A Eureka Moment from Author @RayAnthony07

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R

AY ANTHONY WAS born in Kingston Jamaica in 1958 and lived with his grandparents until 1968, when he came to Britain to join his parents. Educated in south London, when he had the choice, he studied only maths and science; he found the arts crushingly boring.

Books by
Ray Anthony



Ray's Website

(click title/cover to
check it out on Amazon)

Pilot



Empress



Interface



Thinking Man's Guide to Pregnancy, Childbirth & Fatherhood



All Woman


His first employment was in retail management, then he joined the Royal Air Force. After leaving the Royal Air Force he changed career to media sales management. It was during this time that he discovered he had a hidden creative bent. "Less of my time was being spent on selling or management, and more on shuffling pieces of paper. Writing strategic reports did my brain in, so I started 'jazzing them up'. The bosses were not amused. If I wanted to keep my job, and my sanity, I had to find some kind of release."

In 1987 he started writing his first novel. He is now a media sales consultant and finds that training salespeople gives him ample scope to exercise his theatrical disposition.

Right, now you've had the boring official version - time for a reality check. In 1987 I was sitting in a pub with some friends (less than sober) chatting about films. Someone said, "I'm going to write a film script." Another person said, "I'm going to write a book," and I thought, 'I wonder if I could write a book?' To be sure, the type of perennial conversation to be found in pubs. However, by the time I'd made my unsteady way home I had the title, plot, characters, beginning, middle and end of Interface. Still in a stupor, I stumbled down to the cellar, retrieved the 1919 typewriter, set it on a table and typed, "Hello Harry." In 1990 I typed 'The End' having upgraded to an electric typewriter, PCW and finally a PC in between. I'd done it! Deep feelings of satisfaction...

I've got to be honest here, I hate writing - I don't write letters; I don't write notes; I don't write reports; I don't write memos; I don't even write post cards - I hate writing! However, I discovered that there was something about getting a creative idea down, tight, on the page that was addictive. It was so addictive that when a friend jokingly said, "You've got so many kids, you should write a book about it" the next thing I knew I'd written Thinking Man's Guide to Pregnancy, Childbirth & Fatherhood. Great, I've written two books!

Well, actually, no.

Until they are published, they remain manuscripts.

What do you do with manuscripts? You send them to Publishers or Literary Agents, right? The 57th time I got a polite letter saying, "Thanks but no thanks," I took a stock of the situation and decide it might be a smart move to read some books about writing books. I bought the books, read them and conclude that there must be a very lucrative 'How to get published' sub-industry - the books on writing books are badly written, boring and less than helpful.

Towards the end of 1994 I got fed up with being told by well-meaning friend that loads of authors who are now famous got rejected by hundreds of publishers and literary agents - "Keep sending out the manuscripts," and "Keep writing" - an author's first published work wasn't usually the first manuscript they wrote. I got fed up with the whole thing - time to step outside the situation and take a good hard look at it:

I want to have my books published.

So I send my 'manuscripts' to agents and publishers.

They send them back, saying they can't or won't represent me or publish them. So, why can't or won't they represent or publish me?

Because they don't think it will be profitable for them to do so... Eureka!

To read the rest of Ray's Eureka Moment, check out his website. Click "author" ... that's where the above was taken from.