Tag: Writing

And now we wait …

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Cover Official

Well, this is it.  As I said in my previous post I’ve submitted to a total of 18 agents and might add others over the next few days.  And that’s all I’m waiting for — the agents’ responses.  Love or Lust is now completely proofread and copy-edited.

My editor does feel that she might have missed a few commas in the course of some early chapters, so she wants to give those another glance over.  I also want to update the asterisk scene separators with fleurons.  And I will spend some time fine tuning the layout and formatting, as I wish for the book to be ready to go in early June if I haven’t heard back a positive response from the agents before then.

So final time table:

  • Between now and 1 June I will be tweaking layout and updating the sample to reflect the proofread version, adding the fleurons, and so forth.
  • Waiting.  Maddening, heartbreaking waiting.  This will be filled with much anxiety every time I check my email, and occasional bouts of disappointment as I’m bound to get more than a couple of rejection letters.

If, by 1 June I have been accepted by an agent then, as I’ve said before, I’ll keep you all updated about what the publisher is going to do and when.

If I haven’t been picked up by the first of June I’ll begin uploading the book to e-stores and will announce the date they’ll be available for purchase.

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Baker’s dozen

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Thirteen agents.

Thank god for computers and the ability to copy and paste blocks of repreated text.

13 isn’t many, really, and it brings me up to 18 total queries.  Not a lot, but a fairer sampling.  For my eyes’ sakes (some of those site were not pleasant to look at) I’m done for now.  Might grab another few tomorrow or Wednesday.

Still, 13 more agents … just because Google suddenly decided to be co operative.  Go figure.

When it rains, it pours …

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My God! I suddenly have a ridiculous pile of agents and agencies that look promising.

I will spend this week sending out queries. I do still plan to put a deadline to be accepted or self publish. Love or Lust will either be on the hands of an agent, being shopped to publishers, or it will be self published by the start of June.

I wish to give the agencies a reasonable time with which to respond, but I also don’t wish to sit idly on a completed story. I’m sure there are plausibly hundreds of relevant agents out there, if I can but find their names and sites. I will play that game to a point. When I could only find two promising looking agents, I didn’t like giving up so I looked – cautiously as I don’t need an agent, but I looked. I found a whopping three more. Today Google’s results were utterly different! Two pages of results I’d never found before before I decided to stop and get ready for bed! These were the top matches!

So I will continue to selectively query, but to a much deeper and broader pool (a wise thing, I should think, as it give the agent idea a far fairer chance). After this week, though, no more searching. This new pool of results gives me a more comfortably sized list, and looking much longer risks pushing my June deadline in order to give the agents fair time to respond.

Good night.
Wish me luck.

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And it’s done

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Love or Lust is edited.  I’m giving it another read through to make sure everything reads the way I meant it to, but it’s otherwise done.

I’ve submitted a query to the last agent I’d found and was interested in submitting the story to (would have done it days ago, but didn’t see that she wanted only 3 chapters, not the entire manuscript when I’d found her before).  So this is the way it’ll work:  if I’m accepted by an agent I will discuss details with them, I still might self-publish it’ll depend on various things. I’ll keep you posted on when the book is due based on the publisher, and will (of course) post links for pre-ordering if that becomes an option.

If I am not picked up by an agent, or decide not to go with one the book will go on sale 1 June 2012, and I may elect to set up a pre-order with Apple’s iBookstore before then.

It’s always a rush to not only finish a story, but to finish putting the polish on so that it really shines.  All the little typos (theoretically, never fails you’ll find more — I swear little gremlins or imps sneak into the books at night and rearrange the print or edit the files!) are gone, the sentences clear and orderly.  Beautiful.

Part of me does wish that I were just self-publishing this and had never thought about agents and publishers, but teen romance is not sci-fi/fantasy.  I feel that, given a sensible and competent agent and publisher that there is genuinely more benefit in the long run to a contract.  I hope I won’t be proven wrong, and I wish there were some way to know for certain … but I can’t exactly put the book out now and then go hunting for a publisher — it’s possible, but tends to go rather badly.

In the mean time, Ready or Not is on a quiet little hold for another week.  I have only a chapter or two left but I want time to consider how the school year wraps up.

So … this is it, wish me luck.  I may go mad with the waiting.  I just hope it’ll be worth it.

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Agents

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Suddenly Google is being more helpful.  I’ve gone from two solid sounding agents and a few flaky looking ones none of whom looked like they were remotely relevant to my search except to be literary agents to several agencies.

I’m not querying them all, I’m still being selective by criterion I’m sure I couldn’t explain since I’m not fully aware — call it Vibes and move on — but I am querying several.  I shan’t bother naming them all, but I would like to list some of the more interesting and promising ones whether I’ve queried them or not just to (hopefully) help others.

By all means, if you’d like to suggest an agent or agency for me to query leave a comment or shoot me a message.

A small list, but there you are.  There actually was another agency I was trying to find, I stumbled on them once upon a time looking for a SF agent for something and now I can’t find them.  Pity.

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God help me, I didn’t learn my lesson.

Published on by Jaye3 Comments

So, Camp NaNoWriMo is coming up.

For those who don’t know, it’s a set your own word count goal event in April from, yep, the folks who bring us NaNoWriMo.

I’ve no idea what I was thinking.  Still, I’ve set myself a loose goal of 25,000 words with the expectation that it might be to the end of Ready or Not.  To be honest, I’m not sure the book actually has that far left in it, so I’m thinking of changing my goal to 10 or even 5 thousand.  Or else making up the missing word count with Book 3.

In any event, Ready or Not should be ready for editing and proofreading by the end of April.

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The end is in sight!

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Ready or Not (concept only)Well, I’ve reached the end of Ready or Not‘s chapter 20.  I feel like the next one or the one after should be the wind down to the end and then I can get started on the third book.

So far I’m not sure what to call that one.  I’m likely to be several chapters in before I’ve got a clear vision of a name.  At least the fourth book has a name:  Now & Forever.  I think I was planning to call it that all along, I’m not sure, but I am now.

I’m still waiting to hear back from Ms Lakosil to decide how I’m going to proceed.

Cover Official

Which does, by the way bring me to a perfectly related detail.  Love or Lust should be done editing in two weeks, maybe three.  I mean done done.  It’d be sooner, but I want to give it one more personal read through.  The lovely part of this is that the agency’s expected response is supposed to be 2-4 weeks which would put today the earliest I’m likely to hear back and the latest just about the time I finish my read through — just in time to decide what I’m going to do!

One thing I have decided to do, but haven’t got around to is tweaking the cover for Love or Lust to a less dark colour.  It doesn’t go as well with the second book.  Admittedly it won’t matter if I end up going with an agent and a traditional publisher, but I’m going to operate on the idea that I won’t be using an agent.  If I do self-publish the cover will be tweaked down to a shade of blue similar to the maroon that Ready or Not‘s cover has.

Sneek preview of the third book (and part of the second, I suppose):  image

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Exploring possibilities

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So I’ve made a couple of agent inquiries this weekend.

Really not many. As I know how to do this on my own I was quite particular in who I elected to send inquiries to rather than sending to every agent I could find. I thought, Why not? There’s nothing to lose, and an advance to gain.

There goes money again. Well, frankly, I may write because I have stories I wish to tell, but we live in a crass capitalism and I like to eat and have a home, and wages don’t go far these days.

In the end I submitted to two agents only:

Ms Lakosil of Bradford Literary Agency and Ms Diver of The Knight Agency.

I was promptly rejected by Ms Diver. I wasn’t very surprised. I’d actually changed my mind about submitting an inquiry to that agency, initially I hadn’t felt very interested.

This does not mean Now & Forever is not going to be self published, only that it might not. I should expect a reply from Ms Lakosil before editing will be done so no delays there, and I she expresses interest I’ll discuss detail regarding time frame expectations and so forth to decide if I wish to go a traditional route.

In truth my opinions of publishing came largely from my love of SF. The SF houses are, in my opinion, trying to commit suicide. As such I want nothing to do with them professionally. While it can be truly said that publishing houses are all suffering some malady of the mind and a terrible case of short sightedness it is to varying degrees dependent on the publisher and, most importantly, genre. Romance, it seems, is a touch less demented and as such I’m willing to test the waters a little and see how I feel.

Let there be samples!

Published on by Jaye2 Comments

Cover Official

Well, there’s a sample up for Love or Lust now.

It’s only the first two chapters, and that’s all I intend to have up, for the moment, but I might elect to add the third chapter too.

There is no downloadable ePUB or PDF sample.  That’s too much bother and will be left up to the various eBook retailers to supply.  The launch availability is currently iBooks, Kindle, Nook, Kobo, Smashwords, Amazon (print), and Createspace.  I’m considering putting up on a little place called DriveThru Fiction as well.  It looks easy enough to use, and I won’t say no to a venue that costs nothing to publish through since all it can mean is more sales.  If you’ve a favourite eBookstore you don’t see listed feel free to contact me or leave a comment naming it.

Ready or Not (concept only)I’ve also decided the cover for Ready or Not.  Mostly because that gave me something to do that felt constructive while I tried to decide what happens next in the story.  I do believe it’s about done as the girls are having an Easter break kickoff party in the part I’m currently working on.  Then it’s off to editing, working out a less placeholdery blurb, and then to the editor (yes, I edit things BEFORE I give them to my editor.  I happen to like the woman and would feel rather bad if she wound up in an asylum by any action of my own).

I’m starting to feel a little better about Book 2, lately.  I’m starting to think that the less cohesive, more anecdotal form it has taken so far might make it a good transitional tale.  Something to give a better feel for the characters and their normal lives.  In short, rather than one big slice of their life looked at from edge to edge as Book 1 is, Book 2 is more like several little slices and glimpses of time.  I don’t know.  I’ll get it typed, give it a few read throughs, then decide if it’s a mess or not.

Suffice to say I’m off my writer’s block and things are moving along well.

P.S.  Those paying attention will notice that Love or Lust‘s cover says “Jaye Edgecliff” while Ready or Not‘s says “Jaye Em Edgecliff”, that’s because the latter is what I’d prefer, but the former is what I have to do because of a quirk to the cover layout and Book 1 has a finalised cover versus Book 2 which has a cover I’m still playing with.

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Wow more word count than I’d thought!

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Winner-120x90-2Just finished typing the bits of Ready or Not I’d written during NaNoWriMo and discovered that the actual final tally is 56,598 words!

That’s very inspiring.   I’m still not sure how much the experiment can be dubbed a success — I feel rather strongly that this story is going to wind up needing far more intensive editorial work than Love or Lust did, but we’ll see.  With luck I’m just being too hard on myself.  I did, after all, think rather poorly of Book 1 until I’d given it two or three read throughs, my editor had seen it and made her comments, and a few friends had taken a look at it.

Well, wish me luck.  I now embark on the grand adventure of figuring out what happens in Chapter 20 and how far it is to the end of this one.

Status of Love or Lust, by the by, is that my editor is about to do her final proofread on it.  Depending how fast that goes (read just how terrible my spelling and grammar wound up being) I could, conceivably, publish it by Valentine’s day (a rather lovely date to start since that would be approximately the 1yr anniversary of me starting to write it, though I think that actual date was 8 February), otherwise we’re looking around Early march barring any major catastrophes.