Worms! Rejection & the Writer.

[Paul Whybrow]

I'm up to Chapter 11 of my fourth novel, with about 13,000 words written, and though I'm not entirely sure of where I'm going (I never am—about anything!), I'm happy with the progress of Sin Killers.

I had my 12th rejection email this morning, from the 60 I sent out this year. What rather unsettles me about these, is that they often come with a signature of someone I didn't submit to. I spend ages researching who is the best agent at an agency to query, as we're advised to do by publishing industry experts—apparently, 85% of queries are immediately rejected as they are sent to the wrong agent. To do that, and then hear back from someone whose name doesn't even appear on their website, makes me think that some work-experience flunky has been ordered to chuck out the last 1,000 submissions with a form letter.

It doesn't put me off—just makes me feel even more jaundiced about the so-called expertise of literary agents. It's hard not to get cynical when I look at the marketing side of selling books. Thanks to the huge success of three novels with the word 'girl' in the title—Gone Girl, Girl On A Train and The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo—there's been a whole slew of crime novels that have 'girl' on the cover. Perhaps I should alter one of mine to 'Girly Girl Has Girl On Girl Action at the Gorilla Grill', (I'm going for the animal lover and foodie fans too!)

Never mind. I keep reminding myself of novelist and screenwriter William Goldman's observation, that:

“Nobody knows anything...... Not one person in the entire motion picture field knows for a certainty what's going to work. Every time out it's a guess and if you're lucky, an educated one.”

I'll just keep on plugging away while treating rejections from agents like the worms of the nursery rhyme.

How do you cope with rejection?

Nobody Likes Me (Guess I'll Go Eat Worms)

Nobody likes me, everybody hates me,
Guess I'll go eat worms.
Long, thin, slimy ones; Short, fat, juicy ones,
Itsy, bitsy, fuzzy wuzzy worms.

Down goes the first one, down goes the second one,
Oh, how they wiggle and squirm.
Up comes the first one, up comes the second one,
Oh, how they wiggle and squirm.

I'll cut their heads off
suck their guts out
and throw their skins away
Surprising how us girls can eat
worms three times a day
That's how we get our wiggles.

 

[Katie-Ellen]

It'll be their PA, signing for them. Doesn't mean they didn't look at it themselves.

I mostly bat the rejections straight out of court. I might shed a tear if I'm particularly tired but that's just fatigue.

 

[Chase Gamwell]

I stopped worrying about out-of-hand rejections this year. If I worried about every single rejection I got, I'd have anxiety issues. Instead, I focus all of my obsessive attention on those few agents that request (then eventually reject) partials. But, even then, my hopes aren't terribly high. I'm not sure I've actually written anything worth publishing yet...

 

[Patricia D]

I would prefer a rejection to three months of silence, which is what I've gotten from the last agent to ask for a full. And yes, I did send a reminder e-mail, also ignored. This is why people query more than one agent at a time, and I should have.

 

[Katie-Ellen]

Great that you were asked for a full But Life's too short for exclusive submissions.

 

[Patricia D]

Great that you were asked for a full But Life's too short for exclusive submissions.

I'm beginning to wonder if life is too short for traditional publishing period. Months for the agent to respond; and then, should they say yes, there is editing per the agent's input; and then should they sell the book, there is editing per the publisher's input; and then and then and then...

We all have to figure out what we really want with our writing then set our own goals. I'm still working on it.

 

[Katie-Ellen]

Me too. Writers have to read. I've always read. My last few novel reads, new or newish releases, the last 5 or 6 have ultimately been disappointing. Much hyped, some style, but little nourishment, and ultimately negligible. I research the book's back story. These have included established names and new names found via creative writing PhDs. There are a few of these now, and a sense of 'writing farms' now springing up, where writers pay to write their novel via the vehicle of an MA or PHD, agents visit, publishers get to 'grow their own', the way THEY want them.
And the prose is often good, as it ought to be, but it is 'skooled' and the stories are not and fall prey to conceits.
But if that's the case, publishing will eat itself.
Self- publishing makes excellent sense and I may go that route myself, BUT without marketing, sales won't happen and too often, the editing falls short. The writer cannot expect to do all that on their own, but who is to help with editing and marketing?
No guarantees of quality by paying for it whether buying much hyped books, traditionally published, or buying support services within self publishing.

 

[Patricia D]

without marketing, sales won't happen and too often, the editing falls short. The writer cannot expect to do all that on their own, but who is to help with editing and marketing?
No guarantees of quality by paying for it whether buying much hyped books, traditionally published, or buying support services within self publishing.

That is the tough part. Writers helping each other via crit groups helps with the editing, but marketing ... I wish I knew

 

[David Newrick]

Where can I buy a copy of 'Girly Girl Has Girl On Girl Action at the Gorilla Grill' Paul?

 

[Paul Whybrow]

Where can I buy a copy of 'Girly Girl Has Girl On Girl Action at the Gorilla Grill' Paul?

It'll be coming shortly (!)—it will conform to Don Marquis' advice:

If you want to get rich from writing, write the sort of thing that's read by persons who move their lips when they're reading to themselves.

Marquis made a number of pertinent observations about the process of writing and publishing, including this pithy favourite—which though it's about poetry applies very well to what happens when you query literary agents!

Publishing a volume of poetry is like dropping a rose petal down the Grand Canyon and waiting for the echo.

 

[Robinne Weiss]

I'm beginning to wonder if life is too short for traditional publishing period. Months for the agent to respond; and then, should they say yes, there is editing per the agent's input; and then should they sell the book, there is editing per the publisher's input; and then and then and then...

We all have to figure out what we really want with our writing then set our own goals. I'm still working on it.

I agree with you there. I don't know how it's going to go, because marketing is my weak skill (no...I have no skill in marketing. It's not even weak, just nonexistent), but I feel so much better having made the decision to self-publish. And I feel better having decided to focus right now on NZ--I can get my head around marketing here--most of it face-to-face or word of mouth, because it's a small place and I already have some recognition as The Bug Lady here. If I can get NZ marketing sorted, then I'll look further. Baby steps, but it feels good (if terrifying) to be moving forward, as opposed to waiting. It does mean I'm spending less time writing and more time on 'business', but if the result is that my books get out there into readers' hands, I'll be happy.

 

[Katie-Ellen]

I expect you looked at these already, Robinne...for their services supporting self publishing, if not publishing with them under their children's imprint? David Ling Publishing - One of New Zealand's leading Independent Book Publishers

 

[Quillwitch]

Where can I buy a copy of 'Girly Girl Has Girl On Girl Action at the Gorilla Grill' Paul?

I´d like a copy too!

 

[Paul Whybrow]

I´d like a copy too!

Although I made that title up facetiously, I can't help but think that a story with that plotline would sell well to prurient readers.

Without meaning to sound bigheaded, I try to make my novels as well-written and tightly edited as I can. But, I'm coming round to the gloomy thought that I need to dumb my writing down. I should stop using complicated words to explore moral dilemmas in my detective series. Instead, I should fill my stories with words that a 10-year-old could read about a protagonist who is no more complex than a fairytale hero. This is what Lee Child does time after time with his Jack Reacher character, who is basically a victim's big, strong protector come to rescue them from the bad boys in the playground.

It would be a real struggle for me to become that simplistic, but if I'm ever going to interest a literary agent I may have to scoop out most of my brain cells and jump on some popular bandwaggon.

The 20th-century writer and critic Cyril Connolly summed up this dilemma:

Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self.

And, as Ralph Waldo Emerson observed:

People do not deserve good writing. They are so pleased with bad.

 

[Chase Gamwell]

People do not deserve good writing. They are so pleased with bad.

I hate to say that I agree with this, but I super agree with this. I grew up reading classic science fiction and I always marveled at the clarity of the writing within. But that made it very difficult for me to read newer stuff as I got older. The precision of the science fiction I used to read stuck with me and I was generally disappointed (with newer offerings). That isn't to say that ALL writers are like that, but I feel like a lot of what is out there falls on the "bad" side of the line...

(Note: I don't mean to imply that my writing is any better than the average author, either. I understand that I have a long way to go before what I put to paper is considered publishable. But I do wonder sometimes whether my "style" is what keeps agents from requesting more. Of the few partial/full requests that I've gotten feedback from, the agent always references not connecting with the writing...)

 

[Emurelda]

My reaction to my latest rejection on Sunday was 'I'm getting closer'.

 

[Quillwitch]

I am under the impression that anything done well will have its readers. It´s just a matter of doing it right. And by right I don´t mean necessarily dumbing down. It´s more about finding your own voice and your own style.
Take Umberto Eco, for instance. I would consider him asmart, maybe sometimes even difficult, but his writing is so well done that he has enough followers to make a living from it. On the other side of the spectrum we have ( cringe) Dan Brown, but both have their fans and both have been on the best seller lists.

That said, if you are actually looking to make money from writing ( which I was under the impression that you were not) then yes, you must write with the common reader in mind. Especially if you are writing detective stories that should be, above all, engaging. If you have to put the book down to find a word in the dictionary ( every paragraph) then engagement goes out the window.
Smart writing can be managed in many different ways, other than choosing the hardest words in the dictionary to tell your story. Unless, again--you want to write only for yourself, which again, is fine. But what exactly DO you want?

Having worked for years with teachers, parents and children in the much needed art of engaging readers, and getting children and families to read, I find that bigheaded writers ( such as Emerson) are the biggest obstacles to getting people to read. I mean, seriously, what constitutes bad writing? That which is not up to your standards? Tosh. Reading is reading and the first rule of reading is thou shalt not look down upon anyone´s reading choices. Even comic books serve a purpose, and beauty is always in the eye of the beholder.

You don´t have to be Lee Child, you just have to be you in a way that is engaging to the world.

 

[Jay Aitch]

I´d like a copy too!

And it's sequel, Shemale on Shemale in Stripey Pyjamas with a Dog in the Moonlight, Tattooed with a Train on the Shoulder of Orion's Belt of Cheesecake

 

[Katie-Ellen]

I read something today via the oft disparaged twitter; an agent, Lucy Luck (now with Conville and Walsh) saying that she will often work through two further redrafts with one of her authors before she presents their book to a publisher.
I found that heartening rather than disheartening. She says that even if further work is needed, it's immediately apparent whether a writer is ready fledged.
The writing has authority and reads with ease.

 

[Quillwitch]

Me too. Writers have to read. I've always read. My last few novel reads, new or newish releases, the last 5 or 6 have ultimately been disappointing. Much hyped, some style, but little nourishment, and ultimately negligible. I research the book's back story. These have included established names and new names found via creative writing PhDs. There are a few of these now, and a sense of 'writing farms' now springing up, where writers pay to write their novel via the vehicle of an MA or PHD, agents visit, publishers get to 'grow their own', the way THEY want them.
And the prose is often good, as it ought to be, but it is 'skooled' and the stories are not and fall prey to conceits.
But if that's the case, publishing will eat itself.
Self- publishing makes excellent sense and I may go that route myself, BUT without marketing, sales won't happen and too often, the editing falls short. The writer cannot expect to do all that on their own, but who is to help with editing and marketing?
No guarantees of quality by paying for it whether buying much hyped books, traditionally published, or buying support services within self publishing.

I agree. This is a trend I see in children´s publishing as well. A stupid trend, but it seems to be what works for them. They groom their in-house writers for their own needs. But that is only a part of publishing. There are many other ways to get your foot in the door. I would like to try my luck at self-publishing for some of my writing, but the marketing part is scary. And I did some marketing in college! Apparently, if you want to make it in self publishing, you need to sell in bulk. You need to have at least 10 books or short stories or novelettes on sale at the same time to actually see some money.

 

[Quillwitch]

And it's sequel, Shemale on Shemale in Stripey Pyjamas with a Dog in the Moonlight, Tattooed with a Train on the Shoulder of Orion's Belt of Cheesecake

You might be on to something. Have you ever heard of the lady who writes sasquatch porn on amazon? Or the stories about the gay bus who likes to hump his passengers? I kid you not.
Here´s a real book title: I Don't Care If My Best Friend's Mom Is a Sasquatch, She's Hot and I'm Taking a Shower With Her.

 

[Paul Whybrow]

You might be on to something. Have you ever heard of the lady who writes sasquatch porn on amazon? Or the stories about the gay bus who likes to hump his passengers? I kid you not.
Here´s a real book title: I Don't Care If My Best Friend's Mom Is a Sasquatch, She's Hot and I'm Taking a Shower With Her.

Hmmm, I don't fancy cleaning hair out of the plughole after that happens....

 

[Katie-Ellen]

As a sprog says, that would be a 'whole can of nope.'

 

[Robinne Weiss]

I expect you looked at these already, Robinne...for their services supporting self publishing, if not publishing with them under their children's imprint? David Ling Publishing - One of New Zealand's leading Independent Book Publishers

Yes, unfortunately, they haven't been taking fiction or any children's books except picture books lately. I've also found what other NZ authors have found--self-publishing through Amazon is vastly cheaper than self-publishing in country. I can get a book printed through Amazon and shipped here for significantly less than having it printed here. Totally ridiculous, but as long as you plan on the shipping delay, it makes more sense to do it overseas.

 

[Patricia D]

You might be on to something. Have you ever heard of the lady who writes sasquatch porn on amazon? Or the stories about the gay bus who likes to hump his passengers? I kid you not.
Here´s a real book title: I Don't Care If My Best Friend's Mom Is a Sasquatch, She's Hot and I'm Taking a Shower With Her.

The gay bus has pushed elf on the shelf out of my brain, and I'm grateful - I think.