Idling, With No Particular Place to Go

The publishing path for Haunted in Paradise

Are you a fan of spine-tingly thrillers? A lover of the paranormal? Or a fan of the paranormal who loves to read spine-tingly thrillers? Or a… well, you know. Believe me, if you answered yes to any of these questions, you’ll love Haunted in Paradise.

For a listing of all my books and published short stories, visit my website at www.susanerogers.com. There are links to stories and podcasts online for free, and to purchase any of my books or anthologies. You can also get to each book from my Amazon page. If you’d like a signed copy, my email is sneirish@gmail.com.

October 2024, when Haunted in Paradise was supposed to released, came and went. I had communicated with the Editor in May about another issue and again in August for some kind of update. She told me that there had been a number of roadblocks that had to be overcome which meant reduced production and finances. Besides my own book, there were several others in the queue that were well behind schedule. There just wasn’t enough staff to manage all the scheduled projects.

I was going to have to be patient. Again. I know that patience is not one of my strong points. And when there is nothing I can do to influence the outcome, I am easily frustrated. But that same frustration serves to make me more determined to achieve whatever goal is up for consideration.

So, I started with patience. At least, Susan Russell, the head of Grendel Press was being communicative, open, and honest about the status of my book. Besides at that point, I had hurricane recovery to deal with as a distraction. I was also still writing every day with work on another novel and some short stories.

Another inquiry and update in early October. Russell advised that she didn’t have any editors available to start on my book and there were still two books ahead of mine in the queue.

My next contact was January 8, 2025 when I saw on the scheduling board that an editor had been assigned to Haunted in Paradise. The one-year anniversary of signing the contract with Grendel was only days away. Russell said that the editor had just been assigned that weekend, and she would have her contact me at least for an introduction as she got to work on editing my book.

I got that email from the editor a few days later. She expected to have the first round of edits completed by mid-February and she did, right on schedule. I felt there were minimal revisions I needed to make. A few clarifying statements, a couple of changes to sequencing, a sprinkling of line edits, and commas (always my nemesis!). There were two proposed changes that I disagreed with. I wrote back explaining my reasons for that.

The next email from the editor was a couple of weeks later. She let me know that she accepted all my changes and my reasons for not revising the two changes she suggested. As far as she was concerned, the book was ready to go. She was going to send the manuscript to the formatting people. I should hear from them shortly.

Guess what? Crickets. Surprise!

Nothing from the formatting people through the end of May. I sent off another request for an update to the Editor-in-Chief. No answer for over two weeks. Now I started to worry. She had always been prompt with a response. I sent emails to my editor and to a couple other staff. No answers from any of them.

Finally at the beginning of June, I sent another message to Russell, saying that I was concerned. She answered back the same day and apologized profusely. Staffing was thin and she was trying to manage and direct everything. She didn’t come back empty handed, however. She said she had a new creative director on board and they’d been working on cover designs for my book.

At least, this made it feel like something was really happening.

What’s Next?

Cover Story