The Daily Rejection

RaggedEdge said:

Hathor, I agree; I don't think your word count is a problem for your category and genre. And I didn't notice any unnecessary adverbs, FWIW. But I am wondering if any of the net 5000 words you added include more of Hades hot touch.

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Heh, heh, maybe I'll add a few of my beloved adverbs back in.

I've gone through my list and haven't had a major impact on my word count. (1K off the total? Hardly worth the effort.) Either I'm a stronger writer now or I caught stuff in the earlier drafts.

The added words are mostly description, gesture, emotional turmoil, and excitement added to the climax. (You were spot on about that Now the plan to take down the baddie doesn't go smoothly.)

Not much more of Hades' hot touch per se... but more thinking about it. Gee, you and krash have certainly caused my book to be steamier than I originally thought it would be.

So far, though, I've resisted the impulse to put the god in a Darcy outfit. But given the way I picture him in my mind, he'd look damn fine in one.

Hathor said:

The added words are mostly description, gesture, emotional turmoil, and excitement added to the climax.

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Excellent! We all know Hades and Persephone's story MUST have an intense climax.

OH MY GOODNESS I HATE TECH SUPPORT!


That is all.

RaggedEdge said:

Excellent! We all know Hades and Persephone's story MUST have an intense climax.

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This morning I woke up thinking OMG IT'S MONDAY. That means today and tomorrow I'm in Rejection mode. Mondays and Tuesdays are evil.

WendyN said:

Happy Monday, everyone. I had an unusually quiet inbox this weekend - I usually get at least one or two short story responses rolling in.

Sounds like everyone's been pretty busy with their WIPs. Yay for being productive and getting stuff done!

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Happy Monday

I envy you all your productivity. I've got two ideas brewing, but am not crazy in love with either, really. One is paranormal so basically impossible to sell (plus has a male POV which I doubt I'd be any good at writing - I get caught up in description and prettiness, neither of which would fit a boy, probably). The other is contemp, my favourite subgenre, and I like the inciting incident and characters but just can't bring myself to start it.
Whether my slacking is to do with starting a new, tiring job, I don't know, but I wish I had an awesome WIP to sink my teeth into!

LadyA said:

Happy Monday

I envy you all your productivity. I've got two ideas brewing, but am not crazy in love with either, really. One is paranormal so basically impossible to sell (plus has a male POV which I doubt I'd be any good at writing - I get caught up in description and prettiness, neither of which would fit a boy, probably). The other is contemp, my favourite subgenre, and I like the inciting incident and characters but just can't bring myself to start it.
Whether my slacking is to do with starting a new, tiring job, I don't know, but I wish I had an awesome WIP to sink my teeth into!

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I didn't know you wrote paranormal, Amy! What's are your WIPs about?

LadyA said:

Happy Monday

I envy you all your productivity. I've got two ideas brewing, but am not crazy in love with either, really. One is paranormal so basically impossible to sell (plus has a male POV which I doubt I'd be any good at writing - I get caught up in description and prettiness, neither of which would fit a boy, probably). The other is contemp, my favourite subgenre, and I like the inciting incident and characters but just can't bring myself to start it.
Whether my slacking is to do with starting a new, tiring job, I don't know, but I wish I had an awesome WIP to sink my teeth into!

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I always see agents asking for more YA from a male POV. I'd say it's worth a shot, whether it be paranormal or not.

The_Ink_Goddess said:

I didn't know you wrote paranormal, Amy! What's are your WIPs about?

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I don't really write paranormal, normally - I just love the selkie folklore, and one of my favourite stories as a child was The Selkie Bride. I wanted to write my own spin on that, but write it in such a way that it's never definitely paranormal or contemp - it's up to the reader to decide. I thought I would write it from the POV of a boy who lives on an island, and falls for this girl who turns up out of the blue - she could be a selkie, she could be an illegal immigrant who was washed ashore from a boat that sank in the sea nearby. She stays, is fostered by an old couple, and he shows her his life, brings her into his friendship group etc, and they fall in love or lust - and she gets pregnant. Every second chapter, it's the parallel storyline - starting the day after she has given birth, and disappeared without a trace. As he grieves and tries to rasie his daughter, he becomes fixed on the idea that she is a selkie - that must be why she's left him and their baby.

She might be, she might not be, and at the end neither he nor the reader would know for sure.


And then the other one is:
16-yr-old Rashmi is one of the ruling clique at her small high school, a position and friendship group she clings to as her newly-adopted parents paint the nursery and choose baby names for their miracle - the baby that is bound to be her replacement.
So when her shy, devoted best friend accidentally hits her boyfriend with her car, sending him into a coma, Rashmi gives her an alibi to protect her and ensure her own place in her best friend's heart. When the baby's born, Noelle will be all she's got.
But when a local boy from a hated family becomes a suspect for the hit and run - and a target for the whole town's intimidation and mob judgement - Rashmi has to decide if she should protect her friend and potentially send an innocent person to prison, or save the boy who she never liked much anyway, and in doing so, maybe give her adoptive parents the excuse they need to kick her out.

LadyA said:

I don't really write paranormal, normally - I just love the selkie folklore, and one of my favourite stories as a child was The Selkie Bride. I wanted to write my own spin on that, but write it in such a way that it's never definitely paranormal or contemp - it's up to the reader to decide. I thought I would write it from the POV of a boy who lives on an island, and falls for this girl who turns up out of the blue - she could be a selkie, she could be an illegal immigrant who was washed ashore from a boat that sank in the sea nearby. She stays, is fostered by an old couple, and he shows her his life, brings her into his friendship group etc, and they fall in love or lust - and she gets pregnant. Every second chapter, it's the parallel storyline - starting the day after she has given birth, and disappeared without a trace. As he grieves and tries to rasie his daughter, he becomes fixed on the idea that she is a selkie - that must be why she's left him and their baby.

She might be, she might not be, and at the end neither he nor the reader would know for sure.


And then the other one is:
16-yr-old Rashmi is one of the ruling clique at her small high school, a position and friendship group she clings to as her newly-adopted parents paint the nursery and choose baby names for their miracle - the baby that is bound to be her replacement.
So when her shy, devoted best friend accidentally hits her boyfriend with her car, sending him into a coma, Rashmi gives her an alibi to protect her and ensure her own place in her best friend's heart. When the baby's born, Noelle will be all she's got.
But when a local boy from a hated family becomes a suspect for the hit and run - and a target for the whole town's intimidation and mob judgement - Rashmi has to decide if she should protect her friend and potentially send an innocent person to prison, or save the boy who she never liked much anyway, and in doing so, maybe give her adoptive parents the excuse they need to kick her out.

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So I want to read both of these. Like, right now.

Brutal day in the query trenches for me today. 3 rejections with I e invitation for future work. Ugh.

Carleree said:

Brutal day in the query trenches for me today. 3 rejections with I e invitation for future work. Ugh.

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I'm pouring a glass of wine in your honor *cheers*

Sorry, Carleree. The invitation for future work is good, but it makes it extra tough to think you got close without actually getting there.

Carleree said:

Brutal day in the query trenches for me today. 3 rejections with I e invitation for future work. Ugh.

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we're still riding high on your full out there! fingers crossed.

Sent out three queries this evening. Let's see if they stick...

Sorry about the rejections, Carleree.

Yet another lonely day for my inbox. This is really strange.

I have looked at my past stats in terms of responses/nonresponses. If the past is any indication, I have a large number of people who should be at least rejecting me.

Like I said, strange.

I'm about through my last run-through of WIP on my computer. Next is hard copy. I'm always amazed what new things I see when I have paper in my hands.

JJ Litke said:

Sorry, Carleree. The invitation for future work is good, but it makes it extra tough to think you got close without actually getting there.

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This one sucks because she said the same thing for my LAST book.

Oh well moving on. To cake. Lots of cake.

Hathor said:

Yet another lonely day for my inbox. This is really strange.

I have looked at my past stats in terms of responses/nonresponses. If the past is any indication, I have a large number of people who should be at least rejecting me.

Like I said, strange.

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Crickets here, too. Comic-Con + RWA14 + summer vacations?

WendyN said:

Crickets here, too. Comic-Con + RWA14 + summer vacations?

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This could explain my experience, in part. Only others on this thread seem to be getting more responses (yeah, the grass is always greener, ain't it?). And I see some of the agents mentioning on Twitter how they're doing queries. And some comments on QT mention responses for queries either right before or right after mine.

I just have to be more patient, I guess It's not as if I have an alternative, you know?

I did get back the agent critique of my first five pages, though, so I know my Gmail account is still working. I haven't looked at it yet. It came late yesterday, and I didn't want to stay up dealing with it (or lying in bed thinking about dealing with it).

I hope you're through with tech support for the time being And get some happy inbox news, of course

Now to finish my last computer run-through of WIP before going to hard copy. And then being brave enough to look at that critique. Of course, by now I've rewritten my beginning, so this should give me a little mental armor -- unless she thinks the entire thing doesn't have enough action and should be scrapped.

No, my hour w/ tech support yielded the answer "Oh. No, we don't have replacement parts for the printer itself." Which they could have told me in the first two minutes, but instead dragged me along, even making me take a picture of where the piece ought to have been, just to tell me that they don't have replacement parts.

Also, talking with our auto finance guy yesterday (twice, plus emails) yielded the answer "I'll call you back"... which he never did. I'm already looking into other finance options.

But enough about that. Short story R, which means my email is working.

Hoping for a good day, but I'll settle for better than yesterday.

RaggedEdge said:

Excellent! We all know Hades and Persephone's story MUST have an intense climax.

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Carleree, but at least it's another invite, and not a "stop bothering me."

Sorry for everyone else's frustrations!

Hathor, there'd better be some ribbiting in the "climax"...


Form R today from one I'd written off as a CNR, so at least it didn't bother me.

Can someone techy (JJ, I'm looking at you) tell me why on 3 different computers with different settings/security/OFPs I can't seem to post a picture to Twitter? Is there a Twitter setting for this or something?

I'm aggravated with WIP right now. I ripped apart the beginning and I think the first chapter definitely benefited, but I've moved the "nothing happens" issue now to CH2 and 3. I added some references to Ch1, but I'm not sure it's going to hold the reader until Ch4. Trying to figure out how to un-boring it...

ETA 19 days until PW!

Krash, tell me what error message you're getting. Is it timing out, or saying you don't have permissions or something?

No error message. Nothing happens. Sometimes I can still click the add photo button again and still nothing happens, sometimes the add photo button becomes inactive. I checked the file sizes and they're within bounds, so...I dunno.

WendyN said:

Crickets here, too. Comic-Con + RWA14 + summer vacations?

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I think you're exactly right.