Friday Obsessions: Imogen Heap, Pinterest, and Spiderman Trailer

Well, friends, it's been a tough week in the querying trenches. (Which, as my CPs know, is a serious understatement.) So, I'm just gonna pretend the trenches don't exist. Manuscript? What manuscript?

Please join me in going to my happy place, as I bring you....

Everything I was obsessed with this week.
Because I know you want to know.


1. Imogen Heap's "Hide and Seek"
So, someone suggested this song as a calming thing for me last week. If you just sit back, crank it up, and let the sounds wash over you, it's perfect for calm. But the lyrics are quite sad.
I realized that it fits perfectly with a certain sequence of scenes in the WiP, and so I've begun to associate it with that mood - that of a tragic inevitability. Awesome.



2. Pinterest
Not so much an obsession as a happy discovery at the outset of this WiP. When I write, I'm really inspired by visuals, and so Pinterest is AMAZING - You can pin All The Pretty Things up on one board! That you can access anywhere! It basically lets me paint the scenes of my WiP for reference any time, anywhere, and has already been invaluable.

(Check out my board for Chrome. Awesome.)

3. The Spiderman Trailer
I'm just psyched for this movie summer in general, but oh man oh man. Spiderman. The wit! The drama! ANDREW FREAKING GARFIELD. Ahem.

Just watch it. (Sorry. I can't find one without an annoying ad before it.)



Annnnnnd the WiP. I haven't done very much good work on it, so you know what that means. I need some tough love. If you can find it in your heart, leave some in the comments. Thanks. <3

(Meet Sarra. She's one of the Iver - the slave class that lives underground.)

“Nedda,” Sarra breathed, “Thank you.”

Nedda smiled wearily, and led her in to the tiny room, that held twenty small girls. They huddled around bowls that fit in the palms of their hands, focused on getting every last morsel into their mouths. One of the littlest ones, Brona, who must have been about four years old now, squealed, jumped up, and threw her arms around Sarra’s waist. Nedda caught her by the arm, leaned down. “Shah, Bron. We don’t want anyone to hear.”

The girl looked down, blinking back tears. Sarra crouched down to her eye level, feeling soft and full of love for the first time in days. Weeks, maybe. She kissed each of Brona’s cheeks and hugged her tight. The girl’s body relaxed against her, then clung to her as she slung her arms around Sarra’s neck.

Sarra couldn’t deny the rush of pleasure the girl’s excitement to see her brought. The poor sweetheart had lived her entire life in the cold, cramped quarters, and if she could still find warmth in her heart, Sarra wasn't about to deny her that. She’d never shush one of the little ones for showing love. 
Sometimes, she thought that love for each other was all the Iver had left. Especially these girls, who held the Ivers’ future in their hands, though their existence was a crime.

What Tugs You Down the Writing Path?

Let's take a moment to put it all on the table.
We're so busy. So, so busy.
We all have so much stuff every day that we have to do besides writing.
It's insane that we're writing at all, really.

Here's my stuff:
Three preschoolers to take to and pick up from school, feed, clean, clothe, etc. Every day.
A house to keep non-condemnable. (Low standards!)
A husband to look at and speak to once in awhile.
30-35 hour a week day job.
Extended family visiting 1/2 of weekends.
Theoretically, working out. (I'm hosting a fetus right now so I give myself a break till May.)
I should sleep? Probably?

Now. I'm grateful for these things. These things make up my life, one that I consider myself very lucky to lead. There could be a lot of extra, not-so-positive things thrown in the mix that I'm SO GRATEFUL are not there.

There's just one thing I know about all this. I have to fit writing in somewhere. HAVE TO.
For one simple reason - I'm a miserable beast when I don't.
(I've learned this through trial and error, and it's not pretty.)

But, especially for the unagented, it's really, crazily difficult to fit writing in. Where's our motivation? What are we really doing here, anyway? No one even wants to buy our stuff! (So it seems.) 

It's so ridiculous to spend our valuable time and energy writing something that'll never go anywhere, right? It's just a big old waste.

What business do we have tossing hot dogs and apple slices in our kids' general direction while staring at the laptop perched on the kitchen island, or depriving ourselves of sleep just to get an extra 200 words in? Who do we think we are, spending way too much money on a babysitter for two hours just to sneak in a bit more brainstorming? Or ignoring our classwork, or secretly rejoicing when our husbands announce they'll be on a boys' night out again?

Well. None, really. But if you're anything like me, you know you'll be miserable if you don't.

So, what pulls you down the path to get started? To keep going, till you've hit 75000 words (or whatever,) then to painstakingly edit, then to go through rounds and rounds of CPs/revisions/edits, then to cry over queries and synopses and rejections?

Well, for me, it's tough love, made up of equal doses of bullying and guilt, with a little flattery on the side.
Like this:
 "Stop whining and JUST WRITE."
"Here, let me spend valuable time brainstorming with you about plot/themes/worldbuilding. NOW WRITE." "You'd better write this story, because it's going to be AMAZING."

So I do.
I "just write" a kissing scene between two characters that kicks off a whole element of the story I hadn't anticipated.
I force my brain to navigate a tough bit of worldbuilding with Chessie's help, and when it's finally there staring at me, my mind is blown with how awesome and exciting it'll be to write.
I take a minute to think about my main character's arc and want to cry a little bit with how difficult things are going to be for her. I fall in love with her.

Then I realize - after just a little bit of work, NO ONE is going to be able to write this story like I can. My characters and the world are speaking to me, and now they're on the "Just Write the Darn Story" team.
And if I don't write it, no one else will ever hear them.

Then I start thinking about my CPs, and I get really grateful that they threw crackers at their kids or ignored their husbands or didn't prep for midterms or lost sleep or made their fingers ache typing that whole chapter on an iPhone during carpool. Otherwise I never would have met Kelsey and David, Emma and Alex, Amity, Damien, Rory, and Viv, Tam and Izuko (oh, Izuko,) Avery, Jack, and Stellan, Alex and Miles, Maggie and Tommy, Grey and Xan and Edward and Nathan. I would have never had their stories tug at my heartstrings and change me just a little bit forever. When I think about how those stories will be published and other people will get to know them too, I'm really, really, REALLY glad those authors kept going. Otherwise, their stories would be stuck in their heads forever, without anyone else to ever love them.


Now, that would be a waste.

Contested

The internet is an amazing place for writers.
It's where we can find incredible critique partners, more writing forums than we have time for, the best agent-finding resources, and a ton of information on improving our craft. Heck, it's basically a DIY MFA playground, if you're willing to use it.

And then, there are the contests.

Every once in awhile, some kind-hearted, self-sacrificing individual will step up and run a contest on her blog. Writing is posted for critique and, if we're very lucky, agents flock to fight over the chance to review that work more in depth, in a (mostly) civilized and (entirely) exciting manner.

(ONE is playing in one such contest, the brand-new Cupid's Literary Connection, today. I'm so excited.)

Here are the reasons that I think contests can be a great opportunity for the querying writer.

1. It elevates my work above the slushpile.
Even if there are fifty or even one hundred entries on display for agents' perusal, that still amounts to two, ten, or a dozen agents looking at one hundred queries as opposed to one lone, hard-working, exhausted agent wading through slush to hopefully pull my manuscript out.

Plus, whether or not the contest is selective (meaning: the person running the contest somehow narrows entries down to what she has determined to be the "best" ones) the dirtiest of the slush has already been cast aside. No crazy queries, no YouTube videos of shirtless men. So when the agent gets to my query, hopefully she's not so slush-weary that she can't read it with a happy heart.

2. I've had success with contests.
Well, what I'm calling "success," anyway. Three of the full requests on my last manuscript were the result of one blog contest or another. Even though I drawered that manuscript, I did get a sense of which agents I would LOVE to query in the future, and their feedback was, in some cases, invaluable.

3. It helps me get to know agents in what I call a "soft query" environment. 
Agent Fabulous might say that she wants Young Adult Romance, for example, and then completely ignore every entry that seems to be a solid one of those. If I'm querying a Young Adult romance, I can then take that information and decide whether it's worth querying that agent. Or, more optimistically, I can see what about YA romances that agent loves, and highlight those aspects of my MS in the query I'll send to her later.

In past contests, even when I haven't gotten a request out of it, I have had agents point out their concerns about or approval of my query and first page, which let me either tweak it or leave it alone, and go forth formally querying with confidence.

4. Contests are how I found a bunch of my CPs.
Checking out the work of my fellow entrants gives me a chance to see whose work I'm absolutely head-over-heels in love with/excited about, which I think is essential to a great CP relationship.

5. I'm really not afraid of anyone stealing my work, or ideas, or whatever.
If anyone can take my query and first pages and use the ideas and voice in there to fully reconstruct my 76,000 word manuscript, I'll probably hand them a cookie and congratulate them. Not only would that be crazy freakish, but it would also free up a lot of my time and stress.

But seriously. I can give a crowd of twenty writers the idea of "half-superpowered teens" and they will write 20 completely different novels. Which would actually be kind of awesome.

Bottom line: It's ridiculously difficult to get an agent as it is. Anything that helps improve my chances can't hurt that badly, and the cheerleading and community-building possibilities are some seriously thick icing on the cake.

***********

Now. Just like anything else, contests *do* have cons. Just some things to consider before you let my above points get you all gung-ho excited for the next contest.

***********

1. Anonymity is tough to preserve
These contests are supposed to remain anonymous, so that they don't become a popularity contest. Obviously, though, the internet is one big web of hyperlinks, and it's pretty easy to connect most of the projects on display to an individual if you really want to. I try to stay anonymous, just because I think it's way classier, but I'm not sacrificing the information I have posted about my MS on my blog or any tweets about it for the sake of staying under the radar while I'm contesting for two weeks.


2. It's tough to keep up self-confidence while watching your work be rejected in real time. 
The point of every contest is for an agent or agents to pick their favorite entries. Sometimes, this occurs in real time, meaning that during a given period of one or several days, agents can leave comments saying, "not for me," "yes, this is good," or "YES PLEASE PUT IT IN MY INBOX NOW." It can be nervewracking and insane, but the worst is when every other entry seems to be getting comments but yours. Yes, it happens. No, it doesn't mean your MS sucks - it just means it doesn't appeal to those agents. But, again - it takes a darn chipper and mature person to remember that. (Spoiler - I'm not always that chipper or mature. I know, you're shocked.)

3. Feedback is not always positive.
One of the stated purposes for all these contests is to receive feedback from peers, but I've never really bought it. Mostly because one of the rules is usually "only submit completed and ready-to-query manuscripts." Now, I don't know about everyone else? But to me, "completed and ready-to-query" means that the MS has run the gauntlet of multiple critiques, revisions, and line edits. Not to mention much agonizing. Usually I'll contest an MS while I'm also querying it.
Now. If I'm confident enough in the MS to query the darn thing, I'm pretty much only looking for cheerleading from my peers, and maybe some gentle suggestions for minor improvement. But every once in awhile, some uppity writer will roll in and leave PARAGRAPHS of feedback, often quite critical, on everything everyone is doing wrong with their entry. This can be annoying at best and crushing at worst. Most of the time I can ignore these jerks, but if you're ultra-sensitive about the soundness of your submission, this might be a big deal.
Note: Some contests are SOLELY for the purpose of feedback, and don't involve agents, in which case the above obviously doesn't apply.


Just some things to remember about contesting:

• It can be a great opportunity to shove your work directly in front of agents.
• It can be an awesome community-builder and confidence booster.
• Subjectivity is a b*tch. Let this be your contesting mantra. Not everyone loves everything. It's okay.
• It only takes one agent to love your work and get you a book deal. There's always another contest or another query. If this contest doesn't work out, don't let it ruin future contests for you.

What about you, sweet readers? Have you participated in blogged writing contests? Do you plan to in the future? Why or why not?

Friday Obsessions: Rainbow Sponge Lady, Bourekas, and NEW WORDS

Okay, everyone. I've learned my lesson: I should never, ever, EVER stop writing. This week: the story of how I got started again. (It's short, I promise.)


But first (and segueing into the story!) 
Everything I was obsessed with this week. 
Because I know you want to know.


1. The Rainbow Sponge Lady.
If you're having kind of a rough morning, just....watch. Just watch her. Trust me.




2. Bourekas.
Here's another "the last thing I want to do is cook because CAN'T YOU SEE I'M WRITING" recipe. Get yourself some frozen puff pastry dough. Unroll it. Cut it into squares with a pizza cutter. Mix up some shredded cheese, egg, and garlic. Plop it in the middle, fold it over, and bake them at 350 for 25 minutes. Eat one and freeze the rest. When your husband/kids/roommate goes looking for food, tell them to get their noses the hell out of your monitor and microwave themselves some of these. You're DONE.


3. The New Chrome Playlist.
So, here's where the story starts. You guys gave me some amazing advice about getting out of my between-projects slump on Wednesday. The words that most resonated with me were, "Just Do It."
My CP Chessie has some sort of sixth sense about my writing self, and so she sent me an email pep-talking me. When that didn't work, she pulled out the tough love in a comment on that post pushing me to write. But the final push off the cliff was when she actually spent time MAKING A PLAYLIST FOR Chrome. This involved not only her valuable music-combining skills, but also an informal questionnaire about the book's mood and also READING THE BIBLE. And, if the playlist in itself wasn't amazing, the guilt alone would have pushed me to write.
Luckily, the playlist Chessie made is spot-on perfect and totally kicks butt. Embedded below -the first seven songs are ones she pulled.

Aaaaaaand last but not least. A little snip of the first thousand words I wrote for Chrome. Meet Havah and Jarrod. Havah's a princess and Jarrod's a douchebag.


Havah drew back, stood tall, and cleared her throat. “My guards will be looking for me.”

“Let them search," he said. "Give those stupid blue lights something to do besides menace all the boys out there trying to touch you.”

Havah ducked under Jarrod’s arm again, and reached for the door, wrapping her fingers around the handle one by one. His hand covered hers, and an unsettling wave of warmth moved through her. She looked him straight in the eye, knowing the chill their icy blue brought to her body would steady her.

“There are others who would have me, Jarrod.” But no others I want. She blinked back tears.

“Havah, my own. Please.”

“I am no one’s own.” She spoke loud and clear now. “And you are boring me.”

The Between-Projects Slump.

I've written about the inital-query freefall before. What happens when you've been querying for nine days, and the form rejections start to roll in? Well, at least for me, my self confidence does this:



Yep. BIG nosedive. 

I thought my MS was good.
My CPs thought it was good (didn't they?)

But agents don't want it.

What was I thinking?
How could I have thought this MS would EVER work?
Will I ever be published?
Can I even call myself a writer anymore???

Yes, I am fully aware of how irrational this all is. Which is why I normally have a backup plan:


The Work In Progress.

Even though working on something new can't give an immediate rush to counter the initial crash of queries denied (and those awful red frowny faces Query Tracker gives you when you record them, what's UP with that?) a new project at least gives us a handlebar to clutch onto as our self confidence slowly inches back up.


You write some snappy dialogue - Wooo!
Anchored down some more plot points - You are a GENIUS.
That scenery description? - NAILED IT.
Wow, that kiss was incredible - *happy dance*




The rewards of working on that WiP are small, but they come at regular intervals.
Best of all, if it's a second, third, or tenth MS that you're working on, you've had the first draft high before. You can see the top of that goshdarn rollercoaster, and you know gazing out from the peak feels absolutely amazing. Your motivation to get there is HIGH.

This time around I know what the rollercoaster looks like. I have a super-shiny idea for my newest project, and I even know most of the plot points and a bit about the characters.

So, what's the problem?

For some reason, I can't make myself get in the seat. Can't write a word.

Anyone ever been in this position? How did you kick yourself in the bottom to tackle that blinking cursor?
My CPs are telling me to write something fun. (In case you need a translation, that means "a kissing scene.")
That sounds mildly appealing...I guess. *sigh*

HELP!!!!

How I Query

So....ONE has been querying for a week! Yaaaay!

Just wanted to do a little post on how I query, since I know a good portion of my critique team thinks it's crazy. This is mostly an attempt to convince them - and myself - that it actually makes sense. In some universe.

So, before I do this, I'm just going to make the blanket statement that this is MY querying practice, because I think it's the right way FOR ME to query AT THIS TIME in my career. If you do something different, and you like it, and you're happy, well, that's all that matters, my love.

Now that that's out of the way.....here we go.

First of all, I work on my query until I'm sure it's good and clear and voicey and hook-y. I don't post it on forums, because I don't know the folks over there, and I don't have the emotional or physical energy to deal with people who tear things up just for the sake of tearing them up. I send it to some people I "know" or have "met" via Twitter, critique groups (CPs of CPs) and then my actual CPs for this. Just like when they're critiquing my novel, they're not afraid to tear it up, tell me something doesn't make sense, and I know it's all with the intention of making my novel succeed.

Second, I set up an initial list of agents I'd like to query - somewhere between 60 and 80. I spend a good week on Query Tracker, scoping out agents listed as representing YA, making sure that they'll look at Science Fiction, and noting what projects they've sold to see what kind of styles and voices they like. (I don't stress too much about the styles-and-voices thing, because I know that for an agent, it's all about finding a book she loves. How many of us have fallen in love with a book completely different from all the other ones we've ever loved?) I make notes about what materials they're asking for, so setting up queries later is easy-peasy. (Yes, obviously, this is not as easy as it seems. Hm.)

I query my Dream Agent first. This is for a few reasons.

• One, she's the agent I'm most nervous about querying, and so if I get over my terror of clicking "send" on her query, it's all downhill from there. I mean, sending every other query is relaxing in comparison to that experience.
• Two, if she sends me a form rejection, then I'm not stuck wondering "what if" for the rest of my queries. I know she doesn't want it, so I can set my sights on other agents and move on.
• Three, if she IS interested in the material, she gets first crack at it and I have no qualms about (please please pretty please) signing with her.

Then, I begin a series of what I like to call Query Flurries.

I send an initial query batch of 20-30 (I think this time, contests and web forms included, it was something like 26)

I like to throw in a couple of agents I'd LOVE to work with, some that I know are awesome but I have no special attachment to, and some that I haven't really heard of, but seem to have great clients and sales.

Now, I know you're saying, "Hold on. 20 agents is a whole heckuva lot at one time." 

But here's the thing. A good request rate - like, a really good one - is about 20%. So, let's say you and your query and your writing sample totally kick butt. You send out 20 queries, and get four requests. You are ON FIRE. If one of those agents reading your manuscript is totally in love, and wants to sign you, that means that you still have three others considering your work at the same time. This puts you at a great advantage.

(Personally, I'm not really believing that a 20% req rate is very possible these days. I'm thinking more like 10% would be admirable. But that's neither here nor there.)

After I send the first query flurry, I wait until I get a decent number of responses.

This past week, I got two requests and eight rejections.

So, today, I'll send out eight more queries, to make up for the eight rejections I got last week.

In this way, I always have about 25-30 queries out in the universe.

(I'll also be contesting my MS, which I consider a "soft query." It'll tell me which agents aren't interested, without me sending an actual formal query to them.)

"But, Leigh Ann," you might say. "How do you know that all those rejections aren't because your query SUCKS?"

Well, I don't. But I don't stress that much about it (unless I'm getting 100% rejections for awhile) for a few reasons:

•  First of all, I've done the research and worked really hard on my query, remember***? I've had a lot of feedback on it. I'm super-confident in its ability to do its job.
• Rejections come for lots of reasons other than a query sucking. It could be that the agent likes science fiction about cyborgs, but not superheroes. Rejection. It could be that the agent just signed a superhero novel, or for whatever other reason is not confident in her ability to sell it. It could be that the agent is really only looking for multi-ethnic fiction. It could be that she hates first person present, or she had a rough commute, or her kid is obsessed with X-men and she just can't bring herself to deal with anything else regarding superheroes. All reasons that might make me, personally, not want to read a book, let alone try to sell it. REJECTION.
• 
  
• Lastly, form rejections almost never come with any helpful feedback on the query itself. Agents don't have the time to tell you WHY SPECIFICALLY they don't think that they can sell your book. So, I could try to change the query purely based on the fact that I'm getting a lot of rejections, but without agent feedback, how do I know WHAT to change?

(***If you are worried about your query, GET MORE FEEDBACK. Run it by people who you know are supportive but haven't read your book and don't know you - i.e. don't really care about upsetting you that much. Make sure they're people who know what grammar looks like, and who understand query basics. Read QueryShark. Read From the Query to the Call. Do your homework.)

As I get more rejections, I send more queries.

Along the way, I might tinker with my first page or query to see if it gets more bites. But overall, again, I don't sweat it.

I do this until I run out of agents to query.

When I've run out of agents to query, I put the book in a drawer and gear up to query the next one....

And I'll blog about that on Wednesday.

If you feel comfortable sharing, my loves, what are your tried-and-true-and-loved querying practices? Have you changed anything since you first started querying? What are some resources you love?

Friday Obsessions - Names, Men with Swords, and Marshmallow Cereal

Well, friends? It's been a bang-up writing week over here.  The first official queries for ONE went out on Monday and I've been delighted to send out some requests by Friday. So, rule. I'm convinced this good fortune is due to your good vibes, so keep 'em coming.  (Thank you!) 

Up next week on the blog, I'm planning posts on how I query, since I know some of you think my method is insane, and also how to stay sane while querying.
(Not that I'm a paragon of success in that endeavor. But I try.)

Ahem.

Alright. Here we go.
Everything I was obsessed with this week.
Because I know you want to know.

1. Names
I've always been sort of obsessed with names. Their meanings, the stories behind them, etc. And being a Lady Who Knows Her Bible (part of the day job description, you see) I took great joy in naming my children in the same way the matriarchs did - with stories and deep, personal meanings behind them.  Now that the fetus has a name, I'm pretty much done with that bit of fun.

Luckily, I write. Making up new characters allows me to name things without going through labor or wiping any additional bottoms, which, now that I think of it, may be one of the top ten reasons I write. Huh.

The characters in my first two books were not named like that at ALL. I just...named them things I liked. For Nik, I wanted a girl with a boy's nickname, because...I liked it. I wanted Davis to have the kind of last name that could serve as the first. "Merrin," I just liked, and "Elias" just sounds sexy-but-geeky to me. (Did it work, CPs?) I named Leni after my grandmother, who is even more kickass in real life.

But CHROME, the alleged WiP, demands a bit more thought and care in this regard. Each of the names I use for this one has to pack a punch of meaning as well as have some seriously awesome linguistic roots. It took me for-freaking-ever to come up with Havah's name, and I'm still not sure I'm keeping it.

So...yeah. Obsessed with names these days.

2. Men with Swords

I've obsessed over Prince Charming from Once Upon a Time, and I promised myself I would shut up about this particular obsession, but I'll be darned if I haven't picked up two CPs this year who have Men with Swords in their manuscripts.

I'm reading one now. It's really distracting. You know, in the best way possible.

Marieke! Our man Nathan looks like this, right?


Or maybe this?


(ignore my girl Mia, she's just there as a prop in this case)

But preferably - HOPEFULLY - like this?  Yes??? Okay. Good.



3. Marshmallow Cereal
Some obsessions are just unhealthy and bad for you, and there's no way around it. I know I should be eating raisin bran or Greek yogurt or oatmeal. I know.

But I CANNOT STOP THINKING about marshmallow cereal. It's talking to me, you guys.
I might have eaten a (couple) bowls this week. Oops.

Let's blame it on Merrin. She loves junky food.




What about you, sweet readers? What were your obsessions this week?

Making Stupid Mistakes

Well, you guys?

This is my second tour through the query trenches. I know better than to make stupid mistakes.

(Here are some examples of stupid mistakes:

• Writing a bad query letter (one that doesn't talk about the book, disparages published books, etc.)
• Addressing your query to "Dear Sir or Madam"
• Sending a query to an editor
• Sending an attachment with a query
• Not following submission guidelines)

So, when I sent out my first batch of queries Monday, you'd think I wouldn't make any of those mistakes, right?


Yeah. You'd think.




Here's the story in all its brief, harrowing detail:

I've been watching my query inbox just in case I get a request, so I can send it out quickly.
I ran over to the agency website for one of the queries I'd sent and been on especial watch for a response to, to see if I should even EXPECT a reply. (Some agencies are "no reply means no," so this would be normal.)

While on the site's submission page, I skimmed over the part that said I should send a query letter, first chapter, and synopsis.

Right, okay.

Wait. WHAT? Because I know - I KNOW - I only sent a query letter and synopsis.
Knew it down to my bones. Knew it without even having to scramble through my "sent" box to desperately re-check.



How did I know that, so clearly and certainly?

 Because. The one and only query I messed up?

WAS THE ONE I SENT TO DREAM AGENT.




I drafted that query for A WEEK. (I personalized it because she read a full of my last MS.)
 I knew (thought I knew) her sub guidelines inside and out.
I wrote a synopsis JUST FOR HER. (A lot of agencies don't require one.)


I know my chances of getting a request from her were low anyway, just like with any other agent.
I know, from reading some of her stats, that she only requests 1-2% in the first place.
I'm sure my query would have fallen in the 98%, so it's no big difference - or loss, I guess - if she decides to just chuck it outright.
I know that, at this point, getting a rejection from her would be her doing something REALLY nice.



I'm not going to blog about how things happen for a reason, or how everything works out for the best.

(Incidentally, I don't believe that everything happens for a reason, or that everything works out for the best.)

I have nobody to blame for a stupid mistake but myself.
And this one? Was pretty epically stupid.

Hold me.

Please regale me with stories of stupid querying mistakes (or really any stupid mistakes in general) you've made, so I don't feel like quite so much of an idiot.

Why Do We Do It?

(before I start - You all HAVE seen the new covers for Elana Johnson's POSSESSION and SURRENDER, right? Because they are awesome. Just making sure.)

I'm about to send out the very first round of queries for ONE.

I know the manuscript is ready for professional eyes.
I know the writing is as polished as I can make it.
I know, after two revisions, that I'm happy with the pacing, the voice, the plot, the characters.

And yet, as I queue up the queries in my inbox - one to my Dream Agent - my hands tremble and my heart drops into my stomach.

I know that this book may not sell. Ever.
I know that today is the beginning of setting out on that road, that might end in ONE's living in a drawer.

I've written before about the split personality of a writer - the audacity that enables us to send our work to critique partners' and agents' inboxes and internet contests, paired with the self-doubt that can be, at times, crushing.


We all have those moments when we bury our heads in our hands and think,
"Why do I even bother with this anyway?"


Maybe it's frustration finding ideas, or adding word count to a draft when we have one. Maybe it's a scene we just can't get right, a relationship we can't seem to communicate fully, or a plot hole we can't seem to adequately fill. Maybe it's teasing from a family member or some especially stinging crit.


Maybe it's staring at the draft of an email about to go to your Dream Agent and only being able to think, "Who do I think I am to be sending this to her?"

The drafting, the editing, the critique, the revisions.
The query-writing, the synopsis-composing, the pitch-crafting, the contest-entering.
The rejection, the rejection, the rejection.
 Altogether, it's enough to make you think you're crazy for doing this in the first place.

Right?


So, why do we do it?

For most of us, the reason we write is some subcategory of this -
Because we can't NOT write.
Maybe it's because it gives us a sense of self we can't find anywhere else.
Maybe it's because stories live in our heads and we can't rest until we get them into beautiful words.
Maybe it's because writing gives us something to dream about when nothing else does.

Just like anyone else, I have my own answers. Just like anyone else, those change all the time.

This weekend,  when I was having kind of a tough time with some stinging critique I'd gotten, a different critique partner asked me, "What do you love about ONE?"

And so, through streaming tears, I told her. 
I told her about the characters - and their story - that just won't let me go.
I told her about how superhero stories have always absolutely captivated me.
I told her about how I knew, first hand, about dreams lost, ambitions changed, and things turning out different - but better - than we ever envisioned them.
I told her about how much I LOVED telling a story of empowerment, hope and comfort, despite things not turning out the way we dreamed they would.

At that moment, I knew why I did it - why I poured myself into this whole project. Why it's okay if it never sells, why I'm glad I did it anyway.


Somehow, thinking about that stills my shaking query hand just a little.


So, now it's your turn. Please tell me - Why do you write? 

Friday Obsessions: New Covers for POSSESSION and SURRENDER!!!

You guys, it's been one of those weird weeks where I have felt very busy, but when I look back on it, I haven't gotten too terribly much done writing-wise. I mean, I did a synopsis, which ate a whole day, and probably a good chunk of my CPs' (thanks, ladies, for your love and patience.) And the synopsis is pretty good.

So I guess that's something.

I would say I'm in a sad, sad state for obsessions. I'm sleeping WAY more than I'm accustomed to (or would like to) and I'm eating WAY less than I'm accustomed to (or would like to) thanks to squished stomach space.

(In other words - We can blame my little monster sweetheart-on-the-way for lack of gushing posts about TV shows or tater tots, which I know we all LOVE.)


But wouldn't you know it? The writing community is made up of amazing people who are always THERE FOR EACH OTHER. So, in addition to being an extra-classy authoress, Elana Johnson must also be psychic. Because she asked a handful of lucky bloggers the other day if we'd be up for showing off her new covers.

Let me say that again: SHOWING OFF HER NEW COVERS.


Um. Yes, yes, a thousand times YES. I've had an author crush on Elana Johnson ever since I read her first book, POSSESSION. This week's obsession (and probably all the weeks till June): FOUND.

So, without further ado, THE COVERS!!!

Here's the new one for POSSESSION:

And here's SURRENDER's (swoon, swoon, I'm dying over here)

Now, let's recap. A little cover commentary.

1. The color fade just BLEW ME AWAY. I don't know how something so subtle could be so powerful - probably because the intensity of color really is strongest at the bottom right corner, making you just want to grab it and open it and OH GEEZ WHY IS THIS BOOK NOT OUT UNTIL JUNE 5????

2. For those of you who have read POSSESSION, you'll understand how apropos the image of a butterfly in an ice cube is. The creature is so beautiful, but so hopelessly trapped.

Except...butterflies are stronger than they seem, stronger than people expect them to be. Just like Vi. And if you look carefully, there's the smallest crack in that ice cube...the smallest chance that she'll be able to escape.

And if you know Vi? She' going to take that chance, or die trying.

3. I haven't read SURRENDER yet (much to my chagrin) but this cover image of a hummingbird hovering at the mouth of a glass jar has me absolutely buzzing to get my hands on it. It's looking out of the side of the jar, even though escape awaits it at the top.

This cover tells me that there's a clear way for Vi to escape all the terrifying ridiculousness going on in her life (read POSSESSION to find out what that is!), and that maybe she senses that the escape exists, but she has no idea where to look. She just has to find it, and she'll bust out of there like a mofo.

The last word: It's a good thing I can't preorder books more than once. Because I'm pretty sure I've already tried to order SURRENDER about six times. This cover just makes the urge that much stronger....which is awesome.


So...what do you think of the new covers? I know Elana's DYING to know!

Because I'm Running Out of Ways to Gush over My CPs...

I'll just let Ryan do it for me.

Isn't it amazing when you spend the whole weekend critiquing, and you don't even procrastinate at all (not that you would ever procrastinate while drafting or revising. Never. ) because the stuff you're reading is JUST SO GOOD that you don't want to stop working?

And then when it comes time to write a blog post Monday morning, you realize that all your creative/intelligent thought and energy is sapped?

Yeah. That.

So I wanted to gush over my CPs again, but that's getting old, I think. So I'll just let Ryan do it for me.


(Reference: LAST YEAR'S MISTAKE by Gina Ciocca)


(Reference: ALEXITHYMIA by Francesca Zappia)


(Reference: THE ELITE by Maggie E. Hall)


(Reference: TIME BOUND by Jamie Grey)



(Reference: THE ALTERED by Jenny Kaczorowski)


(Reference: LAST YEAR'S MISTAKE by Gina Ciocca)


(Reference: THE NOCTURNIAN trilogy by Francesca Zappia)






Have a great week everyone!

Friday Obsessions: Snow, Crit Projects, and the Kindle

Before we begin!
Some housekeeping.

First up, there's an amazing literary/writer's auction happening over at Write Dreams to benefit Donna's Dream House, which helps KIDS IN THE HOSPITAL, so, you know, it's really important. Anyway, someone set fire to it right before Christmas, those jerks, and now Donna is trying to rebuild so that sick kids can hang out with their families a little more while they're staying in the hospital.

So if you have some extra holiday cash lying around and want to use it for a good cause and get writing help from the pros as a really nice bonus, GO BID!!! (Remember, they're bidding in pounds, so...yeah. Do your conversions.)


Second! The winner of the Brodi Ashton Classy Author Giveaway is.....

COREY WRIGHT!!!

(I swear to you I did the random draw and whatnot, but I'm too lazy to do the screenshot, etc, so you'll just have to believe me.)

Who said, "In a weird way, stories like Brodi's are so satisfying to hear. Insofar as, here is someone who really *wants* it. Who works for it and keeps at it because it's what she's called to do, not just because it's something to do. And it's a fantastic light to the rest of us who struggle with the rejections and the self-doubt and the looming fear of the not so great What If." 

To which I say: Damn straight. Congrats, Corey! (Though, I can't for the life of me find your email address, so shoot me a message with your address and whether you'd like EVERNEATH on Kindle or in hard copy, okay?)


Okay. Now, on with the obsessions!

Everything I was obsessed with this week.
Because I know you want to know.


1. The Forecast.

So, right now (5 AM on posting day,) the weather looks like this:


Which...okay. Whatever. I just pretty much HATE this whole "ten degrees and cloudy" nonsense if the weather's not going to oblige and at least give us some pretty snow to look at. So every morning these days I'm going to weather.com and just hoping....

Well, guess what I saw this morning!!!


Which pretty much has me doing this:


Yep. Even though it won't shut down work or school, or really even accumulate that much, I love a good Shabbat snow. So pretty to watch, so nice to curl up with a great book. Which brings me to....

2. Crit Projects LYM and TB
As soon as I finish pushing through this revision high on ONE (yes, ba''H, ptuh ptuh ptuh, my CPs helped pep talk my sorry behind through my revision wall from last week and I'm ALMOST DONE) I'm spending ALL WEEKEND with books from members of the team. I'll probably finish in-lines on Gina's fab new YA romance.

You need to be jealous - because my goodness is it ever romantic. Fellow LYM team member Marieke compared Gina's writing to Sarah Dessen's, and I agree, not because I've ever read Sarah Dessen, but because her writing made her famous and Gina's gonna have the same situation.

And then - did I mention? - I snagged (okay, obtained through endless month-long harassment) a very early copy of TB, which is about TIME DRAGONS I mean HOLY GEEZ, you guys - from Jamie Grey. And you guys, the writing is SO BEAUTIFUL and the characters? Love them. So I get to finish reading that and send my comments this weekend too.

Cannot. Wait.

3. My Kindle 
Call me snobby or elitist or a Hater of Paper Books, but I'm in love with my Kindle. I wouldn't get NEARLY the volume of reading or writing (yes, the Kindle is an IMMENSE help to my writing, I'll do a post on it) without my baby in her sweet eggshell-blue case.


My Kindle, tag-teaming it with my netbook to edit ONE.

Plus, when I send ONE to the Kindle, it looks just like all the other books that are actually published by People Who Publish Things. At I'm not gonna lie, that's a rush.

Okay, your turn!!! What were YOU obsessed with this week?

The Revision Cave

 I understand that the Internet is striking against bad people that want to censor the Internet today, so I'm supposed to be blacked out and whatnot. But I'm posting for a few reasons:

1. Alexa called me on not posting on Monday, and I felt like a loser,
 2. I need to announce the winner of the Brodi Ashton Classy Author Giveaway, (scroll to the bottom)( Decided I'm doing that tomorrow instead) and
3. I need to explain why my blog posts might be kind of sub-par (or occasionally absent) in the next few weeks.

Oh! And, lastly, I think this insipid post will illustrate how pointless everyone's blog posts might be if the internet got all censored. So that's worth something, right?

Ohhhkay. Let's go.

Well, folks, it's that time of the manuscript again. The amazing, magical, heartbreaking, devastating, depression-tailspin-sending time when I have a ton of revisions to do and so do half my CPs.

Everyone's gearing up to query, which is a wonderful, exhilarating thing which basically translates to I HAVE TO GET THESE REVISIONS DONE AND THESE 3 OTHER MSs READ AND THOUGHTFULLY COMMENTED ON AND ALSO COULD YOU PLEASE LOOK AT MY QUERY ONE MORE TIME BECAUSE I'M WORRIED ABOUT THAT COMMA YOU KNOW WHICH ONE.

I'm on edge, we're all on edge, let's hole up in our rooms and hunch over our computers and occasionally burst into tears and maybe also send each other 75 emails a day which may or may not consist largely of exclamation points (!!!!)

Yeah. It's insane, and hilarious, and draining. So, for lack of a coherent post today, I thought I'd show you where I'm going to be doing the most hours of insanity/hilarity on the next couple of weekends: The Revision Cave.



1. There's the Harry Potter crew. Love them. Below them to the left is a quote from Robbie Coltrane about making the movies: "Nobody thought, 'Oh, it's just a kids' film.' Everyone treated it as seriously as Ibsen." Damn straight.

2. Pictures of the fam and me and my sweetie. Because, well, obvious.

3. Flowers. Even caves need flowers.

4. The little corner I keep with love notes from my CPs. Even if Gina's are mushier and flowerier and more quote-filled than Chessie's, I know they love me the same.

5. A giant bag of peanut butter M&Ms that I keep for the sole purpose of letting my kids get their grubby little hands into when they manage to sneak up to my office. It's cute to watch them feeling like they naughtily won something.

6. Mug my sister got me with quotes from TWILIGHT. If I ever lose confidence in my writing ability...well, you can imagine how this helps.

7. Headphones. Obvious.

8. The pretty paper notebooks I bought back when I thought I would actually do some longhand in there. Sometimes they help when I need to scribble manuscript-wide notes.

9. My tape dispenser that I wallpapered the the UGLIEST flowery stuff so no one would want to steal it and pretend it was always theirs. Because seriously, why are people always stealing tape dispensers?

10. My crew of guys. Edward, Thor, and Professor X. They help. Edward loves me unconditionally and eternally, Thor will smash anyone who gets in my way, and the Professor is...well...THE PROFESSOR.

11. The netbook with Underwood skin. Because my husband calls it a "glorified typewriter."

12. The paper copy of ONE, God help me.

13. The cast of characters. You can see Nik and Davis, Joey and Brian (let's take a moment of silence may they rest in peace) and Merrin and Elias are up there too (still haven't found a better one than Corey Monteith, sorry G, except that guy I stalked in Starbucks and my picture of him sucks.) Still haven't found a perfect Leni and Daniel so they're down for now.

14. Superheroes growth chart. It might look like I've grown a lot, but I put "Full Request" almost halfway up the chart when I thought that if I was getting full reqs I was basically halfway to published. HAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

I know. I was so cute.

I'm almost grown up to "Second complete MS" and the next step will probably be "sign with agent" which I'm too superstitious to even put up there. But that will be at Daredevil level, which is apropos, and now I'm hovering at Human Torch. Which is WAY apropos.

15. Fab author inspiration. There's another growth chart about growing with critique from Beth Revis and the printout of the first time ELANA JOHNSON COMMENTED ON MY BLOG OMG. Telling me not to stop dreaming. She's so awesome.

16. A bracelet my writing buddy Jean gave me that's engraved with "the heart of a writer." I'm gonna engrave the title of every book I get published on the other side.  So, it's like optimistic and whatnot.

17. This picture reminds me of an Israeli kids' song that says, "To the giraffe, all of our problems look very, very small." I love it.

18. More pictures of the fam. Me and my sister up top, me and my baby girl below, and to the left, a snap of my grandmother at 23, who I think I was probably cloned from. Probably should write a book about that.

19. A handwritten and illustrated version of Shel Silverstein's "Listen to the Mustn't's" from my Israeli bestie Hela, which always makes me weep, and a necklace she made me to go with it.

20. A story from Jewish tradition about the importance of telling stories, which ends: "God made people because God loves stories." It helps remind me that all this insanity isn't really as silly and pointless as I sometimes worry it is.

Welp! That's the tour. Thanks for visiting, hope you enjoyed it, and if you ever come over, there's a second desk in the same office, so we can TOTALLY have a writing date with enough workspace AND without having to look at/talk to each other. Good times.

Friday Obsession: This $%&#@#$ Revision

Hi, writing loves!

I have just the one obsession this week. And it's not cute or funny or fun.

I've hit a revision wall. A pretty big one. One that had me in tears all day yesterday.

At first, I was feeling pretty good about the whole thing. I would have reacted to the idea that there might even *be* a revision wall like this gentleman here:

'

There's no revision wall! There won't be one either! This whole project is looking pretty good!

But yesterday I finally realized there is an honest-to-goodness revision wall for this project, and no matter which way my poor beleaguered brain approached it, this happened:

(*wince* Poor Hedwig.)

I'm still kind of hoping to figure out a solution that will let me come through the other side relatively unscathed:



But I'm actually pretty sure it doesn't exist. I might come out on the other side, but if I do, it's gonna be an unrecognizable hot (cold?) mess.



Unfortunately, I'm a muggle, and there's no magical Hogwarts Revisions Express to take me from draft to queryable MS. *sigh*

Anyway. This weekend I'm obsessed with trying to make a decision about what exactly to do with ONE. My choices are: minor revisions, and hope for the best, or shelve for later and tackle a major overhaul some other time. Probably when this baby-on-the-way starts sleeping through the night. (Translation: about a year from now.)

You know? Now that I watch all these .gifs, and think of the snow falling outside in the 614, I might be obsessed with Harry Potter movies this weekend too.

Your turn! What were you obsessed with this week?

The Revision House of Cards

If you've ever drafted a novel, you know that when you deliver it to your CPs' inboxes, it's like a card house - painstakingly planned, fretted over, each piece fitting into place perfectly. Stable, but intricate.



But what my CPs can see, that I can't possibly see, is that my novel isn't a house of cards. It's more like this:

'

This old farmhouse has a pretty solid foundation, and has the potential to be awesome if we tweaked a little here, cleared all the brush around it, replace the kitchen, add some additions, and build a sweet driveway next to it.

But before I can do all that to it, my CPs have to make some suggestions for change that pretty much amount to this:



Not gonna work for the house of cards. 




But deep down I still see that novel as a house of cards. She's my baby, remember? I agonized over putting every piece of her into place. I saw her being built, but my CPs only saw her finished, with parts of her starting to look not-so-good.

So I try to make the changes my CPs suggest without the wrecking ball.

You can guess what happens. I usually end up with something like this:



I changed one little thing, moved around one little piece. I can pretend the whole thing's going to stand on its own, but inevitably the next round of CPs notice it for what it is: a wibbly-wobbly (but not timey-wimey, that's Jamie's book) proto-mess that won't last for long  or maybe just doesn't make any sense as-is.

We all know it. They know it, and sometimes they try to pretend it's okay, but most of the time, they keep telling me my house is about ready to fall. Yeah, it hurts to hear it, because just look at that card house up there! It's MOSTLY fine. Who's going to notice?

Well, they tell me, everyone will. When it falls. Or worst, only I will when it doesn't sell.

Well, crud.



So, that's where I am now.

It's hard, but I'm resolving to (try to)  follow my CPs advice with the wrecking ball instead of just by moving cards around.  I asked these people to read because I trust and respect every one of their opinions. FULLY.

Even when it's scary. Especially when it's scary.

And so, as my fingers hover over the "delete" button or the keyboard to write even more new stuff,  I remember that those ladies saw a strong foundation, and some beautiful elements, and knew that even with a wrecking ball, the whole thing would turn out okay.

No. It would turn out way, way better.


(That's what Elias's house looks like, by the way. Movie room's down the hall on the left.)

The Itchy Query Finger

It happened with my first manuscript, and it's starting to creep up on me again.

The itchy query finger. (Oh, July me. You were so cute.)

I know exactly what to blame. It's the first draft high, which I got a second dose of, laced with extra uppers, in the form of the first revision high I experienced yesterday when Gina, Alexa, and Marieke read ONE. (Shoot, Marieke's crit was pretty much, "You need to work pretty hard on fixing some things in the first half of this book," and I was still clapping my hands and squealing like a schoolgirl.)


Yeah. Clearly it's just a high. But still.



I have a pretty decent query that could be dolled up with a couple weeks of hard work, and yeah, writing a synopsis and the endless list of pitches one has to write is no tea party, but I could still do it.

But I'm no idiot. (No, really. I'm not. Bear with me.)

I read advice from query luminaries all over the internet:
Wait a few months to query.
Work as long on your query letter as you did on your revisions.
If you send too early, you'll find glaring mistakes in your MS and wish you hadn't.

I know. I know. And I agree. But still. My itchy query finger is CRAZY with shpilkes. 

I thought about why this is while I was procrastinating on starting to eliminate one of the ten kajillion times the word "just" appears in ONE (thanks G) and I think I realized why. You guys ready for this? It's kind of, you know, deep. Which we don't see a lot over here.

I'm afraid that if I don't query it now I'll realize how much it sucks, and I never will send that first letter.
Even though I know it doesn't suck.
Even though I know most books get waaaay better with revision.
Even though everything in my brain tells me that's wrong wrong wrong.....

The first draft/first revision high leaves me thinking...is this the most confident I'll ever be about ONE? The most excited?

(Wow. I am a nutcase. Analyze away.
Oh. And in case you were concerned? I set up a querying date for myself, to avoid any stupid moves.)

What about you guys? Have you ever had the itchy query finger? Why do you think it got so itchy? Did you send or wait? 

Friday Obsessions: Unagented Writers, Blankets, and Query Fever

Hi there, everyone! How was your first week back to the Real World after holiday breaks? (Please don't tell me if you've not gone back yet. I know who you are and I'm sufficiently jealous, okay?) Seriously, though, even though things get crazier when the students get back to campus, I like it much much better when they're here. Things are busier, days go by faster, I get to feed more people. It works out.

Aaaanyway. Let's do this.

Everything I was obsessed with this week.
Because I know you want to know.

1. Unagented Writers. Yep! I'm guest posting this morning about the awesomeness of unagented writers over at Zap's Lobster Tank. So come check me out.

The only thing I'm almost as as obsessed with as the writers is that I wrangled myself a guest post slot over there. Brushes with celebrity, friends. This is where unagented writers get their kicks.

2. Blankets. And couches. And hibernation.


I am not even kidding, it was like twelve degrees here a couple days this week. I am fantasizing about sitting on the couch for hours under stacks of blankets to read/write/crit this weekend. Not that it'll happen, but....yeah.



Oh, excuse me. I just lost, like, fifteen minutes of my life electric-blanket shopping on Amazon.

3. Finding the Perfect Mocktail
I need a drink. Like, really really. But when you're 6 months pregnant, that's not exactly socially medically acceptable.

It's getting sad, you guys. SAD. The other night I mixed orange juice with Sprite to approximate a mimosa? Maybe? I don't know. I'm going crazy.


Send me your recipes. PLEASE.

Classy Author Giveaway: Brodi Ashton

Wheeee! I love Classy Author Giveaways, but I might love this giveaway's author even more! It's....drumroll please....

BRODI ASHTON!!!

*confetti*

*excitement*

*dancing*

You guys, this author classes. It. UP.

First reason I love Brodi Ashton - She's a freaking INSPIRATION. A reminder to never, ever give up. Here's her summary of her publishing journey, divided into prefaced sections by me:

Brodi queried something like a hundred agents to secure rep for her first book, finally found an agent, yay! And then it didn't work out.

1. Wrote a book.

2. Edited that book.

3. Queried agents

4. Received about a hundred rejections.

5. And one offer of representation.

6. Revised the book with the agent.

7. Submitted the book to publishers... and...

8. Got rejected by every single one.

9. Wrote another book.

10. Revised that book.

11. Sent book to agent, who didn't love the book.

12. Parted ways with agent.

So what did she do? Girlfriend pulled herself up by her bootstraps, took her new awesome book, and found herself another agent. After another hundred queries. 

13. Queried agents again.

14. Received almost a hundred rejections again.

15. But also received 9 offers of representation.

16. Signed with my agent.

17. Revised my book.

And guess what that agent was able to do with the kickass book she wrote for him to sell. No, just guess.

He sold it. Within two days. At auction. (Like a mofo.)

18. Submitted the book to publishers.

19. Accepted pre-empt from HarperCollins after only 48 hours on submission.

So, in summary, Ms. Ashton's here to teach us: You think that rejection's the end of the world? It's not. Your book failed on submission, and you don't know what to do? Well, you're a writer. Write another book. Your agent doesn't like your new book? Find another one. Earn your own darn book deal, because no one else is going to do it for you. 

She's awesome like that. 

But inspiration alone does not a classy author make. 

She also Pays it Forward.

First of all, Brodi is open and honest about her publication path with the writing community. Her blog's one place to start to find out about it all. Beyond that, she spreads her special brand of "never-give-up" type of love to the aspiring, unagented, and unpublished everywhere.

 She spoke on this episode of the Appendix podcast about persistence, and she's all over Twitter with the cheerleading and encouragement. If you ask her a question, she'll answer. If you mention her or her book or her awesome book trailer, she'll have a conversation with you about it. If you're frustrated and she catches your tweet, she'll jump in waving pompons.

 I've even  heard of her doing critiques of queries and first pages for the unagented, (nope! Not me...) even though she SO doesn't have to do that. She's so in touch with the raw feelings of being in drafting, or revising, or querying-land, even though her ship sailed from there awhile ago, and doesn't mind commiserating with writing commoners. (Not that she would call us that....)

So, for all these reasons and more....let's give away a copy of Brodi's debut novel, EVERNEATH, which releases on January 24!

Here's a summary from Amazon:

Last spring, Nikki Beckett vanished, sucked into an underworld known as the Everneath. Now she’s returned—to her old life, her family, her boyfriend—before she’s banished back to the underworld . . . this time forever. She has six months before the Everneath comes to claim her, six months for good-byes she can’t find the words for, six months to find redemption, if it exists.

     Nikki longs to spend these precious months forgetting the Everneath and trying to reconnect with her boyfriend, Jack, the person most devastated by her disappearance—and the one person she loves more than anything. But there’s just one problem: Cole, the smoldering immortal who enticed her to the Everneath in the first place, has followed Nikki home. Cole wants to take over the throne in the underworld and is convinced Nikki is the key to making it happen. And he’ll do whatever it takes to bring her back, this time as his queen.

     As Nikki’s time on the Surface draws to a close and her relationships begin slipping from her grasp, she is forced to make the hardest decision of her life: find a way to cheat fate and remain on the Surface with Jack or return to the Everneath and become Cole’s queen.

Um....WOW. 

So, who wants to spread the word about  an ultra-classy author by winning a copy of her debut?

(Yeah. I know you do.)

To enter for the giveaway, leave me a comment below saying something sweet about Brodi or EVERNEATH or any other author you think is classy. 

Want an extra entry? Tweet about it and link up below. 

Want an extra extra entry? Be a follower of this here blog. New or not, I love you all. (But tell me if you are, because I can't keep track of my three little in-person responsibilities, let alone all 135 of you who were following before this went live.)

Good luck! You guys rule.

Will 2012 Be Your Year?

I'm just gonna say it right now: 2012 is going to be My Year.

How do I know? Because I'm going to make it My Year. Just like I did with 2011.

Here's how I made 2011 My Year:

• I wrote. Every. Single. Day.
• I blogged. A lot.
• I read. A lot.
• I finished THE TRAVELERS.
• I met handfuls, bunches, and scads of amazing, kind, and brilliant writers.
• I got very, very lucky, and some of those writers agreed to critique TT. I listened to their suggestions for how to make it better. Then I made it better.
• I attended WriteonCon in August.
• I learned how to write a query letter. And a synopsis. And a two sentence pitch. And a one sentence pitch. And a Twitter pitch. And a logline. And I learned how to make a first page sparkle.
• I sent almost a hundred queries and entered lots of blog contests for TT. I even got some requests!
• I learned to deal with rejection. A LOT of rejection. (I even cried the ugly cry!) Then I learned to accept that no matter what, it's not easy.
• I started writing ONE as soon as the first query went out on TT.
• I got super, extra, turbo lucky, and some of those writers became dear friends to me (and Aunties to my kids!)
• I wrote ONE much better than I wrote TT, in more ways than I can count.
• I decided to stop querying TT. (That hurt. A lot.)
• I critiqued six-ish projects from other writers while I was doing all of the above.
• I assembled an amazing team of 6 (six!) critique partners in two rounds for ONE (hi ladies, I love you all so much.)
• I started revising ONE according to their suggestions. 

"But, Leigh Ann," you might say. "You didn't sign with an agent, or sell a book, or or or or or."

Nope. I sure didn't. Would I have liked to? Absolutely. I mean, yeah. That would have put me over the moon.

But I took every single step I had to in order to get there.
I learned, I pushed myself, I worked my butt off, I failed (kind of spectacularly,) I learned some more, I worked my butt off some more.

So, how am I going to make sure that 2012 is My Year?

I'm going to do exactly the same thing.

More specifically, here's what's on tap in my writing world for 2012:

• Revise and polish ONE.
• Write, rewrite, and rewrite again all the queries, pitches, and other agent-seeking accouterments for ONE.
• Query and contest the heck out of ONE.
• Attend WriteOnCon.
• Outline manuscript #3.
• Write manuscript #3.
• Rewrite, revise, and polish manuscript #3
• Attend SCBWI NYC (okay, I know that's technically 2013, throw me a bone. I'm excited.)
• Read a lot.
• Blog a lot.
• Critique a lot.
• Write. Every. Single. Day. (except maybe the day that I'm supposed to help this new little human get out of my body. But I'm sure I get a pass for that, right? And honestly probably I'll write that day too. Labor can get boring.

Will I get requests for ONE?
Probably, though I wouldn't place bets on it.


Am I going to sign with an agent? 
Maybe not.

Will I sell a book?
Probably not.

Will I attain widespread fame and fortune?
In a parallel universe, maybe.


But that's okay. Because I know I'm trying my absolute hardest to get there.


So, what about you? Will 2012 be YOUR year?

The only one who can decide whether 2012 will be your year is you.  And, as Sugar says, no one is going to give you a thing. You have to go out and get it for yourself.

So, if you want 2012 to be your year, my dear writing loves, then set your mind to buckling down and getting to work. Make it happen no matter what. Because you're the only one who really can.


Now, please tell me, because I really want to know. How are you going to make sure 2012 is Your Year?