Author Bio: Paula Tiberius is an author, screenwriter, filmmaker, musician and mom living in North Hollywood, California with her musician husband Richard, their daughter Violet, and their German Shepherd, Jackson. Paula wrote and directed the award-winning feature film Goldirocks in Toronto, which came out theatrically in 2004, played on Pay TV and Cable in Canada and is currently available on Netflix, distributed by R Squared Films. To learn more about Goldirocks, visit www.goldirocks.com You can read more from Paula Tiberius at her website www.paulatiberius.com/blog, where you’ll find lots of thought-provoking blogs, vegetarian recipes and more. The Cowboy Singer is her first novel.
Go Where The Love Is
I moved to Los Angeles to become a famous screenwriter. Ha! What a cliché, I know. But hey – I had a feature film under my belt, a few connections, a few scripts, and a lot of time on my hands. I was sure I would have an agent within a year, at the outside.
Five years later, still no agent. But, I had a few more scripts, a new short film in post-production, a new distribution deal for my feature, and a new job editing a lifestyle website that had me working with over thirty writers and creating original content. I couldn’t really complain.
One day the phone rang and a writing partner of mine had great news. A screenplay that we had co-written was getting optioned. Hooray! Who needs an agent if someone wants to make your film directly? It felt great to be wanted, and we got to work polishing the script with the production company’s story editor.
Two years later, the company dropped the project. Dream dashed. But, we had a polished script that we were free to shop around, and in the meantime I’d met the man of my dreams, had a baby daughter and written a romance novel for fun. I couldn’t really complain.
Yet this time I was complaining an awful lot. So much so that I thought I better get some help. So I went to work on myself to improve my attitude, and I began meditating, focusing on the positive and all that hippie stuff, and lo and behold, I felt a lot better.
So much better that I thought maybe I was ready to get back out there in the find-an-agent-in-a-haystack game. Yes, I was ready! But something kept stopping me. I polished my query letter over and over, but didn’t send it out.
Then it was suggested to me that I send out a query for my romance novel too. My romance novel? You mean the thing I wrote for fun without any expectations at all? The 220 pages that were largely pure joy to type? The hunk of paper that’s been sitting in my office for well over a year? Well, okay – why not? So I did.
And I got a book agent in a week.
I’m not saying this energy / non-attachment stuff is always so fruitful, but I will say that I think it pays to go where the love is. Now, I’m happily working on my next book, and who knows? Maybe one day someone will make it into a movie.
