Going South

Going South

I have bad news about Going North, the joint sequel to The Whim of the Dragon and The Dubious Hills, also affectionately known as the Amazing Expanding and Shrinking Novel. After a protracted discussion, Viking has decided to cancel the book. They will not be publishing it. Nor will Firebird be reissuing The Dubious Hills, since of course they are connected.

Things actually started to go wrong when I turned the manuscript in very late and far too long. Making it into two volumes was supposed to address this difficulty, but eventually the decision was made that the book should be only one, much shorter, volume. Possibly I should have quit at this point, rather than shrinking the book back down as requested by the publisher, but I felt responsible for the lateness of the original book and wanted to act like a professional.

The whole buildup for the new novel got derailed by my original lateness and by the revisions. In the meantime, the Firebird reissues of the Secret Country trilogy had gone out of print, except in e-format.

Furthermore, the condensed book is still 135,000 words, and Sharyn November, my editor, feels that parts of it are now too confusing and opaque. She thinks that not only should it not be cut any further, but that in order for it to be the best book it can be, it ought to be expanded again to properly explore various aspects of it. In other words, the book as it stands is not long enough. (Cue hollow laughter, from both author and editor.)

Finally, it is apparently not a YA novel. I seem to fall neatly between the cracks every time. If my work is published as adult fiction, I get continual inquiries as to why it was not published as YA. If I try to work with a YA publisher, as I did some years back with Jane Yolen when she had her line at Harcourt, and as I did more recently with Sharyn and Viking, the verdict is that the book is not for kids, though a few smart teenagers might like it: the book is for adults. I probably should have seen this coming. I know other authors who don't themselves know if any given work is adult or YA, but their agents and editors don't have a problem in determining which the book is. So these lucky writers just write, and the work is put into a marketing category after the fact. When I just write, things go plumb into the chasm.

I am not giving up on this book. It wants expanding so that it makes sense and fits itself better. Everything it needs for that is already written and carefully saved up. I don't think the two-volume format is the way to go; I think a decently-sized version of the current pared-down story will work better. The subplots and characters I have taken out are already rampaging around in short stories and back-of-the-head worldbuilding, making wild proclamations, studying astronomy, and seeking whom they may devour. Backing up to the stories I originally envisaged for these people is not really possible.

I'm in the process of looking for a new agent, so the first thing to do is to see what whoever-that-ends-up-being thinks of the situation. But if nobody wants to represent me, or if someone wants to take me on as a client but thinks that the book itself can't be sold to a regular publisher, I will self-publish it in some way or another.

I'm very sorry, everyone who has been waiting so long. If I end up doing this myself, I'll try to do it as quickly as is consistent with putting the book in its best form. If this is how things go, Sharyn, who has been involved in this project for more than a decade and who fought very hard for it, has offered to give me any help in her power, which is a great comfort.

In the meantime, I'm working regularly on the Liavek novel, and gnawing away at the first confusing point in the current version of Going North.

I've been coming to terms with this news for some months now. I expect to be posting more now that I've finally told you guys about it.

Again, I'm very sorry to have to tell you this. I'll give you any news when I have it.

Pamela