Posted by Christine on Aug 12, 2010 in General, Query, Randomness |
When I started the query process for Red and Grey I set a number. It was the “enough is enough†number. In other words, this is where I draw the line and call it quits number. Because, at some point a person has to realize that the manuscript they are pitching is not going to sell. I didn’t want to become one of those people who became blinded, tied to my project, and unable to move forward. Locked in a cycle they were unable to escape and chained to a manuscript that was long dead. So I needed to give myself an end date. It wasn’t about giving up so much as about moving forward. Realizing this wasn’t the right project and choosing to keep making progress. The number I set with the approval of my best friend and my husband was 100 rejections. Today I received my 25th. The rejections have varied greatly. I’ve gotten: – form rejections – very kind personal rejections – requests for pages that turned into rejections So, it’s all good. But today I realized I was a fourth of the way to my “enough†number. How do I feel about this? My emotions are mixed to be honest. I’m proud of myself for having gotten this far, and not being ready to quit. I’m disappointed by my growing pile of rejections. At the same time, I know that one day when I’m published, I’ll be able to encourage some other aspiring writer(s) with my binder full of researched agents with notes about when I sent queries and when I received rejection. (The binder is beautifully decorated by my five and seven year old by the way.) Finally, I’m excited. Why, two reasons – first because in the midst of sending those 25 queries for Red and Grey I haven’t just sat around and waited to see what happens. I revised and submitted a short story to a magazine and I rewrote a novel and submitted it to a publisher. (The short story was rejected, but I’m still waiting for the verdict on the novel, keep your fingers crossed.) The second reason – I still have 75 queries to submit – and that’s 75 chances for someone to say yes they want to read Red and Grey and with luck represent it. Will I still stop when I reach 100, even though I have proved to myself I will keep pursuing other avenues and new stories? In all honesty, I don’t know. I love Red and Grey (the character’s not the novel). I would hate to see them relegated to living under my bed (figuratively speaking) but I might let them sit for a while and come back to revisit them in a year or two after I have 100 rejections under my...
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Posted by Christine on Aug 9, 2010 in General, Randomness, Revisions |
Nope, it’s not an expression, it’s how I remember the three words I most overuse and have to search and destroy when I finish writing. In fact this is my fist line of revisions after I finish a story and do the initial read through for typos. I go to the Find/Replace feature in Word and start with “just†and work through the document starting at page one and eliminate all non essential uses of the word. Which, to be honest, is pretty much all of them. Then I do “had†and then “thatâ€. Most times when I use these words they are unnecessary, so why do I use them? I have no idea. But I seem to be fond of them. It’s incredible helpful to do a hunt for them, especially when I’m on a word count limit and need to cut words. I love to see my word count go down by cutting unneeded uses of these words. In fact as an exercise I wrote this entire blog post without using the words “just had that†except where they were encased in quotes. (As I read through it I ended up cutting a “that†and a “just†from this tiny little blog post how sad am I? 😉 ) I hope by eliminating these words it makes my writing tighter and flow better. My phrase might grow with time as I learn more of my problem words and start eliminating them from my writing. What are your problem words? What do you hunt for and eliminate from your...
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Posted by Christine on Aug 4, 2010 in General, Randomness |
or as they are often referred to Beach Reads. I know what books I took on vacation, you can see my list here. I didn’t make it through the whole list I finished Three Days till Dead and On the Edge. I’m currently working on Doppelganger and enjoying it when I can steal a few minutes to read it. Out of curiosity where do you go to get your summer reading ideas. One of them is Flashlight Worthy books that just put out a whole list devoted to Beach Reads. Another idea is to check out the blogs and websites of authors you enjoy and see what they are reading. What are your thoughts, feel free to share in the...
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Posted by Christine on Aug 4, 2010 in General, Updates |
A status update? For real? Yup, here I am giving a real live status update so without further ado… Rejection Queen Status Update: – Rejections to date: 17, including the rejection of my outstanding partial. – Outstanding queries: 6 Other writing news: – Outside of the contest I have actually 22 rejections on Red and Grey. I was starting to feel a little discouraged but… I got over it and I’m getting my next round of queries ready to send now. – Everyone keep your fingers crossed for Cat’s Revealing which is currently with the editors at Brava in the Writing with the Stars contest. – I am currently working on the sequel to Red and Grey. I would like to have it finished by the end of the year. Personal Updates: – I didn’t get to read nearly as much as I wanted to on vacation. I was far to busy doing stuff. Have you ever noticed that about vacation, that you come home and need to relax and recover from all the “go, go, go†? – My family and I did have a wonderful time on our trip and I am excited have spent time with my husbands family and with my sister in...
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Posted by Christine on Jul 29, 2010 in General |
Vacation was wonderful. I loved visiting family and friends in Tennessee and Florida and hanging with my kids. I have to admit as wonderful as it was to be away I’m thrilled to be home and reunited with my house, my bed, and my internet connection. I know some people thrive away from technology and the break was nice but I wouldn’t be able to live that way long. I missed the internet, e-mail, twitter, my cell phone not dropping calls. The truth is I like being connected. I feel more stressed when I’m not connected then when I am. I mean, how do you research anything or look up important information without Wikipedia – the font of all knowledge? And how do you keep in touch with people without e-mail or a reliable cell phone connection? I know that there are people out there rolling their eyes at me right this minute thinking “Wow, has this chick never heard of the library or snail mail?†Yes, I have heard and used both. But the library is not available at 6:30pm when you want to know what the plural of the word “Pegasus†is. Nor is Snail Mail convenient when you want to invite someone to come over for dinner at 7:00pm and it is current 3:45pm. Both of these incidents arose on our trip. I love the library and visit it often, I send packages through the post office frequently as well. But I’ll admit to being tied to my technology in ways that generations prior to mine were not and generations after mine will likely take for granted. So yes, I am thrilled to be home, and have my beloved connectivity back. Oh, I missed my hubby this past week too....
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Posted by Christine on Jul 11, 2010 in General |
So I had six books all picked out to take with me on vacation. I went ahead and started one of them, On the Edge, by Ilona Andrews. Really liked it. Can’t wait to read Bayou Moon – already told Hubby he could buy it for me for Christmas. 😉 I’m glad I have Magic Bites to take with me. Looking forward to reading more by this author. Yeah, the only problem, I did nothing all afternoon today so I could finish it. Uhm…yeah…oopps. I kind of planned to clean the house and finish packing today, oh well, such is life, guess I’ll stay up late and finish those things. Oh, the next book on my list Three Days till Dead by Kelly Meding. I will not start it till I’m done packing. I swear. Really I do… More room in my suitcase for some other book I want to read. :-) One last post tomorrow and then I will be offline for two weeks....
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