First day of MFA Summer Residency

Today was a great day to ease my MFA program for our first day of classes.  We had a discussion about Kafka’s The Castle.  It was our book-in-common for the whole group (we are divided into genres based on our focus area but today we were all together.)   It was really interesting to hear so many people share amazing insights into what they had gleaned from reading the book.   It was also great to hear how many of them struggled to make it through the thing as well.  When they started discussing existentialism in the book, I had to try to reach back to Philosophy 101 to make the connections.  Good mind-stretching!

The other cool thing we did today was to hear each of the faculty for the summer residency read part of their own work.  Wow!  What a talented group of people!  The person for my focus area read a couple of her upcoming picture books (one is scheduled to be published in 2017…such a long time away!) and they were so cute.  I can’t wait to buy them down the road. 

There are places for students to sign up to do 5-minute readings of their own works-in-progress. The workshop leader for my genre was encouraging several of us newbies to the program to put our names down when the 1^st years get the opportunity to sign up tomorrow.  She said it would be good practice since she often has to do readings for school groups, etc, and it is wise to start getting experience with doing it.    I see her point.  Not sure if I’ll do it though.   I timed a portion tonight that might be interesting to read then remembered that I am horrible at doing different accents and one of the characters needs to have a British-sounding one. 

So, don’t be a chicken like me.  Read your work out loud to others!  :)

The Personalized Query Reject

I've started sending out query letters (slowly...only three so far) to agents to get a feel for what I need to work on.

QueryTracker.net (QT) is awesome in keeping track of who/when/what happened when you query agents.  You can sort the agents in their system in a variety of ways, search for agents that meet certain criteria (i.e. represents your genre), and see comments from who else has queried them and been rejected/selected.

For my first agent of this round, I selected one person at a top listed agency.  (Only a query letter.)  I got a quick rejection the next day.

For the second one, I sent the query letter to an agent I was very impressed with at a conference I attended.  She is one of the most queried agents.  It took a month to hear back but I got a personalized rejection letter!  Woohoo!  Through QT, I had been monitoring when other people heard back from her and they were getting one-day turn-arounds.  So, the fact that it took a month and it had my name instead of "Dear Author" was encouraging.  Plus, she added an extra line up front about something I said in my letter.  It was probably the nicest rejection letter ever.  I assume it is the next level of rejection form-letters but since it had the extra line and my name, I'm counting it as personalized.

For the third one, I am still waiting.  I selected a colleague of an agent I had a one-on-one with.  (I really liked the agent I met with but she had said at the time that the story was something that would appeal more to her colleague.)  The agency says to give them three months since they ask for the first three chapters.

If nothing else, I am feeling better about my query letter that it made it over one well-known agent's immediate reject pile.

The Awesomeness of Workshops

In case you’re new to writing, or you don’t write but I guilted you into reading my blog, I wanted to talk about the awesomeness of workshops.

In education, workshops often refer to a training session where you learn about something new or get to understand something at a deeper level.  However, in writing circles and programs, it refers to something different.  It is where you bring a passage you wrote to share with others who will read very carefully and critique it.  It goes beyond people saying that they liked what you wrote and identifying the strengths and weaknesses of what you wrote.  In turn, you do the same for the others.

The first time one participates in a workshop, it can be very scary.  You are taking your work that you put so much blood, sweat and tears (well, hopefully not that much blood…) into writing and you are letting people criticize it.   I’ve had workshops from one to forty pages and everywhere in between.  They’ve all proven useful.  (I’ve blogged separately about the one-on-one session where my whole book was read…loved that…but not what I’m talking about here.)

I went to a couple workshops at conferences several years ago where 15 people and two agents listened to my first two pages.  After hearing the agents’ comments, I was ready to curl up into a fetal position in my hotel closet.  However, that experience helped me to figure out how to make my opening stronger. 

Subsequent workshops I’ve done have been online.  I really like the time that particular approach gives to digest the feedback before responding.  Some of the harsher sounding feedback I received has been the most helpful…although it took a few days of pouting for me to appreciate it.

By having multiple people reading and commenting on your passage, you can get a feel for how others would read and interpret what you wrote.  I looked at each person in my workshop cohorts as representing ten people each that might read my story – kind of like how the Nelson ratings have representative people that determine how well a TV show is doing.   

Why have one person represent 10 views? For me, it helped to realize that the one person I could have thought was crazy for thinking about something in my book would not be the only one to think that if my book made it to the general public.  Otherwise, it might be too easy to dismiss a comment from a lone individual.

On the other hand, if one person out of 15 says one thing and the rest say something completely different, then perhaps you need to listen to the majority and how to tweak something.  The real challenge occurs when the group is split evenly about an issue in the passage.

The main challenge with workshops is that the readers are only seeing a limited portion of the book.  As a result, when my whole book was read, there were repetitive sections, there were repetitive sections, and there were repetitive sections due to each chunk having received separate feedback.  ;)  Keep an eye out for that issue so you don’t fall victim to it. 

Otherwise, remember – Workshops are Awesome!

BookCon Recap

I loved BookCon!

It was so much fun.  Well, okay, when I was waiting in some of the huge lines to see panels, get autographs, or go to the restroom…not so fun.  But, even then, there were awesome people to talk to in line including a lot of other aspiring writers.

So, quick recap of the first ever BookCon.

I woke up around six and the BookCon app already had teens messaging that they were in line.  What???  Well, I was too old to do that so I left my hotel around eight-ish and was in line by 8:30am to get my badge since I was pre-registered.   That line went quickly and they were able to scan my registration code from my phone so I could get my badge. (Phew!  Forgot to print it out.)

The line to get in was huge by that time.  BookCon opened at 9am for us regular folk.  My portion of the line didn’t move until about 9:15 due to the size of the crowd.  The front book stalls were already picked over for their free books. (Those teens – I tell ya, they are quick!)

There was a HUGE line to get the tickets for certain autographs.   But, there were others that did not require the tickets and were in the publisher’s booths instead. 

In the end, I got about five books autographed in person at the booths.  Including Cary Elwes,  (Side point - He is so charming.  We need to get his character from Psych, Pierre Despereaux a spin-off.  In the mean time, I'm looking forward to his book As You Wish coming out this fall.) 

Jeff Kinney (Diary of a Wimpy Kid) was a total sweetie.  He was so patient when I realized I had turned off my phone.  I also got a photo with him too but I'll post the one of just him here.

I also went to a couple of book panels that were a lot of fun. There was a New Adult panel on Bad Boys in novels.   The authors were hilarious and we got one book from each.  I also went to the Dystopian YA panel lead by Veronica Roth (Divergent) and got a couple of chapter samples. 

In all, it was a great day for $30.  Twelve free books, 3 chapter samples, 5 autographs and a ton of memories. (Ah, isn’t that sweet!)

I hear next year they are thinking about making it two days.  Sounds like a great plan since there were some things I didn’t even try to go to but wanted to see.

Random Tidbit and Decisions on Workshop Submission

Tidbit from conferences I've attended - Agents have said that they sometimes get very well-polished first couple of chapters with a query letter but when they ask for a partial or full, the rest of the writing is a mess.  So, we need to make sure our whole book is ready to go.

And now to my dilemma -
My challenge today is to select 5,000 words for my last workshop of the OWC program.  Do I resubmit the first couple of chapters to get more feedback on it after making some small changes to it or do I submit a portion later in the book that hasn't been read as often and has larger chunks that I've added to it?

Benefits to submitting the early stuff - I would have another read of the first two chapters which would help with submissions to agents.
Problems with it - I've had it read many times before.  Each time it gets better but what about the other portions?

Benefits to submitting the later stuff - Although it has also been read, there are some new portions that I added based on feedback I received. If an agent wants to read more material, it would be good to have more polished portions throughout the book.
Problems with it - If I can't get an agent past the beginning portion of the book, the rest won't matter anyway.

Off to go decide now...

Stanford's OWC - Applications for the new cohort due June 6, 2014!

So, I've already mentioned this program several times but you have less than a month to apply for the new cohort.  If you've been thinking about it - Do it!  It is awesome.  I love it.  The other people in it were smart, fun, impressive people.  The teachers were incredible. And each course had a workshop component where you get feedback on your own writing in addition to other valuable writing exercises.

Here is the information from the email I received this week for Stanford's OWC:

"Applications are now being accepted. The deadline to apply is June 6, 2014, 5:00pm PDT. The application details are listed below. Please don't hesitate to contact us if you have any questions.

• Register for OWA 001 and pay the non-refundable $80 application fee on the Continuing Studies website.
  
• Complete your application packet (download here) and email it to: continuingstudies@stanford.edu as one scanned file. We no longer accept applications by postal mail or fax.
  
• Your application must include the following (incomplete applications will NOT be accepted):
  • A completed Application Checklist
  • References and Education
  • Policies and Honor Code
  • A Statement of Purpose
  • A Writing Sample (3000 - 6000 words)
  • Sample Classroom Feedback

Application materials will NOT be returned to the applicant. Please email the completed application packet to:continuingstudies@stanford.edu. Upon receipt of your full packet and verification of enrollment OWA 001, you will receive a confirmation email.
For more information about the Online Writing Certificate Program in Novel Writing, please visit:csp.stanford.edu/writingcertificate."

Writing Update

Book 3 is now up to 70,000 words.  Woohoo!

Now, I'm not saying it's any good…because it's not.  But my goal for this weekend is to "finish" the first horrible draft so I at least know what is going to happen in it and then I can officially start plotting out book 4 (even thought I've been working on it already too.)  By doing these drafts now, I know some things I have to add in book 1 to make sure they aren't deux ex machina when I need them in book 3-5.

One of the things about each of my  "books" in my "series"  (quotes are due to them not being official books in a series yet…aka published) is that they each take place over a small slice of the main character's life.  I really appreciated how one of my writing teachers at Stanford's OWC shared that there is the arc of the character's whole life (picture an arc like a rainbow) but our stories are a slice out of it.  In my case, my series will look at a chunk of Kayla's life over five years but each individual book is a very small slice within that already small part of her life. 

Now, some of the stuff that comes before the slice that I'm sharing is important to understand the character but I can't cram the whole first part of the arc into the beginning of the story.  I need to fit in little tidbits here and there so that the reader can better appreciate the slice they are reading.  (Why do I suddenly want a slice of pizza now???)

I have a 5,000 word rewrite from book 1 due on Sunday for my One-on-One Tutorial.  It is so hard to select which portion to submit.   I love getting feedback on pieces of the story from people that are genuinely interested in seeing it become a stronger piece of fiction.

I was talking to a person who had never done a workshop before in writing.  She was concerned about people taking her ideas or being too harsh.  I can understand those concerns but once you get that feedback and use it, you start to realize the huge difference it can make in your writing.  So, I encourage all of you to find a group of aspiring writers willing to do workshops where you "sandwich" the criticisms between praise.  

BTW- Having friends and family read your writing is not the same as a workshop.  People who are not reading your work-in-progress (WIP) from a writing perspective do not necessarily know how to comment on your writing and the flow of your story.    They might point out typos but they won't necessarily point out the holes in the plot, the confusing portions, the overly verbose sections, or other issues.  You need people that can be critical but still supportive.  

My desire to keep that type of workshop-circle-of-writers is one of the reasons I wanted to pursue the MFA.  It sounds like workshops are a large portion of the brief residencies and I am looking forward to new people reading my works-in-progress while keeping in contact with OWC folks too.

Book Con 2014

The Book Expo America will be in NYC at the end of this month.

Us regular, not-yet-published-and-not-yet-in-the-industry folk can participate for a very reasonable $30 for the Saturday BookCon.  Sounds super cool!

Some of the incredible MG, YA, and non-MG/YA authors will be there.

Plus, Cary Elwes (who my main character, Kayla, thinks is hot for an old guy) will be there too.

http://www.thebookcon.com

May 31, 2014 in NYC

One-on-One Update

So the One-on-One tutorial through Stanford's OWC program is totally awesome!  (Gosh, you can tell I was a teen in So. Cal. during the 80's, right?)

Anyway,  my instructor has given some incredible insights into my story and I've been busy chopping 10,000 words!  Yikes!  I was apparently a bit long-winded towards the beginning of my story and needed to get to the action a bit faster.  So, I used some "Literary Spanx" (as my instructor called it) and condensed the first 60 pages down to 40.  She reread some of the sections and gave a few more suggestions of what to chop and edit a bit more.  Some of my favorite lines have been chopped so I am trying to deal with that right now but it builds character, right?  :)

I've also been able to get up to 50,000 words on book 3 - so, two-thirds through it approximately.  For some reason, I am concerned that this book will be more challenging to get up to 75-85K.  I'm not sure why that is the case.  Right now I've written all the major scenes and will need to go back and add some more detail and flow.   I am hoping to get to 60,000 words this weekend.

I prefer to do fast drafts to get everything down and then go back and edit.  Of course, the editing is very difficult for me.  Yuck! I hate it…I mean, it is a wonderful opportunity to grow as a writer.  Yeah, that's what I meant.

April update

Greetings!

I am currently in my One-on-One Tutorial through Stanford’s OWC program (a totally awesome program for writers.)    I should get feedback on my current draft of Primed today.  The version I submitted was 95,000ish words and I expect part of the comments will be to cut certain sections that move a bit too slow.

The good thing about having had a couple of weeks with the instructor reading book 1 was that I have finished a first draft of book 2, and am now about ¼ of the way through book 3.  I’ve also written a few more scenes for book 4 and 5 and have a much clearer idea of what happens at the very end of book 5.  (I’ve known some of the plot points since the very beginning but there is something cool about officially having an outline of the last third of the last book in the series.)

I have also been accepted to Spalding University’s MFA Writing for Children and Young Adults.  Woohoo!  This summer’s residency takes place in Prague and Berlin. I’ve already started reading the books and am totally excited that for the MFA, I get to read some kid’s books.  How cool is that! (Don’t worry, we also have other literature we have to read too.)  Now,  If I can just figure out where my passport is now…

 

 

Well, Let's see. It's been a few years since I last wrote on this blog. Here is a summary of what I've been doing during that passage of time (in the writing realm):

 -Finished first draft of Primed in Spring 2009 -Backspace conference May 2010 Great conference - although time with agents reading/commenting on first two pages made me want to curl up in a fetal position in the closet of the hotel. Talk about getting critiqued.

 -In Spring 2012, purchased and read through a couple of Margie Lawson's courses: http://www.margielawson.com/lawson-writers-academy-courses They were useful in giving specific techniques to apply to writing and examples of how they looked in stories. The examples helped me to apply the techniques better than other books that just gave summaries of what to do.

 -In Spring 2012, had www.fictionfixitshop.com read and comment on my first 10 pages. It was great to get a fresh pair of eyes to give me feedback and suggestions on how to improve it.

 -Backspace conference May 2012 Enjoy the conference again. Still had tough criticism on first two pages. Realized that in my effort to edit, I had lost my unique voice and had to put it back. The second day of the conference I had a newly re-edited first five pages. I had a one-on-one with an agent for 15 minutes that was really useful and encouraging. When I feel ready to query, I will try to query her.

 -June 2012 I applied and was accepted to Stanford's Online Writing Certificate Program. It is a two-year program and I am currently in the second year. https://continuingstudies.stanford.edu/writingcertificate/intro.php All I can say is - Wow! What a great program!

Well, I can say more than that... It has been quite an experience to have cohort members that are all taking the courses with me and have read various portions over the past year and a half. As of right now, about half of my work-in-progress has been read and commented on by many different people (typically 10-15 people in each workshop). There are also discussion board topics, literature readings, and video conferencing that is involved. Officially, I have one more class and then a one-on-one tutorial where my whole book will be read and I will receive feedback on it. There is an optional course for my cohort that I am contemplating taking before the one-on-one.

 So, now what?

Well, I am trying to determine if I want to pursue a Masters in Fine Arts (MFA) since I have enjoyed the Stanford program so much. I have identified a program that sounds like it would be a great way to continue with a similar structure that I am used to but now need to figure out if it is the best plan for me or not.

 In the mean time, Primed is much better than it was and I hope it will continue to improve as I continue to work on it. At least for the first 150 pages, I feel that I would be comfortable letting anyone (well, almost anyone) read it. The second half of the book needs work but I am starting to see it come into a more well-formed shape.

 By summer of next year, I hope to have 300ish pages that won't embarras me. So, there you have it - a summary of what I've been doing since the last time I wrote anything.

A whole weekend without Internet...oh, the pain...

I can't believe how much I use (and take for granted) the Internet. Friday night, while I was on-line chatting with a friend, I was suddenly disconnected. (And, no, it wasn't because I forgot to pay the bill.) ;)

I spent the weekend trying to unplug and replug everything to no avail. I didn't call it in right away thinking that sometimes things come back up after a day or so. Today I caved in and finally called the cable company. After the guy on the phone decided that I wasn't the problem, he suggested that I trade in my modem and/or schedule an appointment with a technician. Fortunately, the cable company was still open so I traded in the modem for one that was half the size as the one that I had for almost 6 years...apparently those things don't last forever.

After another call to the company due to an error message (always fun to receive those things), I finally got back on-line! Woohoo!!!

Now that my Internet is reconnected, I am trying to catch up with everything I missed for the past 4 days. I am really tired but I am afraid that I will miss something if I go to sleep too soon tonight.

I wonder if that means I'm addited to the Internet. Nah, I just need to keep up with Farmville/Facebook, Amazon, emails, QueryTracer, various blogs,.... Hmmm, maybe I am addicted...

Ways I procrasitnated today....

So I should be working on query letters after I get home from work but today I found myself very busy...

For example, this evening I had to try on some clothes to make sure they still fit, harvest my virtual Farmville crops on Facebook, enter the guest blog contest on Nathan Bransford's forums, and I had to post something on this blog. How can I possibly work on query letters and making sure my novel in is good shape, when there are so many other things to do!!!

Hmmm, perhaps I better read some of the blog enteries that talk about procrastination...

Alas, have I been influenced by Disney too much...

I have read a lot of young adult novels the past year. Many of them are pretty dark in nature. Even if they aren't scary, they still have vampires, dream-readers, or ghosts in them. Perhaps I have been too influenced by Disney and other more "happy" stories. Or, maybe I am still influenced by the middle school books I read growing up - like the Judy Blume books that had some humor woven into them. I do think it is possible to have a good story and some mystery in a book without it being dark but will those be accepted by agents today and the target age group.

Although my main character is a high-schooler, perhaps I should look for agents that do cross-over work with middle school/young adult books. In other words, maybe I need to acknowledge the lighter aspect of my book and play it up in the query letter. Or, should I look for ways to increase the struggles in them to make them darker. Hmmm. (Maybe I should stop stressing about it and just send in more query letters before I further contemplate how I need to change the book.) ;)

Honorable Mention -Woohoo!

The highlight of last week was receiving an Honorable mention from Nathan Bransford's blog contest. Woohoo! I have printed it out and plan to look at it when the rejections start pouring in for my novel. =)

As for the other querys, I have joined Querytracker. I have searched their database for agents looking at young adult proposals which turned up quite a number of hits. I then went through and narrowed down the list by looking at their statistics. Wow! There are so many proposals that are rejected!!! Sure, I've seen the numbers that agents have given from this past year but it is interesting to see the figures that are reported through the Querytracker service as well. As a result of what is listed in their statistics, I have unselected (at least temporarily) the agents that did not appear to request partial or full manuscripts in the young adult field.

So, now I need to get up the courage to submit my work to those people. It is a bit scarey to turn over something that I've spent so much time on to professionals that might not think it is worth the while to read. I guess I am following the path of many people before me. Yikes!!!

The first rejection...

Alas, only the 5th day of 2010 and my first rejection came via email.
Perhaps I should give up writing now...okay, I might be overreacting. If nothing else it was a nice rejection form. Plus, I am in good company with the others rejected by this particular agent but I still greatly enjoy his blog. You never know, maybe I'll win him over in the future with a different book. =)

So, now is the time to query the agents that don't share so many useful tidbits with the wannabe writers. They seem a bit scarier since you can't find out as much information about what they want to see in an unsolicited query letter. I also signed up for QueryTracker to keep...track..of querys (funny how that name shows what it does - what a concept!)

First Query Letter...

So I have submitted my first query letter and have bookmarked a couple of other agents that work with books of the same genre.

I must admit that I have new respect for all the other authors that have not only gone through this stress but have also been successful. Say what you want about authors such a Stephanie Meyers or others who often get heavily critiqued but they not only got an agent, they received an impressive book deal (and I'm not even mention the movie deal.)

It seems that there is a demand for literature for middle school boys. Too bad that is not my intended audience. Oh well. Some agents are also looking for more literary stories aimed at teens. Hmmm, I guess I won't get them to represent me (special apologies to my wonderful high school English teachers that tried to get me to appreciate literature.) There are also several agents looking for dystopian societies...I guess I am too Disneyfied to write about things like that.

And so the journey begins...

Well, this blog is to document the journey of yet another wannabe writer. I know that there are many people who are also documenting their stories, but this blog is about me. =)

So, here is some background on why a person with two masters and a doctorate in education decided that it was more fun to write about an imaginary world instead of the non-fiction education book that I also started at the same time. Yes, I did start writing a book about education but really, where's the fun in that...it would mean lots of picky research that didn't seem nearly as interesting as making up characters and studying information that would help me to create their world.

A little over a year ago I began to think that instead of hiding my enjoyment of watching and reading stories aimed at teens, I should work on writing my own young adult novel. With that in mind, I started officially reading young adult novels to get a better feel for the material (after all, I could claim all the teenage novels I was reading were actually "research".) After spending some time brainstorming and thinking about some story ideas off and on for a couple of months, I finally started really writing each day after work until I had the first draft of my book and sections of its "sequels" that I thought would be fun to write.

I really didn't look at first draft much for a few months to get some distance from it. It took a few months to finally get through editing it because for me, it was harder to do the editing than the initial writing. When writing, you can just write down the things as they come to you...editing means that you have to ensure that what you wrote makes sense.

So, now I have written a book and it is time to brave the scary world of finding an agent. I am bracing myself for the rejections to come.