The Little Red Hen.

In the most snide and hurtful way today I was accused of being “The Little Red Hen.” After thinking about for a while it really is the perfect analogy and I refuse to let that be an insult no matter the level of pretentious contempt in which the words where issued.

The publication of my 1st book has been a long time coming. The Darkness started as a short story five years ago and it hasn’t always been easy. Not only for me but it was really difficult for the people who love me most.

There was a phase where I wrote the same scene over and over…there where times I’d be out walking around in public with a blank glaze talking out the scenes and I’m sure I appeared quite mad.

There were times that people would be talking to me and I didn’t hear a word that had been said because I was distracted by the imaginary world that I had created and wanted to know what was happening there.

There were months on end when all I selfishly talked about was The Darkness despite the importance of what the people who cared about me spoke about.

There was a time when I wrote for 2 or 3 days straight, I didn’t eat and couldn’t sleep, my eyes felt like sandpaper and in a sleep-deprived state of delirium I called my sister at 3am mumbling frantically incoherently about a character from The Darkness. Because I startled her awake and I was near hysterics I scared her pretty bad and when she realized I was talking about the book she was pretty pissed.

I cried for 3 days when I saw the bloody gore on every page of my manuscript that had been caused by the razor sharp tip of my editors red pen.

Now after all this time and work The Darkness is starting to generate some excitement so now that the book is finished I’ve entered the business phase of selling a book. I have been inviting people from different crafts to this project in order to put together a franchise that will be successful.

I have been fortunate enough to meet people who are excited to offer their expertise; people who have suggested some pretty kick ass ideas and have made phenomenal contributions…but lately I’m come across some people who could easily play the roles of “The Lazy Dog”, “The Sleepy Cat” and “The Noisy Yellow Duck.”

These people covetously look at me with dollar signs in their eyes and hope to attach themselves to this project not for how they can represent their crafts but for what they think they can get for themselves.

A woman presented a bid that was 150% above union wages; a man believed that providing eight hours of work somehow entitles him to years of royalty checks and that’s just the tip of the outrageousness.

If these greedy selfish people are any indication of the potential success that I can hope to achieve with the unveiling of my début novel then I am going to have a pretty bountiful loaf of bread…and like “The Little Red Hen” I’ll be damned if I let anyone eat from my table while riding on my the coat tails of all my hard work.