Announcement!

Well, I've been wanting to say these words for some time now: I HAVE AN AGENT!

And all last week, I've been absolutely desperate to add: AND IT'S JESSICA SINSHEIMER!!!!!!!!!

Time for the dance of joy!

This is how she makes me feel. 

When I began thinking about how I wanted to tell our agent story, I immediately got a little panicky.  We do not have a traditional courtship to share, and I didn't want Jessica to get flooded with unconventional emails and the like, so I asked her if she didn't mind if I shared exactly how we got together.

She, being the wonderful and awesome human she is, said of course.

Ok, how'd I find Jessica?  A contest.  Specifically, Cupid's Agent Invasion (AWESOME blog with AWESOME contests, btw.  www.cupidslitconnection.blogspot.com).  But that's not the unconventional part.

How'd I get her interest?  Tweeting about a WIP I hadn't even started.

Oh snap, you guys are thinking, that is really not smart of you, sword-bride-girl.

Oh, I know, I know.

Anyway, it went a little something like this.  Jessica had tweeted that once an agent and author corresponded enough, you may want to start talking about WIPs.  She had asked for my manuscript a month prior, and I tweeted back a little bit about my next project.

Jessica's a foodie-- I knew this.  I thought the tweet would make her smile and maybe she'd remember it.  I said, "My WIP is about a time-travelling food critic."

I expected a smiley-face at best.

I got a "tell me more".

Oh dear.  I hadn't started GASTROPHYSICS yet. I had an outline and a query.  Ok, ok, I'm a nerd who writes queries ahead of time. Sue me.

Anyway, I sent her the details (she knew I had zero word count) and she said she squealed out loud in her office when she read it.  Then five minutes later she clarified the squeal and bounce was a good thing and that her intern may be terrified of her.

So we begin corresponding about this WIP.  Then I wrote a little. 

THEN SHE ASKED TO READ THE LITTLE TINY SAMPLE.

Oh no you didn't! is what you're thinking, isn't it.  Why on earth would you share a rough, unfinished first draft, unbeta-ed, with your dream agent?!  ARE YOU CRAZY?!

She was very persuasive.  I sent it. She asked for more.  I wrote more.  This little dance continued and one day that email about "when's a good time to talk" showed up in my inbox and...

... The rest is history. 

Needless to say, I'm thrilled and truthfully a little smitten.  We've talked on the phone a few times and she makes me positively giddy. We're in sync in so many ways, it's actually baffling to me how I could find someone so perfect to represent me.  Plus, Sarah Jane Freymann Literary Agency is so amazing and prestigious!  Wow!

Ok, so there it is.  I have been smiling for a week straight thanks to this funny, professional, smart and charming agent.  My agent.  :D

Writer Interview: Meghan Drummond

Ok, so dream theories, the Trojan war, teen ghost hunters and manuscripts under your mattress?  All in a day’s work for today’s writer interview with Meghan Drummond.  Come get to know this up and coming talent!

 

AG: Tell us about your current project.

MD: I’m currently working on two. One is in the querying stage, and the other is almost complete. The one I’m querying for is about a sixteen year old who turned to paranormal investigations after the death of her younger brother. Actually finding a ghost turns out to be more trouble than she expected, especially when it follows her from the haunted house she was investigating to her New England boarding school.

The work that is still in progress is almost finished, that one I’ve been laboring over for close to six months. It’s a retelling of the Trojan war, but with a young adult paranormal twist. I don’t want to give too much away, but I did get to spend a lot of time researching the nature of dreams for it. Which was so much fun. Everyone should spend an hour reading about dream theories before going to bed, you’ll have the craziest dreams ever.

AG: Is it your first book?

MD: Nope! I’d always heard you needed at least one under the mattress. I have three. Mattress novels are really useful for a few reasons. There was one character that I absolutely loved from a mattress novel, but as I reread I realized I had created a novel that was all character and no plot. Now that character is a side character in the book I’m querying for. It’s great to have over a hundred pages of backstory for one side character. And I still read my mattress novels whenever I think my writing hasn’t improved.

AG:  How did you tackle the revision process before you queried? Did you use CP’s?

MD: I took a month off right after I finished. I was too in love with my own work to see it clearly, let alone revise it. I needed that month of believing it was perfect. Then I re-read it. And cringed. It was so far from perfect! I started sending it off to a few friends who wrote, begging them for honest feedback, and I got it. Finally, I knocked out the dents and added some shine, then I started querying. Finally an agent told me that my MC was too old for Young Adult, and I needed to change EVERYTHING. It was hard to hear, but I looked around and they were right. I changed a ton of details, rewrote the character and created a timeline for all of their new birthdays and important life events that reflected the three year backwards jump. I just finished that process and have started querying again. It took me a month to write my first manuscript. It’s taken me close to a year and a half to get it revised. I understand that after I get an agent, there will probably be even more revisions.

AG: What was the querying process like for you? Any tips?

MD: At first, I just kinda flailed my arms at the query process, and failed hard. I don’t recommend that. This time I’ve been a lot more organized.I started following a lot of agents on twitter, and made an excel spreadsheet with all of my ‘dream’ agents, complete with the agencies they worked for, and what they needed in a submission packet. I’ve been querying one or two at a time, and just slowly making my way down the list. I think a list is really important. Before I was wasting a lot of time querying multiple agents from the same agency, or querying people based on order in the alphabet on querytracker, or because they looked like they had kind eyes in the picture on their agency website.



AG: Do you blog? Where can we find you on Twitter and the internet?

MD:  I love twitter, and can be found @meghdrummond. I don’t blog much, just because my writing time is precious and usually gets dedicated to works in progress. You can find my blog at Snarkyforhire.blogspot.com.

AG:  What online resources have you used to help your writing and querying and revision process?

MD: Agents blogs are wonderful, and can be an unexpected source of revelation when you can’t figure out why your query got rejected. I love scribophile, and think that the community there is a great one if you need some help with revisions; they have provided some of the most honest feedback I have ever received.I actually pretty soundly got my butt kicked by some of the folks on Scribophile, and thanked them for my asskicking whole-heartedly. Recently I found the Teen Eyes website, which provides a lot of great services for writers.

AG: Any extra info you’d like to add or discuss?

MD:A while back a close friend told me something that really made writing less frustrating for me, and I think it was good advice. Publishing is the goal, but writing is the dream. Don’t lose sight of the goal, and work toward it, but don’t forget you’re already living the dream.

 

Ok, that’s my new favorite quote, Meghan.  Thanks for sharing!  Everyone, go follow Meghan and her snarkiness!

#GUTGAA retraction

I am withdrawing my query from #GUTGAA.  For good reasons.  Best of luck, everyone!

Guest Post: She-Wulf author Sheryl Steines

Please enjoy this guest post by Sheryl Steines, author of the action-packed urban fantasy, She Wulf. Then read on to learn how you can win huge prizes as part of this blog tour, including a Kindle Fire, $550 in Amazon gift cards, 5 autographed copies of She Wulf, and 5 copies of its companion, The Day of First Sun.

If you could go anywhere, meet any person, in any period of time, where would you go, what would you do, who would you meet?  I know this is all hypothetical, but hey, I write in the pretend–in the fantasy.  So suspend your disbelief,  and come play with me for a moment.

Not such an easy question to answer, is it?  One option would be to go and meet someone long dead–perhaps Elvis circa 1959 makes your heart swoon.  Would you take the opportunity to meet a favorite entertainer, or maybe you want your trip to count for something meaningful?  But what if you made a change, saved a life, corrected a wrong, how would your alterations affect the future?  An interesting notion, don’t you think?

As I wrote She Wulf, my time travel adventure, I developed the idea of changing the past and how that might lead to the future you are trying to change.  Maybe our interference might just be a self-fulfilling prophecy.  That’s when The Terminator movie struck me as so relevant and important in how I shaped my ideas of time travel.

For those who don’t know, The Terminator is a science fiction adventure where machines take over the world.  The machines are human like cyborgs, ruled by an artificial intelligence program called Skynet, whose sole mission is to annihilate humanity.  In opposition, the resistance was created by John Connor and they are winning the war.  In an effort to prevent the resistance from being founded, the cyborgs send back one of their own, to murder John’s mother Sarah, before he’s born.  To protect her and ensure he is even conceived, he sends back one of his soldiers (his father), to protect her.  Got all that.  So finally to my point, and I realize this all imaginary and takes place on celluloid but really, had the cyborgs never sent back the terminator, John Connor never would have sent back his father and he wouldn’t have been born.  But what can you expect from a bunch of cyborgs anyway?

For me, in She Wulf, you couldn’t just decide one day to go to the past unless you found yourself there when the past was actually the present.  Huh?  Picture it this way.  It’s 2012 and you want to go to the past, let’s say to the year 1900.  You can’t go unless during the year 1900, you actually showed up.  I know, it’s all theory, but that’s how it happened when Annie Pearce finds herself falling through a time portal, back to eleventh century England.  She understands the concept of time travel, of altering the past and how it can affect the future which makes her reluctant to get involved.  But she realizes that she had already been there, in the year 1075, had already altered time and whatever she touched or changed or created, was meant to be touched, changed or created.

So still think time travel is cool?  I know sometimes we’d like a do-over, the ability to change a decision, to not have to live through pain and despair.  But sometimes, these things make us who we are.  Each experience shapes us, each tear, each laugh, adds to our self.  We gain something.  All those things that I’ve experienced, including the loss of a child, made me who I am.  Without that, could I have written She Wulf?

So time travel–can you see it?  What if it was real and I could look at it from a purely joyful perspective, without those darned consequences hanging over my head.  Maybe an afternoon with Elvis would be fun.

As part of this special promotional extravaganza sponsored by Novel Publicity, the price of the She Wulf eBook edition is just 99 cents this week–and so is the price of its companion, The Day of First Sun. What’s more, by purchasing either of these fantastic books at an incredibly low price, you can enter to win many awesome prizes. The prizes include a Kindle Fire, $550 in Amazon gift cards, and 5 autographed copies of the book.

All the info you need to win one of these amazing prizes is RIGHT HERE. Remember, winning is as easy as clicking a button or leaving a blog comment–easy to enter; easy to win!

To win the prizes:

1. Purchase your copy of She Wulf for just 99 cents
2. Purchase your copy of Day of First Sun for just 99 cents
3. Enter the Rafflecopter contest on Novel Publicity
4. Visit today’s featured social media event

About She Wulf:  Annie is sent through an ancient time portal with only a prophecy to guide her; she struggles with a new destiny as she tries to figure out a way to destroy an un-killable demon and return home.  Get it on Amazon.

About The Day of First Sun:  A vampire, a rogue wizard and an army of soulless zombies are par for the course for Annie Pearce and Bobby “Cham” Chamsky of the Wizard’s Guard. But when the non-magical princess, Amelie of Amborix, is murdered by magical means, a deeper plot unfolds. Get it on Amazon.

About the author: Behind the wheel of her ’66 Mustang Convertible, Sheryl is a constant surprise, using her sense of humor and relatable style make her books something everyone can enjoy. Visit Sheryl on her website, Twitter, Facebook, or GoodReads.

Writer Interview: Dahlia Adler

Ok, guys, here's a writer you should all get to know.  Dahlia has a really interesting story about finding her agent-- it was 100% through a contest, and she hadn't queried it at all!  Still, she's been in the trenches and has great advice.  Plus, her book is out on submission-- cue the squees!  :)

 

AG: Tell us about your current project.

DA: The project I currently have out on submission is called BEHIND THE SCENES, and it’s about a girl who takes a job as her TV-star best friend’s assistant to make money for college and ends up falling for her friend’s co-star. There’s drama, of course, and lots and lots of kissing.

AG: Is it your first book?

DA: No, prior to BTS I wrote another standalone contemporary YA set in a New Hampshire boarding school, and prior to that I wrote a “New Adult” series that was just for fun. I queried the first one in the series a few years ago, learned very quickly not to bother trying to get an agent with it (although it was a strangely positive querying experience), but kept writing it anyway for another year or two.

AG: How did you tackle the revision process before you queried? Did you use CP’s?

DA: I used two betas before querying, one with whom I exchange everything and one who doesn’t write and has never read anything of mine before. The latter gave me some seriously scathing notes, and I’m glad she did because I think the manuscript is far better for it. My revisions ended up being quite extensive as a result, and by the time I had a finished product, it was 10K longer than when I’d sent it out.

AG: What was the querying process like for you? Any tips?

DA: I actually didn’t have a real querying process for this one because I didn’t query it prior to submitting it in the Writer’s Voice contest. I did query a few agents during and right after the contest - ones I had queried with my last manuscript and with whom I’d had very positive experiences - but I don’t think they numbered more than five. As far as tips go, I’d say:
1) Be on top of contests and enter any and all of them you possibly can. They’re a fantastic way to get access to agents and to meet people.
2) Keep track of who requested a full from you, even if they ultimately rejected it, because if you end up querying them with a new project, you’ll want to mention it.
3) Don’t send queries in massive batches, because if at some point you realize you want to overhaul your query (which I did with my last ms), you’re not going to have a very deep pool of agents left to wade into with the revision.

AG: Tell us how you ended up with your agent.

DA: You can read the longer version of the story on both my blog and CupidsLC’s, but the very short story is that she (aka Andrea Somberg of Harvey Klinger, Inc.) “voted” for BEHIND THE SCENES in The Writer’s Voice contest, I sent the partial as a result, she requested the full shortly after, and the rest is history.

AG: What is that relationship like? What is doing agent revisions like?

DA: Andrea is very professional, very quick, and very knowledgeable. I have the utmost faith in her choices, which is really nice for me to be able to say because I work in publishing and I’ve seen how this works from the other side. We do not have a “let’s talk about everything every day!” relationship, but again, the fact that I trust her completely to do the best she can by my book renders that totally unnecessary for me.

I can’t really speak to agent revisions because Andrea had exactly one minor scene she wanted me to fix. I did it, she liked it, and the whole process took about fifteen minutes.

AG: Tell us about the editor submission process from your experience.

DA: My experience is not very extensive; it’s only my third week on submission! It’s kind of like querying in the “cannot peel my eyes away from my inbox” sort of way, but there’s something calming in the fact that there’s someone in the middle to break the news to you, and that someone has as much invested in this working out as you do. It’s strangely nice to know you’ll be sharing both the highs and lows of the process with someone like that.

AG: Do you blog? Where can we find you on Twitter and the internet?

DA: I do! Not as often as I’d like, because when I do have time to write, I prefer to work on one of my WIPs rather than on blog posts. I have a (work-in-progress!) website at www.dahliaadler.com, which links to my blog, dailydahlia.wordpress.com. (Or you can go directly, of course.) I’m also on Twitter as @missdahlelama.

AG: What online resources have you used to help your writing and querying and revision process?

DA: I’m not a diehard devotee of any of the writers’ forums (fora?), but when I want the brutal truth about one of my queries, it’s Absolute Write all the way. I also did NaNoWriMo for my first time this past November, and the result was - ta da! - BEHIND THE SCENES. It’s one of those things I think every writer should attempt at least once, because I think it teaches invaluable lessons about discipline. I don’t know if I’ll do it again, but I am so, so glad I did it the first time.



What’s really helped me are the not-so-obvious resources out there - Twitter, for following agents, editors, and fellow writers, which in turn has built relationships, taught me some great tips, and made me aware of what people are looking for; Evernote, for jotting down notes on my phone at the most random times and places; and oh, have I mentioned contests?

And for the love of God, don’t give up. Enlist help, write something new, but whatever you do, if you love it, don’t ever stop.

 

Great advice, and BEHIND THE SCENES sounds really fantastic!  Hope you get that exciting email or call soon.  If you do-- TELL US!  :)

Writer Interview: Jamie Krakover

I’m a sci-fi fan to the nth degree, so the stuff Jamie Krakover writes should be right up my alley, and hopefully yours too! Check out this interview!

 

AG: Tell us about your current project.

JK: I’m currently juggling two projects. The first, which is in various stages of editing, is a MG sci fi about a boy that is abducted by aliens. He’s given an ability that he didn’t ask for and it comes with a price. The second which I’m currently writing is a YA sci fi, but I’m not quite ready to tell the world what it’s about yet.

AG: Is it your first book?

JK: Neither is my first book.

AG: How did you tackle the revision process before you queried? Did you use CP’s?

JK: I have various stages of revision that I run through. I self edit, then run it by my CP for a sanity check to make sure what I wrote makes sense to someone else. After I fill in the gaps, I run an abused words check where I eliminate as many to be verbs and overused words as possible (I have a list I cross reference, and the ‘find’ tool in word is a big help). Then I submit it to my YA/MG critique group for more feedback.

AG: What was the querying process like for you? Any tips?

JK: I haven’t submitted a formal query yet, but I’ve done a lot of research on it. There’s a lot of great info online about how to write a good query, as well as numerous examples of successful queries.

AG: Do you blog? Where can we find you on Twitter and the internet?

JK: Yes I have a blog. I talk about everything from writing, to YA books to TV and movies. You can find me at http://www.jamiekrakover.blogspot.com. I also use twitter and you can follow me @Spacecadet570.

AG: What online resources have you used to help your writing and querying and revision process?

JK: Google is my best friend. There’s a wealth of great free information out there about writing do’s and dont’s, querying and editing. There’s also some great reasonably priced online classes you can take about all stages of the writing process.

Another huge resource is twitter. If you follow writers, agents and editors on twitter you will see a ton of great advice and blog posts. All the advice there I’ve found to be invaluable. I’ve learned a ton about writing, querying, and publishing just by following people who know the craft.

AG: Any extra info you’d like to add or discuss?

JK: I know every writer hits that point where they doubt their work and don’t think they can continue. I’ve definitely been there many times, but that’s actually a healthy response. You can’t love your work 100% of the time otherwise you will never strive to improve it. But it’s important to remember that when you hit that wall, you aren’t alone and the writing community is a great resource. Go out there and do what you have to move forward in your writing career. Never give up, because every writer, and author has been there at some point. Look to see if you have a local writer’s guild or local chapters of some of the larger writing organizations. The information and support systems I’ve found there have been immensely helpful. And if you ever need a pick me up or some motivation, send me a tweet or a note on my blog and I’ll happily be there with a virtual hug :)

 

Thanks so much for your tips, Jamie!  Best of luck!  Go check her out, friends!