{"id":10848,"date":"2023-04-26T09:49:20","date_gmt":"2023-04-26T13:49:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/inspirationreport\/?p=10848"},"modified":"2023-04-26T10:11:57","modified_gmt":"2023-04-26T14:11:57","slug":"how-novelist-karen-kingsbury-kept-going-after-receiving-30-rejection-letters","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/inspirationreport\/2023\/04\/how-novelist-karen-kingsbury-kept-going-after-receiving-30-rejection-letters.html","title":{"rendered":"How Christian Novelist Karen Kingsbury Kept Going After Receiving 30 Rejection Letters"},"content":{"rendered":"
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The best-selling novelist, often called \u201cAmerica\u2019s favorite inspirational storyteller,\u201d says as a young writer, she received 30 rejection letters before a publisher took a chance and hired her. Karen Kingsbury\u2019s books have sold over 25 million copies and have been made into multiple television series and movies, including her latest one, \u201cThousand Tomorrows,\u201d starring Rose Reid and Colin Ford.<\/p>\n

However, Kingsbury told Christian Headlines that in the mid-1990s, she had issues finding a publisher for her first faith-based inspirational book, \u201cWhere Yesterday Lives<\/a>.\u201d Kingsbury was a crime book author and former journalist at the time. She said, \u201cI had done four true crime books. I had written for the L.A. Times; I was a sports writer and then a crime writer. And so I wrote crime books, and everyone loved them. And they were received very well, but I didn\u2019t want to write that.\u201d<\/p>\n

When Kingsbury read Francine Rivers\u2019 book, \u201cRedeeming Love,\u201d she felt led by God to stop writing crime novels and start writing Christian inspirational stories. Kingsbury continued, \u201cSo I wrote my first inspirational novel, \u2018Where Yesterday Lives.\u2019 My agent dropped me. He said, \u2018Karen, you were going to be a star. Why do you want to do this other stuff?\u2019 You know, why would you want that? He dropped me, and I had to kind of be on my own.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kingsbury took \u201cWhere Yesterday Lives\u201d to dozens of publishers, but unfortunately, she received 30 rejection letters, taking about a year to find an interested publisher. Kingsbury said, \u201cThe first rejection letters kind of surprised me. But it was a secular publisher. And they were like, \u2018We do nonfiction crime, and you\u2019re wanting us to look at fiction inspirational. We just don\u2019t do it.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n