Your first book is your first baby. It remains something special. Even if it looks a bit funky to those not in the know!
Today I bring you Time Stoppers, by Carrie Jones. The cover tells me Carrie is a New York Times Best-selling Author—the back flap elaborates: “of the Need series,” Young Adult titles I have not yet read. (Titles: Need, Captivate, Entice, and Endure.)
Here is the summary for Time Stoppers:
“Foster child Annie Nobody discovers a new world of magic, power, and scary creatures in a hidden magical town, Aurora, where she and her new best friend, Jamie Hephaistion Alexander, learn it is up to them to protect their new home from those who want to misuse the great power, even if it means diving headfirst into magical danger.”
The thing I most love about this fantastical romp of kids finding their “tribe,” successfully battling trolls and other nasty creatures, is I can see the beloved baby it is to its author. The author’s acknowledgments reveal this “new” book was in fact her first—I assume one she did not initially sell. Now that she has experienced substantial commercial success as an NYT best-selling author, her editor was happy to help shape and publish her first story.
I enjoyed the book—don’t get me wrong. But it has that slightly wild, slightly gangly feel of a first book: full of inspiration, like an overgrown garden plot, a little weedy, but some fabulous varieties growing strong among the more pedestrian plants.
I’m bringing Time Stoppers to you not because it’s the best book you’ll ever read, but because it represents hope—and perseverance paid off. Ms. Jones did not give up after her first effort didn’t sell. She continued to write (brilliantly, by all accounts!) The quality of her work eventually gave her first beautiful baby a chance to be born into the world where others can love it as she did.
This could happen for your first book, too!
The message is this: Don’t give up.
If you love doing something, keep doing it, no matter what. Whatever it is for you, keep doing it. Love and perseverance birth miracles—beautiful, bold ones!