Hello guys

How was your week? Mine was very full, and by Friday evening I was wrecked. On Saturday I was more or less a zombie. Today is better, so I found myself thinking about you, about this solitary community, full of prayers and people. Real people. We do not do "how to write your first novel" here, or "how to make money with books written by AI." What we have here is the real work, and maybe I do not point at it often enough. There is a whole section on screenwriting and creative writing in the Classroom. The screenwriting part even has videos I made with an avatar. You should know that those screenwriting lessons come straight out of a university level course, and they hold up just as well if you write novels. There are parts I would like to finish. I have not had the chance to develop them yet. The thing is, this community was born as an exchange more than as a road to success. Success is in your hands whether or not you have finished your novel. I have written several novels and publishers have put them out. I published before I knew the rules, and after. The rules are a guide. A compass. Originality is where the rules get broken, but they are still doing their work when it happens, and how those rules manage that is often a mystery. So there is a guide in the Classroom. There are instructions. I did not invent them. They are there to become your compass, and they will also tell you whether the people you are handing your creativity to know what they are doing. Out there, too many gurus will inject you with their dose of truth. Often it is poison. Some of them do know their trade. So if you have doubts about your path, this is a place to talk it through and check. It is no secret that there is a whole business of scams and exploitation aimed at authors, because some people's dreams are somebody else's salary, and there are people who will make money on ours. In 2021 I paid a modest sum for a marketing campaign for my book. I wanted to see whether it worked. They promised at least twenty five blogs would write about it, plus other services. The twenty five bloggers turned out to be mostly their own blogs, invented, with long names, impossible to find on a search engine, and every review said the same thing. Anonymous people really.

If You Have Ever Queried an Agent, Speak Up We all know it. Once the novel is finished, we face a set of choices, and for most of us there are three. 1) Self-publish. 2) Try the traditional route. 3) Leave it in a drawer, where maybe a friend or a partner will read it. For years, what I wrote ended up in that drawer, read by one or two people at most. Since 2018, though, I have been publishing. I have gone traditional, five books with four publishers, and some in self. My first book in English came out in 2021, self-published. Prior over a hundred rejections. Five years later I have another book ready, and for about a week now I have been in the query phase. So you have probably worked out which road I chose. It is a brutal phase, and I hate it. Between my own experience and everything I have picked up from other writers, it feels like throwing a pebble into the middle of the ocean and going back the next day to fish it out. So if any of you have direct or indirect experience with an agent, this is the moment to share it. In Italy, if you want an agent to read you, you pay (mostly). And the answers sometimes leave you with a bitter taste. One agent once wrote to me that while he was reading my novel he pictured me as a madman typing at the speed of light. Not the kind of comment you want to receive. Whether I write fast or slow is something you cannot know, and even if I did write fast, it would only be because I write a lot. Another comment, after I had paid another four hundred euros, was that my character was wonderful, so wonderful they compared him to a book that went on to become famous, but they still could not take mine. The most frustrating part is that the book they held mine against had been ignored for twenty years, and was finally published to great success after two decades of refusal and denial. They really do not learn from history, or from their own mistakes. Abroad, with agents in the UK and the US, the problem is different. The text is probably either not read at all or read on the surface (I've been told so). What counts is who you are. And the sheer volume of manuscripts they receive is impossible for one person to sound out, so something inevitably gets lost.

Monday, August 3, 2026 Revelation 3:20 (NIV) "Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me." Heavenly Father, Thank You that You never stop knocking on the door of our hearts. You desire a relationship with us and long to dwell with us. Help us to listen for Your voice each day and open the door of our hearts to You. May we welcome You into every area of our lives, walk closely with You, and reflect Your love to everyone around us. In Jesus' name we pray, Amen.

📅 July 31, 2026 📖 Scripture of the Day "Though the mountains be shaken and the hills be removed, yet my unfailing love for you will not be shaken nor my covenant of peace be removed," says the Lord, who has compassion on you. Isaiah 54:10 (NIV) Heavenly Father, Thank You for Your unfailing love that never changes. Even when life feels uncertain and everything around me seems to be shaken, I can trust that Your love for me remains firm forever. Help me to rest in Your promises and walk each day with faith instead of fear. Fill my heart with Your peace, strengthen me through every trial, and remind me that Your compassion never fails. May my life reflect Your goodness, Your grace, and the hope that can only be found in You. In Jesus' precious name I pray, Amen.