Ideas for Before and After the Agent Search

Every writer dreams of an agent who will help turn them into a best selling author.

The first step is to write a good book and be able to write a query that'll interest an agent into learning more about your book. Sounds easy, doesn't it? The first step is to learn what turns agents off, like the person who mentioned her "fiction novel" at Janet Reid's Query Shark.

Seems most agents think novels are fiction. If you want to avoid such mistakes, Stacey O'Neale's blog at the YA Fantasy Guide has a listing of Agent Interviews.  If any of the interviews are in your genre, they might be worth studying.

Of course, you can exhaust the list of reputable agents interested
in Your Genre.
 Submitting to publishers or Self-publishing then becomes an alternative.

When self-publishing, what is the most important thing you can do?

After editing your book/story, that is.

I'd say its getting the best cover you can afford ... which doesn't mean you must go to a professional cover artist. Granted I'm biased because I'm a browser. I like to go to the book stores to poke and putter among the volumes.

Your covers are still important if you're e-publishing. Have you looked at the promotion sites? Long lines of book covers which are usually organized by genre. The same is true at the e-publishers. A long line of book titles and blurbs, only they aren't organized by genre ... unless you limit your search.

Guess which of my covers on the left I like best and comment.

Vanna Smythe blogged about her decision on whether to create her own cover from stock photos or hire it done.  Interesting reading, and useful, I think, even if you have a publisher doing your cover.  

So. What do Agents Feels About Queries?

Several blogs back, I mentioned Janet Reid's formula for a good query ... ie. one that might give her a positive attitude when she reads your sample ... provided your query lures her on. A query that's low on description and high on action.

I was trying to use her formula for my new query for "Dark Solstice", using Linden as the focus rather than Mariah. So, I had been thinking about queries a lot before NaNoWriMo, trying to get away from describing feelings to show action. Still, I've talked to several people who think writing queries is a waste of time, too hard, or ????? Since self-publishing is so easy, they say, I should just go that route.

Jessica Faust gives an agents viewpoint on why a query is important in her Bookends Blog: The Archaic Query. She considers it just another craft skill which writers have to master. The upside? It allows agents, and probably publishers, to work through their submissions faster.

While we're thinking about queries, agent Rachelle Gardner wrote a blog on interpreting "agent euphenisms": Decoding Query Rejections. What I found interesting: she linked to Janet Reid's Query Shark as a place where writer's can get a specific reaction to their query -- if their query is lucky enough to be chosen. Though I should warn you Janet Reid isn't as nice as Rachelle Gardner.

Then, there's the other end of the process, getting some publicity for your book -- whether traditionally or self-published. The Passive Guy gives some good tips on using Good Reads to reach a targeted market of readers. He makes such a good argument that I may have to go back and visit the site regularly in addition to Facebook and Twitter. After NaNoWriMo, of course.

How am I doing with NaNoWritMo?

I'm behind, of course, but not by much. Sunday threw me off my count when I went to Denver, and I was short yesterday too. Still, I've discovered a completely undreamed of character who is central to the mid-story conflict that launches my main character into deep doo-doo, only I don't know what she's going to do to get out of the mess her contentious attitude gets her into.

PS: Got a good laugh when I discovered all my typos after I published an except of "Combine Mythos" yesterday.  Oh, I'm also thinking of calling the story "Combine Blues".

Archetype or Cliche or ??

The Reading Lesson:

All too often Archetypes turn into Cliches.  This is a major problem for fantasy writers and readers.  Like, who wants to read another vampire novel ... or zombie ... or fairy ... or ???  You name it, and you can probably come up with examples where hundreds of writers followed the cliche and still got published.  You also know why I laughed out loud when I encountered Alison Pang's leg-humping unicorn in A Brush of Darkness.  [Shades of Chihuahuas!]

I've often thunk that Disney & Company should be prosecuted for stifling people's imaginations.  Fortunately, writers' imaginations can still counter the commercial norms.  While we want to make some money from our books, many of us streeetch people's imaginations in the process.

Off the rant.  Pang creates a very credible fey-touched urban fantasy world with a no-nonsense hero --  acting as a gatekeeper between worlds for her boss who has gone mysteriously missing.  The plot centers on finding the boss and other missing people.  The love interest is dangerous [read succubus] and is looking for his sister who has gone missing too.  The peril is developed from the concept soul capturing.  The cast of characters come from faery, heaven, hell, and human, all mixed together in unexpected ways.

Back to the unicorn who remains silent after the hero rescues him from a demon and takes him home.  She even tolerates him sleeping in her underwear drawer.  While she protests, she doesn't kick his ass out the door but fixes him breakfast instead.  About midway, though the book, she learns he's more than a pet ... with knowledge of Faery that helps save her behind.  The beast gives a great example on how to handle a secondary character who makes a major contribution to solving the plot's major puzzle.

A romance?.  Not really.  Urban fantasy is how it's labeled, but it's a dark one.  The love interest disappears in a fit of rejection. Fortunately, I think the book's a trilogy.  At least, there's a second book.  Guess I should read Pang's blog more carefully ... besides checking out the pictures of hunky men. 

Web Promotion and Other Stuff:

Stumbling over query writing?  Jessica Faust at Bookends is running a query critique on Wednesdays.  Granted it only  one agent's opinion, but you might also take a look at Query Shark.  Between the two, you might find a way to improve your query efforts.  I've been printing them off to study, but it's too soon to know the results.  I haven't sent out a new query -- to agent or publisher -- in ages.

[These sharing agents should be at the top of your blog reading list.  I only wish they represented the stuff I write.]

Maybe this should be under "progress" but I finally got around to cleaning up the 1st Turning Point marketing blogs hanging in my email.  Here are a few ideas I thought especially useful.

1)  Hank Quense ran a series at the beginning of the year on making your book stand out in the marketplace.  Can anyone say Amazon or Barnes and Noble here?  This is the third article, but there are links to the first two.

2)  Misty Evans gives some great tips on marketing your series ... and maybe gives you reasons why you should write a series.  There have been a lot of comments in the stuff I read that you'll sell more if you offer more than one book.  Guess once you've made one sale and they like it, the buyer will come back for more without another hard sell.

3)  John Klawitter writes about your book blurbs:  "Blurb Right or Die".  Hey, you wrote the book -- you have to market it even if you have a traditional publisher -- so write a good blurb.  Again more and more traditional publishers are making the writer to more and more of the marketing.

Progress:

Got a short, short story off to my critique group.  It borders on science fiction ... or at least uses SF parlance to explain the linch-pin situation.  Need to make sure I sure the vocabulary right.  Fortunately, one of critiquers is a scientist.

"Devil in the Details" started out as a flash fiction piece.  It made the first cut in a couple publications but didn't sell.  Thanks to an idea in a blog I read, I came up with an added danger and 500 words.  --  Next week I'll learn if I improved the story.

Bascially, I'm in revision mode.  Back to Emma ... plus I have Kaffy Anne waiting in the wings.  Then, I need to decide what to do with Britt.  I still have some agents I could send queries to.  Unfortunately the book straddles the line between YA and Tween.  Maybe I'll just try submitting it to publishers.  I'm very good at indecisive procrastination.

Trivia:

It weird watching a family squabble over an estate when they were left out of the will...