Do you struggle with acknowledgments for your inside book cover? Yes, me too. What I have to say isn’t always what I want to say.
Alan Greenspan said, “I know you think you understand what you thought I said, but I’m not sure you realize that what you heard is not what I meant.”
We write truth in our books and we should write them in the acknowledgements too.
It is courtesy to name all those who helped you, in order of importance, whether it be family, writing buddies or editors.
And if you got financial aid, you are to share that as well. You should keep all your emotional thanks to the end.
Translation:
I wish to thank Sir __________ for his comments on my newsletter which set me on this path. Certainly I must mention the government grant that got me this far.
And surely I must mention _________ __________who spent ages editing my unpolished manuscript. And then I wish to mention all those in my writing group who offered helpful hits toward the plot.
I am grateful to my husband and children who believed in me and suffered through many evenings of take out food on my behalf. Signed___________
Or you can write the truth like the multi-award winner Ruth Goose did in her excellent mystery, ‘Doing it in the Dixie Dew.’
This is not to thank the members of my long-ago Charlotte writer’s group who disliked this manuscript from word one.
My husband, who said, “Whatever you do, don’t write a novel. It takes too long. You’ll never get it published and you can’t plot.
My sons, who asked, “What do you know about running a bed and breakfast?’
Note to my academic cell mates, ‘Doing it at the Dixie Dew has the only two subjects W.B.Yeats said were worth writing about: sex and death, plus the third one: food.
And then she goes on … Seriously, I do want to thank ….
So from this message I glean this truth. We write truth in our books and we should write them in the acknowledgements too.
Brenda J. Wood is a motivational speaker and author.
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