35,518 Words
I met Denise Mina on Wednesday night (Garnethill, Exile, Resolution, etc. see link.) A fab crime author and a really nice woman too. It's made me wonder if I gave up on Amelia's Body too easily. I think I just got to the point where I really hated it and when J.M. said she didn't want it, I just thought fair enough - neither do I.
So what exactly happened? It's a bit of a blur, probably because I was in the process of thickening my skin and initially pretended the rejections weren't happening. I've been back through the pile so let's look at the stats.
1st lot of submissions: 17. Rejections: 17
Followed by six months of rewriting.
2nd lot of submissions: 8. Rejections: 7, requests for full ms: 1
Followed by six weeks of furious polishing and spell-checking.
March 2008, sent off full ms to agent J.M.
Rejections: 1
Embarrassment at getting full ms returned and discovering it contained two chapters with identical titles: excruciating.
Maybe all is not lost with novel 1? I don't hate it quite as much as I did six months ago.
A
So what exactly happened? It's a bit of a blur, probably because I was in the process of thickening my skin and initially pretended the rejections weren't happening. I've been back through the pile so let's look at the stats.
1st lot of submissions: 17. Rejections: 17
Followed by six months of rewriting.
2nd lot of submissions: 8. Rejections: 7, requests for full ms: 1
Followed by six weeks of furious polishing and spell-checking.
March 2008, sent off full ms to agent J.M.
Rejections: 1
Embarrassment at getting full ms returned and discovering it contained two chapters with identical titles: excruciating.
Maybe all is not lost with novel 1? I don't hate it quite as much as I did six months ago.
A
posted by WorkingOnABook at 10:36 am
5 Comments:
"Maybe all is not lost with novel 1?"
- of course it bloody isn't!!!! Okay, hate it for a while, forget about it for a bit, burn some copies on the bonfire. Then go back and start sending it out again.
I'd buy it.
px
(That was me being a bit bossy, btw )
px
Thanks Poppy! I'm going to give it some thought, anyway. Maybe I'll shut myself away for a weekend with a big bottle of wine and a sharp blue pencil and hack it to bits (in the hope of being able to put it back together again - a bit like Molly Ringwald's dress in Pretty In Pink.)
Hi Amy, I've tagged you with a new "Spread the Word" tag - details here: http://writingandallthat.wordpress.com/2008/10/26/spread-the-word-again-a-new-tag/
Feel free to ignore if you don't want to do it!
Caro
Hi Amy
I've tagged you. Please see my blog for details.
Oh, so has Caro. Oh well, you're double tagged!!
pxx
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