WEbook Page To Fame Update

A few weeks ago I got some astounding news. My WEbook Page to Fame submission got elevated to the final round! (They call me a winner, baby!) I had to go and check out what this meant… It means that my submission is now hanging out in the literary agent showcase. Then I had to see what that means… Which is basically that all submissions that have made it through all the rounds are placed in a virtual pot where agents can sift through looking for the next bestseller. (Not thinking that my story will get snapped up, but still, very cool!! And good company to be in!)

So, I guess this is the final deal for my submission. It’s been a $4.95 well spent, I tell ya!

Oh, and I think I forgot to mention that a month or two ago, the publishing pro who rated my first five pages gave me a 5 out of 5!!!! Whoa! How crazy is that? It almost makes me think I might have something here. That inspires me to keep on writing! Has a contest inadvertently inspired you lately?

Ay karumba!

Page To Fame Raters–I LOVE You!

“Wow.”

The raters over on WEbook’s Page To Fame contest have knocked my socks off. Seriously. Socks across the room, stuck in a plant.

As some of you may have read, I’ve been doing the Page To Fame thing over on WEbook. I have one submission that has made it to round 3 (submit 50 pages). Currently it has 7 ratings and a 72% elevation rate (that means 72% of the readers gave it a 4 or 5 out of 5 and therefore want it to go to the next level). That in itself makes me feel pretty good! But what really wows me is not only how many of the raters have plucked the very questions/thoughts, etc., I have from my mind about my work, but also wonderful, giving comments like this:

“That said, I truly admire the quality of the writing itself—-IMHO you’re writing at a professional level, which I think is rare here.”

Wow. Just Wow. What an amazing compliment. Truly. This person had issues with the format–something I have struggled with. Do I keep it all letter style or not? I tell you this: Page to Fame rocks. I get to see what readers think and how they react to my work. Maybe I will change the format. Maybe not. We’ll see what they tell me because quite honestly these wonderful readers and raters are rockin’ my socks off and giving me a much needed boost. Thank you anonymous rater–you made my week! Heck, my month!

(And yes, you may have heard through the grapevine that it took my about 2 weeks to suck up enough courage to look at these ratings. Talk about needing to grow a pair!)

In my opinion, these raters’ comments are spot on. And I really appreciate the time they have put in to not only reach the status of a round 3 rater, but how they have given up their time to rate a stranger’s work (50 pages) and provide such helpful feedback (300+ words).

Thank you, raters! You are doing a fab job–very professional and helpful and us WEbookers appreciate you and all your hard work!

Get Noticed by Agent Deidre Knight

Deidre Knight of the Knight agency is holding a little something special on November 30th. Are you looking for an agent? Hoping to get noticed, but want to try something a little more daring than emailing a query?

May I ask if you have tried speed dating an agent? Because when it comes to Deidre Knight, She’s Just That Into You!

Okay, after Tuesday’s post about not querying agents anywhere you happen across them, you might be scratching your head and wondering what sort of wacky tobacky Jean’s found. (It’s just an eggnog chai latte–I swear! No rum or anything!) Because doesn’t the recommendation to speed date an agent kind of going against that earlier advice?

Yes. And no. Let Ms. Knight (as per her agency blog) explain for me:

Knight Agency president and founder Deidre Knight is on the hunt for a fresh, unique voice to add to her personal client roster. Are you the one she’s looking for? Find out by joining us here on The Knight Agency blog for “Speed Dating with Deidre.” Beginning Tuesday, November 30th, Deidre will whittle down the first 125 entries to one lucky winner.* The contest opens at 8:00am ET right here on the blog, so set your alarms!

Oh, and there’s a special bonus, one randomly drawn winner will receive a first chapter critique from Deidre – drawn from all entries.**

That’s right… she’s looking for a new voice. Is yours what she is looking for? If you think it might be, post your name on the contest blog post on the 30th. In the meantime, check out your manuscript and give it a polish if you think it might need it, and also be sure to check out her submission guidelines (what she’s interested in representing) as well as the rest of the contest rules.
Good luck and may November 30th be your lucky day.

P.S. Happy Thanksgiving to all my American readers. May your turkey be moist and succulent and your pie heaped with mounds of whipped cream. Mmmmm!

Update: Goals and Challenges

Okay, who stole last week? No, I’m serious. It vanished without even the typical whooshing sound it makes when a week goes flying by me!

I think it is about time for a little update from me. As you know, I have issued a few challenges to myself in the last year. Here are the goods:

Good news first? You betcha!

My romance group critique partners and I issued each other a challenge–get a literary agent by Christmas. Well, guess what? 2 of the 3 of us have! I would be in that statistic–due to a humongous leg-up from Calista Taylor–she put a well-timed word in for me. The third partner is doing edits requested by an agent that could very well lead to representation. Wow! Can all three of us meet that goal? I think so!

PASS!

(So, yes. I am now ‘agented’ and have been working on my proposal for my nonfiction Kid’s Play project. We hope to have that out on submission soon. Cross your fingers for me!)

Other good news:

My WEbook Page to Fame submission (Humorous women’s fiction) got elevated to round 3! I haven’t submitted it yet, but will soon. (More on that as time goes by.)

PASS

And then I’ve been letting other things slide…

Remember my challenge to myself to read 5 banned/challenged books in one year? Well, I didn’t quite make it. I blame all those other good books in my life and how they’ve weasled their way ahead in the To Be Read lineup. I do still plan to read those banned/challenged books. And I will.

FAIL

As for my Read Around the World Challenge which is an ongoing project… well, I haven’t posted anything in months, but I have been keeping tabs on what I read. I’ve gotten to the point where it is typically the same three or four countries being read over and over again. But, I do have a little something from France that I will post (one of these days).

Er… FAIL? Er…PASS? You decide.

And lastly, there is my tidy up and organize my life New Year’s plan. Yes, I am still working on that one. Decluttering, etc. I have shredded and recycled a whole pile of old manuscripts–don’t worry, I still have copies! But I still haven’t cured the problem of the tumbling items on the top shelf of the back door closet yet. Working on it though. Well, mentally. (I might mention that in the New Year’s Plan post I also mentioned getting an agent and also relaxing a bit–I’ve done both.)

Er… PASS? Mostly.

That’s all from me at the moment, any news updates from you?

Lucky UK?

Two chances to get your writing noticed in the United Kingdom!

First is Penguin (yes, the publisher) over in the UK. Until the end of the month they are accepting queries (along with a synopsis–no word on the preferred length). Generally, big publishing houses such as this one do not allow writers to query them directly as they prefer their queries to come from agents–it lessens the load. So, regularly if you query–they ignore, shred, or simply dump your query in a slush pile where someday someone might actually find your submission and get back to you–but most likely not.

More details on this chance here. (The good news on this one is that it doesn’t matter where you call home–you can submit!)

Good luck!

Second up is also UK centered. Transworld Publishers (another publisher) is seeking full length novels in their Terry Pratchet contest. The clicker is that you must be a citizen of the UK  or a Commonwealth country. That includes CANADA!!!! Yipee!

The deadline is December 31st, 2010. More details here.

Best of luck!

WEbook Challenge News

So, guess what?

My finely edited piece that I entered in the WEbook Page To Fame Challenge was ixnayed. However, my not-so edited piece (which does have a slightly flashier and more interesting first page) has been elevated to the next level. I’ve been asked to submit the next 5 pages for level 2 and two literary agents will be reviewing the first page. A critique partner of mine has already had her first page elevated on her submission as well as rated by literary agents. She says they just click the button–just like the average joe reviewers–and that you don’t get personal feedback. Nuts.

If this image is blurry, you need to drink less. I’m not judging, I’m just saying….

Still, cool beans! It’s been worth the $5 entry fee in entertainment value alone.

WEbook Contest Update

Whew, what a week! I love it when weeks streak by, and that one certainly did. Let’s see, we bought a larger second-hand vehicle this week, I started a new job, did a hefty pile of good things for friends and acquaintances (working on my sainthood here), and we put my beloved Dodge Shadow up for sale. (sniff, sniff) I even almost destroyed my computer this week. And then I discovered, it wasn’t actually me or the computer, it was Windows and a bad update. Whew! I thought I had lost everything. That would have really sucked bo-bo. In a big way.

Speaking of updates, I remembered to check on my WEbook Page to Fame submissions today. I tell ya, I’ve gotten a lot of entertainment out of those $5 submissions.

Anyway, here’s a screen shot of how I’m doing at the moment:

I’m doing much better since they’ve removed all the ‘bad’ votes. It turns out some folks were going on there and lowballing submissions that weren’t theirs. I had kind of wondered why I had the almost exact same crappy marks for two very different projects–one that had been very much edited and one that hadn’t (at all, really). Now, there is a variety in marks which is relieving and expected. The edited project is doing 4% better (it’s the 2nd one in the above image). Interesting, isn’t it?

I may have already mentioned this, but I love the fact that this contest (which allows you to submit the first page–about 250 words if I recall correctly) has opened my eyes to things I need to improve. Looking at my first page and looking at the marks that were coming in, I quickly realized my story was not showing how it was different right up front. It was, well, kind of average in its topic, if you know what I mean? Thanks to this contest, combined with a few bits of agent feedback, I have since improved my opening with a few tweaks to let the reader see that this might not be your typical girl-getting-married-and-having-second-thoughts kind of story.

I sure do love it when feedback helps me see what I need to do to push my writing to the next level.

How about you? Have you gotten a tidbit somewhere lately that’s opened your eyes to what you need to do to make your work better or make it stand out?

P.S. I’ve blacked out the contest submission titles as I don’t want folks I know inflating my marks out of the kindness of their dear little hearts. Just in case they might be tempted….

Crazy Rejection Reactions

As a writer, sometimes rejections make us do crazy things. I have personally reacted all over the spectrum when it has come to the rejection of my pages, from the indifferent shrug to the all out breakdown/tantrum.

Now, I just want to take a moment to say that all my agent rejections have been exceedingly kind and complimentary–it is NOT the agent. In the reasons for my rejection, there is always that little something missing in my stories that will make it jump out in the tough market I am seem to be drawn to writing for.

Once the sting of rejection passes, what does a writer do? While I briefly consider the idea of giving up, I always return to the worn out keyboard more determined than ever. (Well, maybe not more than ever, per se, but pretty darn determined.) However, today I took an ‘extreme’ approach. I decided to go ahead and enter WEbook‘s PageToFame contest (entry fee $4.95 per entry). I didn’t just enter once, I entered twice. Yes, you heard me. I even entered things nobody else has read before. Scary. I know. Not yet tried, tested or edited.

Why did I do this? Because I want to know how a blind reader sees my work (okay, they only actually get to read the first 250 words). Yes, there are big prizes involved if you do well, but I’m not in it for the prizes. I need to know whether my pages (okay, okay, first 250 words, 200 shy of when the caca hits the spinning blades in my story, propelling everything in chaos) have the potential to stand out. And I am learning that they do not.

Story 1: 2 rankings
Story 2: 6 rankings

Reading through some of the PageToFame submissions, I can say that I feel as though I am at least average (even though my marks above say I’m below reader expectations). However, I should add that I can be a little delusional about my own talent, varying from ‘this is brilliant’ to ‘this blows multi-coloured chunks.’ As well, if someone you know has entered PageToFame and you want to judge their entry, you have to sift through quite a bit of slush until you land upon it. While readers may be tempted to say they don’t like the work just to move through to the next submission which may be the one they are looking for, there is also the very real realization that they are clicking low numbers because they aren’t grabbed by the story (or they are trying to take out their competition–women can be sneaky that way. I say women because I entered in the women’s fiction category, which is mostly written by women). Then again, I may just be making up excuses and need to get a life.

Have you been rejected? What is the craziest thing you’ve done to combat the sting and self-doubt?