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Laura Cowan, Laura K. Cowan, novelist, prophecy, spiritual warfare, supernatural fiction, unpublished novel
Who is Laura K. Cowan?
Don’t you hate it when gurus tell you that you are the only person standing in the way of your success? Me, too. That’s why it stinks to have recently realized I was doing exactly that. I’m a toe-in-the-water kind of person, which is a nice way of saying that fear has dominated most of my life because of big hurts that made me way too scared to risk rejection again. And even after I decided I was going to write and publish my writing, which is an enormous step for my road to healing, I recently realized I was still standing in the way of my own success, because I was still afraid to tell everyone the whole story–who I really perceive myself to be.
Why is this an issue? Because I can’t truly connect with a community of people through my writing without showing up, entirely myself. And if I write a novel of spiritual warfare with angels and demons warring over a young girl’s discovery of her own identity, how can anyone understand it unless they understand what made me write it? What will make a publisher believe that I’m the only person who could have written this book, if they don’t know who I am in the first place?
Is this the final baby step? I have updated my bio with a full and honest explanation of who I am and why I’m pursuing this career writing supernatural novels, and I also plan to include this honest information in future bios, pitch letters, and videos seeking support for my projects. Because you deserve me to fully show up for my life, because I do have something to offer, and because I need nothing less than the same from you.
And this isn’t really just about me. Most of us hold back a piece of ourselves in certain situations to avoid rejection, don’t we? What piece of you is the world in need of seeing for the first time? Or for the second time, after a long hiatus? Please feel free to share in comments.
Since I write contemporary fantasy novels and paranormal short stories, most people think I’m making it all up from scratch for the same reason they don’t spend time wondering if J. K. Rowling really went to a school called Hogwarts.
I’ve had mixed feelings sharing the realities behind my stories because people expect fantasy/paranormal to be total fiction. Of course, my fiction is fiction, much more dramatic and overt then my “real life.” So, I don’t know whether telling people more about me will help me sell books or whether it will sound, oh, amateurish in some way since most big name writers don’t confess to being anything like the characters in their fantasy/occult/folktale books.
Over time, I’ve said more in blogs about me, and it doesn’t seem to have hurt anything. I like your open attitude about this. It’s refreshing. It will probably help you start a dialogue with readers and prospective readers when they stop by your site.
Malcolm
Thanks, Malcolm. You’re right, there is a tendency to deny that you are anything like your characters to avoid the accusation of writing an autobiographical novel, but I think it’s also important to say why you are the one to write your stories and why they are important to you. Fine line. My first novel is not at all my story, even though I have been through a church split like my character and experienced some supernatural phenomena. But if you look at a lot of writers, especially of speculative fiction, you find that they believe what they’re writing about is at least possible, and that’s a conversation that is too interesting for me to miss.
I had just commented on Lynn Serafinn’s blog about this very thing this morning. My greatest fear is fear of judgment by others and it has held me up for a while. I’m pushing through that though, so I hope you are too. Here’s the link to Lynn’s post if you would like to read it: http://spiritauthors.com/news/going-public-what-all-authors-fear-when-getting-ready-to-publish/
And i see that you mentioned updating your bio to reveal the real you (my paraphrasing), which is so coincidental because I’ve done the same thing recently to mine.
It’s a hard one, isn’t it? But even just meeting you is turning the light on in my head to all the amazing blessings connected to letting people see the real you. Blessings! I will check out that post. Thanks for the comment!