<a href="http://www.halfwaytonormal.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/451557688_8e483bdd7a.jpg"><img class="alignnone size-medium wp-image-467" title="451557688_8e483bdd7a" src="http://www.halfwaytonormal.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/451557688_8e483bdd7a.jpg" alt="" width="533" height="354" /></a>
<h5 style="padding-left: 420px;">Photo by <a href="http://www.flickr.com/people/lollyknit/">LollyKnit</a></h5>
<strong>I'm a frustrated artist. Yeah—how cliche is that?</strong>

From what I've heard about the publishing world, I should just get used to it. "Frustrated" is the hopeful author's middle name.

An editor who a year ago seemed eager to move forward with my book proposal for Halfway to Normal (we just had to work out a minor concern with the topic of one chapter), recently told me the publisher is no longer interested. I spent the past year <em>improving</em> the proposal in many ways, but no thanks.

<strong>It's not just rejection that I'm having a hard time with, though. As a writer, I've lived through plenty of rejection.</strong> It's the <em>rationale</em> behind the rejection, and the fact that I can't seem to do anything to alter my situation.
<h4>A shift in the publishing landscape</h4>
What the editor said is that while I have "a lot of talent" and a "strong proposal," the "publishing landscape has changed in the past year." Particularly for memoir-type books. <strong>Essentially, if you don't have a strong "author's platform,"—in other words, if you're not already widely known for something you've done—you're out of luck.</strong>

I've done just about everything a regular person can do to build her platform—at least in a way that feels genuine to me. I've developed significant connections on Twitter and Facebook, I've built a community around my blog that is committed and engaged. I've published an essay in <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Ask-Me-About-My-Divorce/dp/1580052762">an anthology</a> that's on its third print run, and have participated in readings at Powell's Books in Portland, Women &amp; Children First bookstore in Chicago, and KGB Bar in New York (scheduled for Sept. 23). I've even garnered a letter of endorsement for my book proposal that's so significant and glowing, it makes me blush.

So what's Plan B? Should I start dreaming up crazy schemes and scandals to pitch to Oprah?
<h4>As readers, we lose out</h4>
My frustration isn't just about my dreams to publish, though. <strong>The bigger issue is what ultimately emerges as a result of this sad trend in the publishing industry, brought on by their financial woes, and who loses out the most.</strong> I don't think it's the would-be authors, it's the readers.

Personally, as a reader, I want stories from people's lives more than I want self-help books. And when it comes to <em>whose</em> stories I crave, its the stories of real, average people—people like me. I'm a mom who knows kids can be maddening; an ex-wife and new wife who knows marriage takes work; a Christian who struggles with God and with church, but doesn't want to walk away from either one; a writer with modest successes and dreams, who works at it day after day. <strong></strong>

I don't need to hear life stories from a famous athlete, or a hip young pastor of a mega church, someone who made a million overnight, or a woman with eight babies. While I might be intrigued, inspired or fascinated by some of those stories,  they leave me feeling more empty and hopeless. <strong>I need to hear stories that remind me I'm not alone in my failures, my struggles, my messes, or my everyday hopes and dreams.</strong>

And I want to be someone who is able to share some of my own stories with as many people as possible. That's all.