Book Update
I often forget that some people who read this blog might be interested in how my latest book is doing...
So here's a summary.
My first book was published June '04. It was very exciting. And after that I was all fired up and motivated to write another one - my confidence in my writing skills at an all time high. But still I managed to dither endlessly, and 18 months later I still hadn't got any further. Well, I had written a novel's worth of words - about 80,000, I think - but they were all just notes. Almost no prose. And I had concocted an impossibly complicated plot that even I couldn't follow, or even keep all in my head at the same time.
My plan had always been to finish Novel II before starting work on Baby II, but I was getting older, my son was getting older, and the book wasn't even started yet. So I asked for unpaid leave and took seven months off work to finish the book. Not long after this I sent a very early draft to my agent, but she didn't like it. So I rewrote it. And ploughed ahead. In October '06, I finished Novel II. Supposedly. But it was only really a second draft, still needed work, and it wasn't until Feb '07 that it was finished. And then I sent it to four agents. And started work on Baby II. And waited. And then I had a miscarriage. And three of the agents said no. In a very nice friendly detailed very-nearly-yes kind of a way, but it was still No.
So I rewrote the first few chapters, edited the rest, sent it out again - to a bigger batch of agents this time. The current situation is that six agents have asked to read the full manuscript (this is a pretty big deal - it means they've read and enjoyed the first 3 chaps and asked to see more on that basis), four agents were interested by the synopsis and asked to read the first 3 chaps on that basis, and some others have still not got back to me after I sent unsolicited submissions.
Literary agents, for those who don't know, are hard to come by. They do a similar job to estate agents, with books instead of houses. And it's even harder to sell a book (for decent money, with respected publisher and good contract) without an agent than it is to sell a house. And the big difference is that, whereas an estate agent will tout for your business and take anyone on, literary agents are very choosy indeed. To give you an idea: Most literary agents get sent thousands of manuscripts per year, and only take on one or two new clients in that time.
But they are also busy people and always have massive piles of manuscripts waiting to be read, and the ones from existing clients get priority, and it takes them typically two to four months to read and respond to a full manuscript.
So now I just have to sit back and wait for a response. And I'm dealing with this by focusing on other stuff and trying to just forget about it.
Technically I'm in a very strong position. It's rare to get such a positive response from so many agents. And it is a great book. But I've been in similar positions before, and it's ended in disappointment. And there are millions of writers out there, and many of them have written great books, not all of which will get published. And the book has somehow got caught up with the miscarriage in my head - mainly because I received two rejections within a week of the miscarriage - and I daren't feel optimistic about it. Despite having had such encouraging feedback, at the back of my mind is an assumption that this book will never get published. That I'll have to write another one instead. That in two or three months the answers "No" will drip steadily through my inbox, and I'll have to decide whether to keep trying or to give up.
So there you go, and so it drags on.
[shrug]
___
So here's a summary.
My first book was published June '04. It was very exciting. And after that I was all fired up and motivated to write another one - my confidence in my writing skills at an all time high. But still I managed to dither endlessly, and 18 months later I still hadn't got any further. Well, I had written a novel's worth of words - about 80,000, I think - but they were all just notes. Almost no prose. And I had concocted an impossibly complicated plot that even I couldn't follow, or even keep all in my head at the same time.
My plan had always been to finish Novel II before starting work on Baby II, but I was getting older, my son was getting older, and the book wasn't even started yet. So I asked for unpaid leave and took seven months off work to finish the book. Not long after this I sent a very early draft to my agent, but she didn't like it. So I rewrote it. And ploughed ahead. In October '06, I finished Novel II. Supposedly. But it was only really a second draft, still needed work, and it wasn't until Feb '07 that it was finished. And then I sent it to four agents. And started work on Baby II. And waited. And then I had a miscarriage. And three of the agents said no. In a very nice friendly detailed very-nearly-yes kind of a way, but it was still No.
So I rewrote the first few chapters, edited the rest, sent it out again - to a bigger batch of agents this time. The current situation is that six agents have asked to read the full manuscript (this is a pretty big deal - it means they've read and enjoyed the first 3 chaps and asked to see more on that basis), four agents were interested by the synopsis and asked to read the first 3 chaps on that basis, and some others have still not got back to me after I sent unsolicited submissions.
Literary agents, for those who don't know, are hard to come by. They do a similar job to estate agents, with books instead of houses. And it's even harder to sell a book (for decent money, with respected publisher and good contract) without an agent than it is to sell a house. And the big difference is that, whereas an estate agent will tout for your business and take anyone on, literary agents are very choosy indeed. To give you an idea: Most literary agents get sent thousands of manuscripts per year, and only take on one or two new clients in that time.
But they are also busy people and always have massive piles of manuscripts waiting to be read, and the ones from existing clients get priority, and it takes them typically two to four months to read and respond to a full manuscript.
So now I just have to sit back and wait for a response. And I'm dealing with this by focusing on other stuff and trying to just forget about it.
Technically I'm in a very strong position. It's rare to get such a positive response from so many agents. And it is a great book. But I've been in similar positions before, and it's ended in disappointment. And there are millions of writers out there, and many of them have written great books, not all of which will get published. And the book has somehow got caught up with the miscarriage in my head - mainly because I received two rejections within a week of the miscarriage - and I daren't feel optimistic about it. Despite having had such encouraging feedback, at the back of my mind is an assumption that this book will never get published. That I'll have to write another one instead. That in two or three months the answers "No" will drip steadily through my inbox, and I'll have to decide whether to keep trying or to give up.
So there you go, and so it drags on.
[shrug]
___
Labels: Writing About Writing
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