Why I want to get published

An interesting question in W.I.P It: what’s your reason for wanting to get published? An excellent thing to think about. These are my primary reasons:

1.   To tell stories to a larger public. For years I’ve been posting my work on writer’s sites, especially De Verhalensite. Stick long enough and you’ll get a more or less steady circle of readers, but still only a select few members of the website. I want to give what my favourite writers have given me –  inspiration, motivation, courage, growth, but most of all:  something to disappear into for a little while. To offer them adventures and tests where they cannot actually go out and save the world themselves.

       To make me feel that I am actually good at this. To be published by a real (non-POD) publisher tells you that you have skills, that your stories are worth getting invested in and paid for.  To be able to say: “I am a professional writer. It is my job to tell stories. I have the best job in the world.”

          To fill a gap in the market, more or less. I have a great admiration for YA literature in the English speaking world; I think they have a freshness and depth that the Dutch market still sort of lacks. That is to say, most books do get translated – for example, The Hunger Games, Exodus, The Forest of Hands and Teeth - so there’s definitely an interest in the mature, somewhat larger-than-life themes so commonly found in YA lit nowadays, but Dutch writers haven’t really picked up on this yet.  There are exceptions of course; De Gevleugelde Kat by Isabel Hoving is by all degrees quite extraordinary (and, to my delight, actually translated into English as The Dream Merchant.)