Randy Mixter's Blog - Posts Tagged "books"
Ouch! That Hurts!
Have you ever been rejected at one time or another in your life. If you said no, you need to get out more. Rejections, whether personal or professional, are a normal part of life.
The game plan should be to keep them to a minimum. Me, I guess I'm a masochist because not too long ago I e-mail over 40 queries to book agents about my book Sarah Of The Moon.
I thought the queries were well written and insightful but I knew I was in trouble when the first rejections hit my inbox within minutes of my mailings. That's right, I was receiving rejection letters on queries sent two minutes previously.
The funny part was that they were saying things like: We've read your query letter, and the attached first 3 chapters of your book, and found that your novel, though it has potential, is not what we're looking for at the present time.
Let's skip right to the obvious. They didn't read my book excerpt and they probably did not read my query. There's a good possibility the agent never even opened my e-mail.
Things didn't get any better after that. After the initial first wave, the rejections began to trickle in one or two at a time. The wording rarely changed. The agents were always apologetic but still the book was not in their best interests.
Here's the bottom line, and the reason I'm not doubting my writing ability and even my manhood, the agents, are far as I can tell never read any of my stuff.
There I said it. I firmly believe that 99% of unsolicited e-mail queries are never read, at least all the way through.
Self-published authors are not top priority with book agents who must be absolutely certain a book has best seller potential before they begin pushing it to publishers.
It's tough out there in the book business today and agents know it.
So if you are trying to beat the odds, and who isn't, then the best of luck to you. But make sure you have a thick skin and a large ego. Both will take a hit in the days that follow.
The game plan should be to keep them to a minimum. Me, I guess I'm a masochist because not too long ago I e-mail over 40 queries to book agents about my book Sarah Of The Moon.
I thought the queries were well written and insightful but I knew I was in trouble when the first rejections hit my inbox within minutes of my mailings. That's right, I was receiving rejection letters on queries sent two minutes previously.
The funny part was that they were saying things like: We've read your query letter, and the attached first 3 chapters of your book, and found that your novel, though it has potential, is not what we're looking for at the present time.
Let's skip right to the obvious. They didn't read my book excerpt and they probably did not read my query. There's a good possibility the agent never even opened my e-mail.
Things didn't get any better after that. After the initial first wave, the rejections began to trickle in one or two at a time. The wording rarely changed. The agents were always apologetic but still the book was not in their best interests.
Here's the bottom line, and the reason I'm not doubting my writing ability and even my manhood, the agents, are far as I can tell never read any of my stuff.
There I said it. I firmly believe that 99% of unsolicited e-mail queries are never read, at least all the way through.
Self-published authors are not top priority with book agents who must be absolutely certain a book has best seller potential before they begin pushing it to publishers.
It's tough out there in the book business today and agents know it.
So if you are trying to beat the odds, and who isn't, then the best of luck to you. But make sure you have a thick skin and a large ego. Both will take a hit in the days that follow.
So Boring!
It's easy for us, as authors, to fall back on old habits. I'm referring to the discipline it requires to sit in front of a computer monitor and type words onto a keyboard for three or four hours a day. It begins after a while to feel too much like work. When that happens, it's break time.
Here's where the old habits come into play. I find myself getting restless at around the same time the characters in my book are getting bored with their lives, usually somewhere in the middle of the story.
This often occurred at work too. When I would get bored with what I was doing, I'd start looking for excuses to do something else.
Nowadays, when this happens, if the phone rings I pick it up. Something never done when I'm at a crucial juncture in my story. I might even find myself entertaining the ideas of telemarketers, asking them to go over that thing about a free iPad one more time. Or, if the phone remains silent, I might again browse the same internet sites I left mere minutes before, hoping for a new e-mail or a freshly posted movie review on Rotten Tomatoes.
Old habits are hard to break, even as you know the longer it takes to write the book, the longer it will take before publication.
Soon I will push through the center of my story and begin the rapid free-fall to its dramatic end. Until then I resign myself to the gods of the internet and to the fate of the telemarketers.
Hey, anybody interested in a free month at Planet Fitness?
Here's where the old habits come into play. I find myself getting restless at around the same time the characters in my book are getting bored with their lives, usually somewhere in the middle of the story.
This often occurred at work too. When I would get bored with what I was doing, I'd start looking for excuses to do something else.
Nowadays, when this happens, if the phone rings I pick it up. Something never done when I'm at a crucial juncture in my story. I might even find myself entertaining the ideas of telemarketers, asking them to go over that thing about a free iPad one more time. Or, if the phone remains silent, I might again browse the same internet sites I left mere minutes before, hoping for a new e-mail or a freshly posted movie review on Rotten Tomatoes.
Old habits are hard to break, even as you know the longer it takes to write the book, the longer it will take before publication.
Soon I will push through the center of my story and begin the rapid free-fall to its dramatic end. Until then I resign myself to the gods of the internet and to the fate of the telemarketers.
Hey, anybody interested in a free month at Planet Fitness?
