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PERSISTENCE was written while I was in the depths of depression about my writing ability. On the afternoon of the day I wrote this, I received five (5) rejection notices in the mail. This, by itself, wouldn't have been so bad, but I'd also gotten disgusted and trashed 10,000 words of a novel I was writing. I wrote the story in four hours (2000 - 0200) and swore that it was the last thing I'd write. I mailed it the next day. I was chagrined when Stan Schmidt told me that he thought that it was the best thing I'd done.
On reflection I realize that there is a lot of autobiographical material in this story. The woman who was the model for this story told me that she cried when she read the draft, so I guess it I did something right. It also made the preliminary ballot for the Hugo that year, which means that it also touched a few fans' hearts as well.
This issue of ANALOG also contains a bio of me by Jay Kay Klien together with an absolutely ugly picture.