The Next Circle of Hell, Vol. 2

Welcome, Cristin! It sounds like you've had a very up and down experience!! My fingers are crossed for you with these new editors! Especially the one that asked for your MS. That's really exciting!

Thanks, KSavoie! Fingers crossed for you, too!

Hi Cristin! I completely relate; most of my rejections have been complimentary, but along the same lines of "Liked but didn't love" or "Didn't have enough to stand out on our list." It's insanely frustrating and disheartening at times. I really hope one of those seven editors falls in love!

When do you start pushing your agent? I signed back in September and still no timeframe for submission. All of the revisions she wanted were complete in early October so it's been 3 months with nothing. Last I heard from her she said she would give me a list by year's end of editors she plans to submit to. But nothing so far.

How long before I would be justified in pushing for something to happen? I don't want to look for another agent, but I don't like the lack of communication.

spikeman4444 said:

When do you start pushing your agent? I signed back in September and still no timeframe for submission. All of the revisions she wanted were complete in early October so it's been 3 months with nothing. Last I heard from her she said she would give me a list by year's end of editors she plans to submit to. But nothing so far.

Click to expand...

It took my agent a few months after revisions were complete to sub it. Granted, this might have been due to his just having started out at the agency he works for (his hiring had yet to be announced when I signed the contract).

I would say after New Year's it would be fine if you sent your agent an e-mail or gave her a call just to say "what's doing?" Even now that my mss is out on sub, I usually send my agent a quick note if I haven't heard from him in a few weeks, and he never seems to mind.

spikeman, if I were you, I would nudge (not push) in mid-January. And do so by email, unless you've been told you can simply call if you have a question.

Agent guesses when they can get to something are just that and can prove overly optimistic due to time-sensitive client demands or real life.

Seems awfully slow to me Spikeman. Why two months to do a submission list?? Or did she want to wait until Jan to submit for some reason? I'm all for trying to avoid being a pain in the ass client, but you have to be comfortable with your working relationship. If I were you I would set up a call (in a relaxed sort of way) and have a chat about the plan from here. Write out your questions in advance so you don't forget anything.

Anyone else in the midst of a structural edit!? It is freaking me out that this is it! I mean, there'll be the copy edit, but in terms of the story this is my last chance to get it perfect. It's really hitting me now that this is it!

Pinkbowvintage - Thanks for the welcome!

Spikeman - I agree about sending a non-pushy email in mid-January. When I was finishing up revisions in the fall, my agent told me we had a short window to go out on sub. If the ms wasn't ready to send by the 2nd week of October, she preferred to wait until January when editors are focused and excited about new acquisitions. It seems November and December are pretty much a dead zone.

Our agency is holding subs until Jan too. (Not mine, I've not finished writing yet).

also, agent time is not like human time. This stuff is glacial. Glaciallllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll.

MaggieMc said:

Anyone else in the midst of a structural edit!? It is freaking me out that this is it! I mean, there'll be the copy edit, but in terms of the story this is my last chance to get it perfect. It's really hitting me now that this is it!

Click to expand...

I'm about to embark on one. After the new year, my agent will send me an editorial letter for book #2, which we've already discussed at length over the phone. I'm super nervous because she has a lot of suggestions for revision, all of them great, but it's always daunting.

Happy New Year, everyone! May we see all our publishing dreams come true in '17.

Happy New Year!

Happy New Year, everyone. May we all turn the next circle of hell into next journey into paradise.

Happy New Year everyone!

Spikeman -- I'm on the boat of wait and send an email nudge two weeks in January. My agent told me that the last couple months of the year is such a dead zone that if an editor doesn't already have a MS, it's best to just wait and send it in January. I would nudge her in January and see where the process is at!

Spikeman - I would send her an email whenever offices open. Maybe next Monday? Keep it light and polite. Ever since I parted ways with my ex agents, I have very little patience for agents who take forever to handle their clients' MSs, but she might kick things into gear once the holiday lull wears off...here's to hoping!

Happy 2017, everyone!! I hope this thread sees many posts about 6-figure book deals this year!! Hey, one can hope, right?

Happy New Year guys!

Cristen: Hi! It must be nerve wracking to have your MS out with so many editors. Oh my goodness, someone asked for it spontaneously, that's fabulous! I am sure this year is going to bring awesome things for you.

Pinkbow: I am literally bouncing with badly controlled excitement for you! Looks like 2017 is going to be a good year for a lot of people on this thread I can't wait to see your announcement!

Spikeman: Bleh, I'm sorry your agent's been pretty MIA, I know the holidays can be filled with so much stuff but you would think they could communicate that with you. I'm in the wait another week or so camp and see what they say then. It must be super frustrating.

Hathor: Just thought I'd mention I'm like 1/2 way done with you lovely MS and should be back to you this months sometime.

Jeneral: Congrats on signing! I didn't hear from my agent for like 2 weeks right after we signed because she was reading and making notes. So it's definitely not uncommon.


So, I've been MIA from AW for a few weeks as I trudged through a major edit for my agent, but it is done, she has read it and she loved it! So we are officially on sub next week! She's supposed to be sending over a final editor list this week and we're going to chat for a while. She's really communicative, which makes me even more annoyed at the agents who don't talk to their clients.

Any way I'm so excited about the New Year, less excited about waiting around on sub, but really excited about finally being on sub if that makes any sense? Is anyone else selling a series? Because book 2 is kicking my butt and I think I might have made a mistake Haha I mean, not really but seriously sequels are hard.

Happy New Year!

Good luck to everyone out on sub! What are you working on to distract yourself? What are your writing goals for the year?

VEHust - I hope you find your groove for writing the sequel, and good luck out on sub!

My ms is a proposed YA fantasy trilogy. I wrote a rough draft of book 2 during Nanowrimo, and it's such a hot mess. I'm holding off on revising until I know if my book will sell, and I'm trying to get momentum going on a 1st draft of an unrelated book. I keep trying to make myself forget that my book is on submission, but it's really hard to focus. I guess that's why submission is the next circle of hell, right?

Cristin: Thanks! I'm hoping the words start flowing easier soon. Mine is a four book fantasy Ya retelling, so we'll see where that goes. I think sequels have to be hot messes at first? Mine has some serious identity crisis stuff going on.

I'm also drafting a space opera which is so much fun, what's your unrelated book about?

Happy New Year!! (from a lurking lurker )

May the editors be in a buying mood all 2017-long!

VEHurst - Thank you! I will hopefully be announcing news this month. Congrats on going on sub next week!

I received two more short story rejections this week, but I'm going to keep sending it out. I still have faith in it and my workshop group helped me revise it thoroughly last year.

Happy New Year, and happy Monday, er, Tuesday. Short weeks always mix me up.

Pinkbow - so excited for you!! Can't wait to hear your announcement.

VEHust - Thanks, and good luck on sub! Hope the sequel writing gets easier.

I've been brainstorming and outlining and picking my way through the notes from my agent, but it's been slower going than I'd like. I need to get my head in the game and really get this done. I think I have this feeling of things being really REAL now, since these are agent notes, so it's like some next-level, uncharted territory thing. So I'm mostly trying to forget that aspect of it and get the work done.

Happy New Year, everyone! May this year bring great publishing news to you all!

Good luck in the new year, everyone!

I went to a New Year's Eve party where I learned from a writer who's been working on the first draft of her first book "working essentially full-time for years" that she will be successful because she is determined. Oh, that's all it takes

VE, I wish you success. I'm writing sequels in the sense that the books are in the same world and I'm trying to make them consistent, even if they are standalone. It makes it hard that I'm a pantser, though. I end up having to explain away stuff in previous books because I decide to do something seemingly inconsistent in a new one.

Your timing on the Hera beta read is fine. I'm currently polishing the first draft of a novel and its novella prequel about Aphrodite, wherein I explain how the bitch in books 1 and 3 was justified in all she did and try to make her relations with 8 lovers seem different from each other.

Oh man, only 3 days into 2017 and the Rs are starting to roll in. Two of them today, which was quite a kick in the gut because I got all excited when I saw that I had 2 e-mails from agent. For a second, I thought it was going to be "WHERE ARE YOU, CALL ME I HAVE GOOD NEWS" e-mail, but nope. *sinks back into bog*

VEHust: I love space operas. So fun! I write YA historical fantasy. My new WIP is set on an island prison in the early Soviet years. I pitched it as THE BOOK THIEF meets THE DA VICI CODE, with magic.

Putputt: So sorry about the R's. *hugs*