Wednesday, September 15, 2010
Knowing when to quit
Today's quick tip- if an agency has some interest, although it may be tempting to pressure them, don't. If they're undecided about your work and you start acting pushing or desperate, they aren't going to want to work with you. It wouldn't be surprising if it took months, even years to sell. Or maybe that book never will. Maybe it will be your second or third that first gets printed and your fifth or sixth that establishes you as a solid mid-list. Who knows? Point is, agents are in it for the long haul. If you get pushy so early on, they might decide you're more distruptive of their work than your work is worth, even if it's good material. So do yourself a favor and have a little faith that the agency is really considering you. And if an agency does sign you, keep it in mind. Have a little faith that we're really trying to help you. Never forget that in both reputation and money, the author's success is sucess for the agency as well. So even if we were mean spirited, awful people, we still want you to succeed. Please don't make it harder for us to help you.
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This was a very helpful post for those of us new and eager to throw away the “un” status. Thanks for putting this out there.
ReplyDeleteI have been on this blog laughing at the Killer Klowns from Outer Space references and the Fried Chicken and Sushi advice to NOT take that job teaching English overseas.
Needless to say ... I've been raping your blog for information as I prepare to submit to The McVeigh Agency. What a great find this blog is!
I'm new to writing, and determined to get published so being able to put a personality with a face helps take the edge off. Just the edge, the fear is still there.
Thanks for showing some humanity and for posting to this blog. Hope you get a chance to enjoy reading some of my thoughts as I have enjoyed reading yours.
... and as to why White America is just America, you got me. I'm Native American and for the love of all this written I can't seem to figure out why we get a prefix at all!
Lightfoot Osolage
I'm glad I set the blog up just recently to e-mail me whenever someone makes a comment or I'd totally have missed this. I'm glad you're enjoying the blog, and that I've been of some help.
ReplyDeletePolitical correctness and race relations are so weird, and so difficult. Many times, I feel like they just create unecessary distinctions between "us" and "them." At the same time, I have on ocassion tried to convince black friends of this point of view, but so far they've all staunchly supported being a seperate group of "African Americans." After all, they're just American. My family immigrated much more recently than most of theirs, but who would call me Italian-American or German American? By third generation, and often by second, the distinction is gone. But they're reluctant because what would happen if they were "just" American? Would their subculture be subsumed? What are they to be called? Black? Negro? Colored? It sounds like a backslide rather than a step forward, and although I think it WOULD be a step forward, it just sounds wrong to so many people.
Ironically, my father who is about as insensitive to this stuff as is conceivably possible is the one who got me started on this. He was an American historian, and he never much liked the "Native American" title. He was a teacher and really chafed when they made such a point of changing terms back in the late 80s and early 90s. "We spent three hundred years coming up with stupid things to call them, and now we found one that sounds good to us and assume it solves everything."