Tag: queries

End-of-summer update

~ K ~ 4 Comments

It’s nearly the end of summer, and I haven’t blogged at all in the past 3 months.

I suppose the big news is that I am 4 months pregnant with our first child thanks to fertility treatments. (I highly recommend Shady Grove Fertility if you live in the mid-Atlantic states.) The first three months were a bit rough going as I was sick on and off, But I’m feeling much better now that I’m in my second trimester.

I submitted queries to agents for my completed novel, Getting Right with God, and was rejected by all of them. How disappointing. And after sending to an editor and having a few established writers review the opening pages of my work, I realize that I still have more work and more revision to do. I’m afraid that the book itself just isn’t marketable, but I’m not willing to self-publish. What a conundrum.

I am working on a novel idea for NaNoWriMo in which a black teenage girl from New York City relocates to the Philadelphia suburbs and attends a posh, primarily white private school. Conflict ensues!

Other than that, I’ve just been working like crazy at the library as a library assistant. I attended two book club meetings this week, which were actually quite enjoyable. We read Beauty Queens by Libba Bray for one and The Hunger Games trilogy (yes, that’s all three books) for another. On my own, I’m reading several books at once:

Quiet is the most intriguing book of all to me. I’m afraid A History of the World… is going to be rather dry reading.

I wish I had more interesting things to say. There are so many topics going on: President Obama’s second term, Syria, the Affordable Care Act, Egypt, Russia… but alas, I have no brainpower or opinions of my own on any of these things, So enjoy this brief update.

 

Writing Conference

~ K ~ 1 Comment

So I’m attending the Writer’s Digest Conference in New York City in 2013. I will be there pitch slamming my little heart out. I’m not sure what to expect out of the conference. I’m excited to hear James Scott Bell, who’s a fantastic speaker and writing coach. And I’d like to read an Adriana Trigiani book beforehand since she’s the keynote speaker, but I have a dilemma…

I’ve determined that I will write a book during the month of April. So I lose 3 valuable days to conferencing. I hope I learn something worthwhile. I’m so afraid that what I hear will be a rehash of what I learned in 2011. (On the other hand, I suppose a rehash could be a good thing.) But another part of me is excited because my novel is in much better shape for sending to agents than it was in 2011. I feel more confident about hocking my book now. It’s just a matter of nailing down that “hook” so I can properly pitch to agents and get them interested in what I think is a compelling story. (Of course I think it’s compelling—it’s my book!)