THE LIFE-CHALLENGE SERIES: DREAMS DO COME TRUE

A little story about accomplishing a dream. In September 2003, I began shopping my first novel, One Man's Treasure, to publishing houses through my (then) agent. For more than three years, it was repeatedly rejected. Though I never lost confidence in myself or the fact that my book was definitely mainstream worthy, I was outraged with the amount of time it was taking for this dream to manifest. At one point, the upset grew into desperation, and I literally used to cry myself to sleep with my manuscript either clutched in my arms all night, or with it next to my pillow, and I used to promise my characters, like a homeless mother with children, that I would "find us a home" in the mainstream world. I can't even tell you how much "when is it gonna be tiiiiime?!" crying I did. It was exhausting, and quite pitiful, to be truthful.

But things finally changed, and here's how: You can only have (and keep) what you don't smother with desperate actions and energy. So one day, I got sick of chasing and crying over mainstream, and I set out to publish the book myself. I did that in May 2007. And I was very content. I realized that even though it would still be nice to have that book deal, I did not "need" mainstream to be successful. I sold hundreds of books on my own. Seven months later, when I was happily preoccupied with my accomplishment, and nearly done writing the sequel, And They'll Come Home, I got a call from a literary agent friend who told me that bestselling author Carl Weber was starting a line of women's fiction books, and that One Man's Treasure would be a good fit. I sent her my manuscript, and a month later, she called to tell me that Kensington was offering me a two-book deal.

For more than three years, I lost my mind trying to get one book deal, and now I had two, because I let go and moved on, happily. *Side note: I never intended to write a sequel, but the woman who convinced me to do it was one of the readers of my 2007 version of One Man's Treasure. To this day, I still declare that And They'll Come Home is my greatest literary achievement. It's very special, complex work that I had no idea I could do, and I'm so in love with it. Thanks to Angela B. Brown's convincing, I had the second book in the two-book deal almost done when it was offered to me.

Whatever you're chasing after desperately, it won't truly be yours until you can detach from it, find your peace, and move on without it, with confidence.

Now, to get them both made into movies, STAT!

READ ONE MAN'S TREASURE

READ AND THEY'LL COME HOME (THE SEQUEL)

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