Forget About Fame – Ask for Wonder
“Never once in my life did I ask for success or wisdom or power. I asked for wonder.”
Abraham Heschel
A few months before my new novel, The Moonlight Dreamers, came out, a friend of mine who works in the book trade said to me, ‘You do realise that the only way you’re going to get UK bookstores to order your book in bulk is if you have an endorsement on the cover from A Celebrity.’
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This annoyed me … but I was not surprised.
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It annoyed me because I get so frustrated by our celebrity-obsessed culture. In fact, one of the major storylines in The Moonlight Dreamers is an attack on celebrity culture and the shallowness and spitefulness it inspires online and in certain sections of the media.
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If I asked a celebrity to endorse this book I’d be being a total hypocrite.
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But if book stores don’t order your book in bulk – or at all – what hope have you got for it to succeed?
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There’s so much pressure on us in today’s society to ‘succeed’. And here, I’m referring to society’s definition of success, which seems to be measured purely in numbers.
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Number of followers. Number of ‘friends’. Number of ‘likes’. Number of hits.
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Financial numbers. Sales numbers. Profit numbers.
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And the temptation to sacrifice your integrity in the pursuit of these numbers can be HUGE.
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But I was brought up to practise what I preach – even if that means taking the harder path.
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Even if that means missing out on so-called success.
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So I didn’t approach any celebrities to endorse The Moonlight Dreamers.
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Like the quote from Abraham Heschel at the top of this post, I asked for WONDER instead of fame or success.
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I asked and I hoped and I prayed that the book would reach the people who would benefit from the messages contained within it. Free spirits who need a little encouragement in daring to dream.
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I asked for the wonder of the written word and the way it is able to connect us, heart to heart and soul to soul.
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And an incredible sense of wonder is what I am getting – by the bucket-load.
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Wonder that what started out as this random scribbling in a notebook…
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Ended up becoming this beautiful book…
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Wonder at the messages I’m receiving from readers as far away as Australia, telling me that The Moonlight Dreamers has inspired them to re-ignite their own dreams.
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Wonder that, within a few days of its release – and without a celebrity endorsement – it was topping two charts on Amazon and they had selected it as their YA Book of the Month…
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Wonder that Dubray, a chain of book stores in Ireland, had made it their recommended YA book of the month…
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Wonder that it was being recommended as far afield as New Zealand too…
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Wonder at the pictures of the book popping up on Instagram, from on board boats in New South Wales to beside swimming pools in spas…
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And wonder at the wonderful reviews.
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Right now, I am awash with wonder.
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So, whatever your dreams and goals may be, forget about fame and focus on finding the wonder.
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Fame and money and ‘success’ are fragile goals. Numbers can rise. But they can fall away too.
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But wonder…
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Wonder stays with you forever.
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