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Queries? THIS is what you need: http://queryshark.blogspot.com/ Read it. Read it a lot. Read all of them.
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Sep 13, 2017 16:42
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if you can write at that volume and learn at around the same rate per words written you'll probably be published before like 95% of us burkion lol
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Sep 13, 2017 17:42
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anime was right posted:if you can write at that volume and learn at around the same rate per words written you'll probably be published before like 95% of us burkion lol I highly doubt that! It's just something I've had in my head for a while that I needed to get out. Already reworking how to tell this first story though thanks to Nae and the others. I'll keep you guys posted on how the reworking turns out.
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Sep 13, 2017 17:48
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sebmojo posted:cut the 'when a clue happens she's brought back line, its implicit in the rest. otherwise that's p solid imo Naerasa posted:I don't know, change it up like that and you're looking at one long-rear end sentence. How about Sunati's absence brings Caden down a path of depression and isolation. When a rogue synthetic designed by the most powerful biotech company in the city goes berserk and kills its creators, Caden is called in to assist.
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Sep 13, 2017 19:03
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If I get my revised Prologue and chapter 1 written up soon-ish, should I just stick it in my thread? Instead of making a new thread. I'm not sure how often this comes up It'll be more of a proof of concept than anything SUPER solid, but I'm pretty excited about how to rework the ideas I had.
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Sep 13, 2017 22:50
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Burkion posted:If I get my revised Prologue and chapter 1 written up soon-ish, should I just stick it in my thread? Instead of making a new thread. I'm not sure how often this comes up Keep it in your thread IMO, since most of the people posting there will have it bookmarked at this point.
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Sep 13, 2017 22:58
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I've been knocking around a query letter for my most recent manuscript and I've done a few passes after getting feedback from a couple of agents. In case anyone wants to see what this feedback hell looks like, I'm going to post the iterations I've done and the feedback I've gotten on each, and then finally the draft I put together today based on the most recent round of feedback. Please let me know if I'm on the right track or if I'm still floundering like a loving idiot. Letter Number One posted:It’s not easy to kill a mind reader. It’s even harder to stop them once they’re dead. PERMEABLE MINDS is a 95,000 word science fiction novel that will appeal to readers of Claire North’s The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August or The Rise of Io by Wesley Chu. Agent feedback: 1) This isn't a sci-fi, it's a thriller. The comp titles don't work because of that, so scrap them and change the genre. 2) You're not focused enough on the main conflict: Eduardo is in Gillen's head and is trying to kill him. 3) Does Andrew need to be in this query? 4) It's too long, cut off 5,000 words. I listened to points 1, 2, and 4, but kept Andrew because I thought I knew better. I was a little unsure about the genre change, so I acquiesed on that since I figure I don't know what the gently caress I'm talking about. That got me to pass #2. Letter Number Two posted:Gillen Lynch is a successful man and he’s not going to let his secrets hold him back. Unfortunately, his friend Eduardo not only knows his secrets, but can see every other thought in Gillen’s head. Gillen has spent years planning how to murder his mind-reading friend, so he’s not surprised when his plans go off without a hitch. He manages to kill Eduardo, frame his wife, and flee the city within the span of sixty minutes. Everything is going just the way he planned it - until he starts hearing Eduardo’s voice inside his mind. Eduardo knows exactly how he died, too, and he’s looking for revenge. I sent out pass 2. That got me about 15 form rejections, so I decided to get more feedback. This is what I got: Agent feedback: 1) You're focusing on all the wrong poo poo. Stop wasting time on Andrew and tell us more about Gillen. 2) You're leaving too many details out. I come away from this query with more questions than answers. How does Gillen kill a mind reader? Why does he kill him? 3) The title is really bad. You should change it. I listened to all of those points (finally realizing that yes, Andrew had no place in the query), and tried again, this time with a new title. I also ended up adding like 1,000 words in another editing pass, though that's neither here nor there. Letter Number Three posted:I’m currently seeking representation for my speculative thriller, LISTENER’S REMAINS, which is complete at 88,000 words. Based on your interest in_________, I’m submitting my manuscript for your consideration. Better, right? I thought so. Turns out, nah. Another 15 form rejections. Okay, still not working. Let's get more feedback. Agent feedback: 1) Genre may not be right. It's more speculative than thriller, so try dropping the thriller part and shopping it around that way. 2) It's still too vague. What is Gillen's relationship to Eduardo? What happened to Gillen's dad? Don't worry about spoiling stuff. Agents are not readers, so don't leave us asking too many questions. 3) First paragraph is unnecessary. Cut it and weave the info into the rest of the query. Well, okay, gently caress. Guess I shouldn't have listened on the genre. Or maybe the first agent was right. Who knows? It's probably a sign the book has fundamental problems, but I'm not ready to give up on it just yet, so let's give this query another shot. This leads me to what I have now. Apologies for typos, since I just finished this pass. Letter Number Four posted:I’m currently seeking representation for my speculative fiction manuscript, LISTENER’S REMAINS, which is complete at 88,000 words. Based on your interest in speculative fiction, I’m submitting my manuscript for your consideration. So that's where I stand now. After this round of queries, I'm about ready to call it dead, since I'm at 30+ form rejections and probably another 15 Closed/No Replies. My supply of potential agents is dwindling rapidly at this point, which means this book's chances are just about tapped out. I'm already about 2/3rds of the way through my next manuscript, so I'm at the point where I've mostly divorced myself from this one, but I'd still like to see it through to some kind of conclusion. If anybody has any thoughts on how the query has progressed (or regressed), please let me know, because at this point I'm more or less at a loss.
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Sep 13, 2017 23:22
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One thing I might suggest, big laugh considering my own issues with this exact kind of stuff, is lead off with the premise itself. A murderer has his last victim literally stuck inside his head, a mental ghost that is seeking to destroy his life the same way Gillen ended his. You seem to be burying the lead a bit too much in that regard, the last one almost doesn't explain it well enough. Why he was killed comes after, I think. How Eduardo survives in Gillen comes after. Open with the important part. Murderer must contend with his victim inside his own head.
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Sep 13, 2017 23:38
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Burkion posted:One thing I might suggest, big laugh considering my own issues with this exact kind of stuff, is lead off with the premise itself. I could try throwing a logline like that in the first paragraph like I did in the first query. People didn't seem to respond to it, or any of the similar loglines I used when I've pitched the book on twitter, but I see what you mean about putting the hook front and center.
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Sep 13, 2017 23:50
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Naerasa posted:query letters In the first three Gillen's spent his entire life preparing to kill Eduardo, and in the 4th he decides to do it after finding out the guy reads minds? Which is it?
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Sep 14, 2017 00:13
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ketchup vs catsup posted:In the first three Gillen's spent his entire life preparing to kill Eduardo, and in the 4th he decides to do it after finding out the guy reads minds? Which is it? It's both since he found out young and has been planning for years. I didn't think it was necessary to explain the timeline from planning to execution since it didn't seem like the most relevant detail and I'm trying to pare down the extraneous details. Entire life is relative, since they were both teenagers at the time, so to Gillen the time from before finding out might as well not be a thing. Gillen kind of already had an inkling he was gay then, but his sister and Eduardo were already a thing, so he figured he'd bide his time and try and block Eduardo instead of killing. The blocking isn't perfect, though, so eventually Gillen goes back to the tried and truth method of murdering people who make problems in his life. In truth, the time lapse from Gillen finding out to Gillen killing Eduardo is probably less a query issue and more a story issue, which is one of the reasons I think this isn't working on a level beyond the query letter. I'd fight harder for it, but reading the Manuscript Wish List tweets from agents yesterday really drove home how this is not a book anybody is in the market for even if I polish it, so I'm not going to sweat this one too much longer. I still think it's a cool concept and I'm happy enough with the book as a whole, but I don't know that there's a place for it right now in traditional publishing even if I make it perfect. FormerPoster fucked around with this message at 00:29 on Sep 14, 2017 |
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Sep 14, 2017 00:24
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Just self publish it man.
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Sep 14, 2017 03:06
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HIJK posted:Just self publish it man. All the sticks of gum I've got from self publishing made it totally worthwhile. I didn't make any money from self-publishing is what I'm saying. But i DO have a sweet set of 32 matching coasters now.
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Sep 14, 2017 03:36
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If I cared about the money, I wouldn't be writing, haha. My real worry for self-publishing is that I'd be taking a book that isn't actually any good and wasting time and effort promoting it, when instead I could be working on writing more and making something people want to read. I know the publishing market is its own beast that doesn't necessarily dictate the taste of the general reading populace, but really, if they don't want to read it, why should I think anyone else does? Sure, I've had critique partners and beta readers say they liked it, but a sample size of 10-15 people isn't indicative of the population as a whole. I'd rather trunk this and try again on the next book than keep rolling this boulder up the hill so it can smack me in the face again.
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Sep 14, 2017 04:12
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I still have a copy of a self-published book an ex-friend gave me (and a goon at that, although I don't know her name) and oh man. It is not good. I didn't see it at the time but when mutual friends of ours read it they were like "yeah, this is bad" and that's why self-publishing is a last resort kind of thing. I don't know if I'll selfpub or what, but considering that I don't have anything worth publishing yet I haven't even bothered thinking about that stuff.
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Sep 14, 2017 04:18
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Self-pub seems more and more the way to go with a novel that's good but not considered saleable by an increasingly risk-adverse publishing industry. As for whether or not it's actually good, I'd say if you found a freelance editor (if you can afford it) who's worked on novels you can see are good, then hire that editor to help you make your poo poo good. What's the difference, really, between doing that and landing a publishing deal with a meagre advance, an overworked editor, and the complete lack of marketing so many new novelists actually get?
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Sep 14, 2017 05:40
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Speaking of marketing, the fact that you have to do all the publicity and stuff yourself is the primary reason I haven't looked much into selfpub. I can't sell poo poo.
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Sep 14, 2017 06:18
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CantDecideOnAName posted:Speaking of marketing, the fact that you have to do all the publicity and stuff yourself is the primary reason I haven't looked much into selfpub. I can't sell poo poo. I've got the opposite problem, since I spent 8 years doing online marketing/brand management and now I loving hate the thought of it. Writing was the one thing that got me through a wasted decade of misery in marketing and the idea of going back to the internet marketing guru routine as part of writing makes me want to die. I know that I'll have to market myself online even if I do get traditionally published, but Jesus, at least then I can share a little of the burden. Doing it all on my own would be brutal.
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Sep 14, 2017 06:22
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what do i do when my characters come to life and start walking around talking to people in the real world and convincing them that things from the book universe are real historical events? i feel responsible because i breathed life into these people but i have no control over them anymore, they don't answer my calls
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Sep 14, 2017 14:21
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the old ceremony posted:what do i do when my characters come to life and start walking around talking to people in the real world and convincing them that things from the book universe are real historical events? i feel responsible because i breathed life into these people but i have no control over them anymore, they don't answer my calls congratulations you just wrote At Swim-Two-Birds
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Sep 14, 2017 14:28
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the old ceremony posted:what do i do when my characters come to life and start walking around talking to people in the real world and convincing them that things from the book universe are real historical events? i feel responsible because i breathed life into these people but i have no control over them anymore, they don't answer my calls tell your chars to stop saying bernie would've won
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Sep 14, 2017 17:28
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u murder them when theyre children its why its called killing your babies u dumbie
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Sep 14, 2017 17:56
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whats a good resource for culturally ambiguous names for characters? the story im writing doesn't take place anywhere specific and i don't want my readers to think it does but i definitely don't want a bunch of dumb white people names
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Sep 14, 2017 19:15
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fridge corn posted:whats a good resource for culturally ambiguous names for characters? the story im writing doesn't take place anywhere specific and i don't want my readers to think it does but i definitely don't want a bunch of dumb white people names Just go with a bunch of weird mixed names Pick countries at random, see what names they have, liberally take them as you like
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Sep 14, 2017 19:18
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I like http://www.behindthename.com for looking up names. They even have a random name generator if you don't want to go poking through a big list.
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Sep 14, 2017 19:23
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fridge corn posted:whats a good resource for culturally ambiguous names for characters? the story im writing doesn't take place anywhere specific and i don't want my readers to think it does but i definitely don't want a bunch of dumb white people names You don't want dumb white people names, sure, but how about you use some of these really good white people names? 
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Sep 14, 2017 19:31
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fridge corn posted:whats a good resource for culturally ambiguous names for characters? the story im writing doesn't take place anywhere specific and i don't want my readers to think it does but i definitely don't want a bunch of dumb white people names If I want to go for something non-western (e: meaning, names not found in the US, I guess) sounding but don't want to drag other IRL groups of people into it, I usually take common sounds from two different regions and mash them together into nonsense sounds. So like, for a surname, Zhang and Hansen could become Zhansen, Ortega and Dubois becomes Ortois, and so on. Just as some lovely examples off the top of my head. Then i google the resulting monstrosity to make sure I didn't blunder into using a real word/name. idk if that's a good way to do it, but no one has complained so far.
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Sep 14, 2017 19:39
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fridge corn posted:whats a good resource for culturally ambiguous names for characters? the story im writing doesn't take place anywhere specific and i don't want my readers to think it does but i definitely don't want a bunch of dumb white people names Old cemetery. It's the best for names, and they can't sue you.
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Sep 14, 2017 19:54
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magnificent7 posted:Old cemetery. It's the best for names, and they can't sue you. I live near one with some fantastic names, i'll have to jot some down next time I'm by it. It also has some very... unique tombstones, such as "Soldier who Fell Off RR Bridge," "Baby that Died in the Fire," and my favorite, "Man the Bank Fell On"
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Sep 14, 2017 20:19
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CantDecideOnAName posted:I like http://www.behindthename.com for looking up names. They even have a random name generator if you don't want to go poking through a big list. okay this is cool i like the random name generator the best thing about this site i think is that it warns you if a particular name belongs to a harry potter or fire emblem or whatever character lol
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Sep 14, 2017 20:51
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https://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=3833927&pagenumber=1#post476403793 Revised Prologue and Chapter 1 done. Again, super rough draft as I mentioned in the post, but it gives a good look at how I would restructure the whole story.
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Sep 14, 2017 22:00
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Al Cu Ad Solte posted:It's a little over 96k words. My goal was to write something fun with a lot of heart in it. It's a cyberpunk police procedural love story starring a sad gay woman with bionic limbs. PM me if you're interested! Or post here, I suppose? This sounds cool and I would read it if I weren't already beta-reading 4 other novels and writing my own. If you PM me a link I might be able to at least look at the first few chapters and tell you if it draws me in.
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Sep 14, 2017 22:09
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Al Cu Ad Solte posted:Sweet! Shoot me a link some time. I wouldn't mind reading on it!
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Sep 14, 2017 22:13
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Rip your names out of the Bible or the Odyssey or some other v. old book
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Sep 15, 2017 03:06
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You could also come up with dumb white people names and see what, if any, equivalents exist in other languages. Behind the Name is good for that too.
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Sep 15, 2017 03:16
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MockingQuantum posted:You could also come up with dumb white people names and see what, if any, equivalents exist in other languages. Behind the Name is good for that too. I love seeing what regions and languages names are native in. Biblical ones like CC suggested tend to be in a lot of goddamn languages.
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Sep 15, 2017 03:24
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MockingQuantum posted:I live near one with some fantastic names, i'll have to jot some down next time I'm by it. Man, where writer's block goes to die... there's probably a ton of great ideas in there. And judging from what little I know, some of bone-headed ancestors, too.
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Sep 15, 2017 05:45
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you know what? writing is weird and kinda sucks. im writing a scene where a guy comes across two foxes loving in the woods and now i guess i have to watch a bunch of videos of foxes loving so i can describe it accurately???? 😰
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Sep 15, 2017 11:42
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Dr. Kloctopussy posted:This sounds cool and I would read it if I weren't already beta-reading 4 other novels and writing my own. Burkion posted:Shoot me a link some time. I wouldn't mind reading on it! Thanks guys, sent yall some PMs. Good timing too, I just retooled chapter 1 a bit for better pacing. It had been bugging me since I wrote it but I couldn't quite put my finger on why it felt slow until now. fridge corn posted:you know what? writing is weird and kinda sucks. im writing a scene where a guy comes across two foxes loving in the woods and now i guess i have to watch a bunch of videos of foxes loving so i can describe it accurately???? 😰 Writing is a gift and so is this post.
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Sep 15, 2017 12:25
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I know when I am reading a book and come across an unrealistic description of fox-loving, it totally jolts me out of my suspended disbelief and I just can't keep reading.
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Sep 15, 2017 12:48
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