Rejected!

I sent out about half a dozen queries two weeks ago.  As I said, just putting my toe in the water.  I plan to start querying in volume over Thanksgiving break.  I wrote earlier about my fear of how I will react to the first rejection.  Well, the first rejection came and went, followed by the second.  I heard from another agent saying that they had received my query and would reply later.  Haven't heard from the rest yet.

The interesting part is that I was disappointed by the rejections, but it had virtually no emotional impact on me.  Maybe I had prepared myself for it.  Maybe it was more the fact that I have some pretty heavy things going on in my life right now that kind of put an agent rejection in perspective.  I don't know.  But I'm not discouraged.  I'll keep plugging away because I believe this is a good book and that people will read it.  And if all else fails, I'll put it out there for free as an e-book in the hopes of building an audience for the next one, about which I'm already excited.

Finally Sent Some Queries

It was only a couple.  Not nearly as many as I plan to send, but I put aside my fear and stuck my toe in the water.  I think I'll wait to hear back from these folks (or until a month goes by and I decide I'm not going to hear) before sending any others.  I prefer my rejection a little at a time rather than in bulk.

They were just two emails, but each felt like a lot more than that.  It was like I was electronically sending them images of my heart and soul and asking they approve them.  Nothing's ever been so truly me as this book.  I put so much time and energy and so much of myself into it.  It's my baby--my first baby at that. To have someone say no thanks to that is a daunting concept. I'm as scared as I was while waiting to find out if I'd gotten my National Board Certification as a teacher.  I didn't get that the first time and literally spent the next 12 hours in bed.

But I did get it the second time and remember hugging everyone I could--even strangers--and being beside myself with excitement for days.  To even get a request for a full manuscript, I suspect, will feel just as momentous to me.  To have someone say I'm interested seems like such a personal affirmation that I'm not sure how I'll react if it ever happens.  When.  When it DOES happen. Maybe if I pretend to be confident long enough, I'll actually start feeling it.  

For a Writer I Don't Write Much

It's been literally months since I wrote anything longer than a comment or two on my students'  essays.  I had a bit of spare time while my students wrote practice AP essays, so I looked at my blog.  It's been since July. I pulled up my latest work-in-progress the other day.  It's been about the same length of time since I wrote a word on it. So I wonder to myself if I'm actually a writer if I seem never to write anymore.  Odd that, after all this time, I'm back to the same question with which I started this blog.  I guess I can't convince myself that I'm a writer.  I just have to try to write and not let definitions define me, if that makes any sense whatsoever.  Since I have a sneaking suspicion I'm the only person who ever reads this, I guess it only matters if it makes sense to me.  And it does.

I'm seriously considering rewriting the last chapter of my first book before sending out any queries.  I feel like I missed an opportunity.  There are two dream sequences earlier in the story and I don't know why it never occurred to me that the time the hero is in a coma from gunshot wounds would be an appropriate time to add a third.  Three is a better number than two in almost all circumstances, and it seems like a good round number here.  I could tie the other two into it and expose another layer of Harry's fragility.  So it's decided.  Another dream it is.

As I mentioned, I pulled up my new book.  I'm about 10,000 words in and, despite the fact that it has lain fallow for two months, I'm excited to pick the story back up.  Is it grievously egotistical to laugh at one's own jokes and feel that one's writing is good?  I hope not.  I hadn't believed I was a good writer (or even a half-decent one) until recently, so I hope that enjoying it is the better alternative to self-doubt.

I hope someone is reading this.  I'm not sure why.  I guess it would just be nice to know I'm not a lone unheard voice in the vast universe that is the interweb.