FRIENDS AND READERS! I am so excited to be kicking off the blog tour for Kim Liggett’s Blood And Salt. For serious, this book sounds AMAZING!
Kim has graciously stopped by to talk about publishing.
What was the journey to publication like for you and your book? You can speak to the publishing process (working with an editor getting an agent, etc.) or to the writing process (how your drafts/characters changed, etc.)
Blood and Salt is the first book I’ve ever written. Before you get too impressed, I should tell you that I wrote this book over and over and over again until they finally had to pry it out of my bloody fists. I was obsessed. And I think you have to be a little mad to try and make a career out of this. I have no formal education, I’m dyslexic, the odds were stacked against me, but I had a story I felt compelled to tell. It’s the scariest thing in the world to devote years of your life to something that no one really believes you can do. It was a total leap of faith. When I finished Blood and Salt, I remember sitting in the café at the Barnes and Noble on the Upper West Side, crying, trying to work up the nerve to hit send. I kept thinking, “what happens if I fail?†What if this is the best I can do… and it’s still not good enough? What then?’ Fortunately, I didn’t have to ponder that for long. I sent Blood and Salt to five agents. 48 hours later I had four offers and three weeks after that Blood and Salt sold at auction in a two-book deal.
I thought the hard part was over—boy, was I WRONG. My editor is one of the toughest in the business and she worked me over. We spent twenty-four straight months in revision. When I say revision…I mean rewrites. It was the most frustrating creative experience I’ve ever had. I like to think of it as my MFA equivalent. I had an old-school publishing experience, in that I was nurtured with some really tough love, but I came out a more confident writer. I can defend every single sentence in that book. And that’s something to be proud of.
It’s no small thing to take on a debut author, and my editor really stepped up to the plate to help me through every aspect of the process.
There were compromises and tears, but we made something truly unique. I thought I would never be able to look at Blood and Salt without wanting to revise it, but that’s not true. I wouldn’t change a single thing. The final product is a snapshot of how we felt on that day—the hour we decided to let it go. And that’s a beautiful thing.
Tour Schedule:
- Good Books & Wine – guest post #1 – 9/14
- Addicted Readers – interview – 9/15
- Jessabella Reads – 25 Random Things – 9/16
- A Midsummer Night’s Read – Book Playlist #1 – 9/17
- It Starts At Midnight – review & giveaway – 9/18
- The Book Bratz – review & giveaway – 9/21
- No BS Book Reviews – interview – 9/22
- Once Upon a Twilight – Would You Rather? – 9/23
- Please Feed the Bookworm – review & giveaway – 9/24
- The Irish Banana – guest post #2 – 9/25
- Winterhaven Books – Top 10 – 9/28
- My Friends are Fiction – review & giveaway – 9/29
- Fiction Fare – interview – 9/30
- A Dream Within a Dream – Book Playlist #2 – 10/1
- Two Chicks on Books – interview – 10/2
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