps to being a traditionally published author: Lazy Bastard Edition”—a post by Delilah S. Dawson—is an excellent overview of the writing and publishing process, as good an overview as I’ve ever read. I just sent the link to four friends who are working on novels. (Heh. By mistake I  typed “wording” on novels.) 

To give you the funny-but-hard-hitting sense of it, Step #1 is: If you’re actually lazy, GTFO. 

Amen. 

On the home front: 

THE SHADOW QUEEN has a pub. date: April 8, 2014. I’ve sent off the corrected 1st Pass pages and I’ve only the Acknowledgements and the very last sentences of the novel to tweak. I’ve a storage box on my office floor where everything to do with The Shadow goes now, labelled “archival.” (I.e. my crowded basement.) 

No more surprises, right? 

Wrong! Yesterday evening, I got this Tweet:

@Sandra_Gulland it’s Claude. I wasn’t sure if you came across this. http://t.co/svwdofnDVo— Christine Wright (@mllechristine1)

 

I was speechless! A portrait of my Claude? I didn’t think one existed. (Google for it: you won’t find it.) 

Look familiar?

 

I’ve emailed Doubleday to find out if they used the portrait as a basis for the cover. 

I was  pleased when I first saw the cover because the woman looked like how I’d imagined Claude to look. (Eyebrows!)

And now: well! To find out that it   looks like the real Claude: I’m blown away.