. . . and if you read agent blogs, you know her name. She's requested at least partials for both my books . . . twice. And she keeps rejecting them, usually with little encouraging notes at the bottom. I suppose it's a good thing that she keeps requesting to see my stuff. But I do wonder if I'm beginning to be a pest. Oh, well. (Heavy sigh.) I do have other queries still out there.
I won't be making another round of agent queries with Forging a Legend without a contract. However, I will be submitting directly to publishers soon. I've been dithering about a recent rewrite. I sent it to one of my beta readers and she really liked it--in fact, she said she loved it. However, I thought of another way to frame it, and so I made a copy of it and was attempting to make this latest frame work. However, I don't think it will. I really don't want to do another major rework of it, and if I attempt this latest idea, it will require exactly that. So I'll be going back to the rewrite that my beta reader read and will be sending it to another beta reader this week.
One of the things that's been on my mind is the fact that I'm glad I'm branching out into another genre. Historical fiction may be harder to write, but it does seem to be more friendly to females. You guys know that I am intimately familiar with debut novels due to my work at Fantasy Debut. However, the bulk of epic fantasies that have come out since I started FD have been written by men. If you count small presses--old Juno Books and Avari Press--then I can think of a few. If they're not by men, they're about men, such as Naomi Novik's novels. The only exceptions seem to be urban fantasies and YA fantasies, both of which I have not written.
But some of the biggest names in Historical fiction are women like Phillipa Gregory and Diana Gabaldon. It also has a wider readership. I'm also hoping that by the time I am ready to query, this recession is over and time travel historicals are the next big thing.
Maybe--if I get very daring--I'll serialize Forging a Legend at Fantasy Debut. I have a large readership there; I might as well see what they think. What do you think? Good idea, or bad?
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I say go for it. I'm sure rewrites won't be necessary :)
ReplyDeleteI think it's probably a good thing that agent keeps wanting to see your stuff. If it sucked majorly I'm sure she would just send a polite but final rejection.
I'd be willing to follow a serial if it came to that
ReplyDeleteYay! Thanks, guys!
ReplyDeleteDefinitely give it a go. Maybe post the first chapter or so first, and see if there's demand (which I'm sure there will be--it hooked me, way back when!).
ReplyDeleteI think it's good, and if I'm guessing right about the agent (and I am) then you know you've got some quality stuff. Said agent only ever req'd ONE of my partials, so you're ahead there!
{thoughtful look} I can't claim to haunt agent or editor sites. However, when I do run across folks talking about reading the slush pile, they invariably swear that any writer who is worth writing personal notes to Isn't A Pest. {Smile}
ReplyDeleteAnne Elizabeth Baldwin
P.S. Best of luck with the submitting, and the writing. {SMILE}
ReplyDeleteA.E.B.
I think you'd be doing your readers a favor by offering it to them to read.
ReplyDeleteAlthough, I'm not sure what, if any, impact it would have on getting it published if the novel were already published in pieces online.
Who knows, maybe it would create such fanfare a bidding war would start for it. It is TRULY a brilliant and creative idea. Tia, you have such a wonderful and creative mind -
your stories are too wonderful to waste stored on a hard drive, hidden from readers eyes!
If my rooting for you would help, you Kristy and Carol McDonnell would have zoomed to fame and fortune last year sometime!
Thank you, Lisa! You are my biggest fan! I'll be sending you Forging a Legend by the weekend.
ReplyDeleteIf she keeps requesting (and giving encouraging notes), I would say she definitely sees promise in your writing. Don't feel like a pest. Just keep working. You've got to be so close!
ReplyDeleteIf the agent keeps requesting partials and jotting encouraging notes on the rejection letters, you've officically gone up a knotch in Queryland! Congratulations!
ReplyDeleteI am soooo not looking forward to launching SWEET into Queryland. This is my fourth Queryland Novel and I'm more confused now than when I started this journey three years ago. I'm afraid if I do ever get The Call I'll mistake it for a telemarketer and hang up.
Now, don't fall into the trap of constantly revising, but never submitting! You just gotta keep it up. (Why is it so much easier to say that to you than it is to say it to myself?)