Virginia Kidd Agency

So I guess if I don't get a positive reply with a request for revisions then my ms sucks, eh? (ROFL)

Seriously, good luck guys. If all of you don't make it into the fold, I hope at least one of you do!!

Funny to see so many positive instances of dealing with this "Ben," when my own was nothing but negative. He was rude, confrontational, and condescending in his emails to me. His idea of science fiction negates anything such as Star Trek, or, to be more literary, Do Androids Dream Of Electric Sheep? Should my next novel ever be finished, rest assured that I certainly won't be giving them a second shot.

Good luck to all of you that do, though.

Nya RAyne said:

So I guess if I don't get a positive reply with a request for revisions then my ms sucks, eh? (ROFL)

Seriously, good luck guys. If all of you don't make it into the fold, I hope at least one of you do!!

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Did you even get a reply?

I sent mine off the very first day they made the announcement (maybe - I think the date on their page changes automatically). Haven't heard a thing.

With everyone else's getting at least some kind of response, I'm wondering if I should just mark it off as an R in the books.

Especially since I notice now that their page says they are looking for hard SF. Mine is not.

AlterEgox5 said:

Did you even get a reply?

I sent mine off the very first day they made the announcement (maybe - I think the date on their page changes automatically). Haven't heard a thing.

With everyone else's getting at least some kind of response, I'm wondering if I should just mark it off as an R in the books.

Especially since I notice now that their page says they are looking for hard SF. Mine is not.

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I wouldn't mark it off yet. Ben requested a full of my UF on 12/17 so it seems they're looking for more than hard SF. I got an acknowlegement of receipt, but haven't heard further. I'm sure they were inundated with queries of all types. Interesting that they've now limited their search to hard SF. Maybe they didn't get enough SF queries.

AlterEgo - mine wasn't SF at all - just contemporary YA - wouldn't count it out yet, either!

AlterEgox5 said:

Did you even get a reply?

I sent mine off the very first day they made the announcement (maybe - I think the date on their page changes automatically). Haven't heard a thing.

With everyone else's getting at least some kind of response, I'm wondering if I should just mark it off as an R in the books.

Especially since I notice now that their page says they are looking for hard SF. Mine is not.

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Yeah, I got a response saying that he recieved it and would be getting back to me within the week. That was 3 days or so ago. I didn't send the full ms just the first 10 chapters. I figured that was enough to let him figure out whether he liked it out or not.

AlterEgox5 said:

Did you even get a reply?

I sent mine off the very first day they made the announcement (maybe - I think the date on their page changes automatically). Haven't heard a thing.

With everyone else's getting at least some kind of response, I'm wondering if I should just mark it off as an R in the books.

Especially since I notice now that their page says they are looking for hard SF. Mine is not.

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Oh, and yeah my ms was SF but with strong romance undertones. *shrugs* But we'll see.

I heard back from Ben, he said it wasn't quite what they were looking for. Sounds like a form rejection, but at least I won't be going into 2K10 with this one hanging over my head.

Nya RAyne said:

I heard back from Ben, he said it wasn't quite what they were looking for. Sounds like a form rejection, but at least I won't be going into 2K10 with this one hanging over my head.

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Sorry about the R. I got the same note from Ben yesterday.

Erin said:

Sorry about the R. I got the same note from Ben yesterday.

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Same here!

I'm sorry for the rejections, Nya, Erin, and JS. I submitted a revised MS to Ben (I vamped up some of the pacing in the middle, per his request, but did not make two changes he mentioned, but said 'weren't deal breakers at this point') and am now just waiting to hear back from him.

*checks watch*

Yeah, nothing. Ah well.

So, what does "hard SF" mean anyways? And how can science in SF be accurate if it's fictional?

That it's at least....plausible in some way. Michio Kaku's Physics of the Impossible is a great way to beef up the science in an SF book with solid theories and actual physics and so forth. That the science you are using, if it's explained, makes some sense.

For example, if you have a perpetual motion machine in your book, you'd actually do well not to explain how it works because in reality, perpetual motion machines are essentially impossible (based on the physics we have now). It all depends upon how much science is in the book and how you wield it, just as a historical romance can't have a bunch of anachronisms hanging around.

Does that help...?

dgrintalis - still working on my revisions - I'd love to hear how things work out for you!

AlterEgox5 said:

That it's at least....plausible in some way. Michio Kaku's Physics of the Impossible is a great way to beef up the science in an SF book with solid theories and actual physics and so forth. That the science you are using, if it's explained, makes some sense.

For example, if you have a perpetual motion machine in your book, you'd actually do well not to explain how it works because in reality, perpetual motion machines are essentially impossible (based on the physics we have now). It all depends upon how much science is in the book and how you wield it, just as a historical romance can't have a bunch of anachronisms hanging around.

Does that help...?

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It does, thanks, AlterEgo! So then when he says hard SF he doesn't mean just the usual UFOs or futuristic worlds, right? I'm asking because my fiction always starts from a scientific concept that I turn into a novel (I do science in real life), so I'm wondering if what I write is in some sense SF even though it doesn't have fantasy stuff... Thanks!

I assume what he means by "hard sci fi" is actually the stuff we've been told wouldn't sell for a while now. It's not just that the science is plausible, but the story really revolves around the science and explains it. So, you know, Science Fiction Romance is a subgenre now that has, well, romance in outer space, and that's the thrust of the story. Even if the science is plausible, it wouldn't be hard sci fi because it's really *about* the romance, just set on a spaceship, whereas hard sci fi would be more *about* the science of it. Does that make sense?

In fact, if you wikipedia it one of the first hard sci fi authors that comes up is James Blish, interestingly enough.

Argh, that's the stuff I write... Science, but in the present, always,
possible, realistic, scientific stuff... Mhm... so maybe not quite SF.

But what's the source when you say "we're told it doesn't sell"?
thanks though, it puts all those rejections in perspective!!! Either because of the non-selling point
or because I've been sending to the wrong agents, since I was told the SF is only when you have
UFOs or time travel... I guess I should check my sources, huh???

So anyways, fingers crossed for all of you who have fulls with Ben.
Now mine's in the pile too!!!

Sorry, I can't link you to anything on that. It's just been a theme I've heard on agent blogs and podcasts and such "we take sci fi, but not hard sci fi because that's a hard sell" seems to have come up a bunch. But, perhaps things are shifting. I've been reading these blogs for about 4 years and it would be high time to shake things up a bit.

sciri said:

...I was told the SF is only when you have
UFOs or time travel... I guess I should check my sources, huh???

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Yes, you should. SF encompasses near and distant future, plausible SF (aka, hard SF) such as physics, chemistry, biology, and so on, to implausible elements such as time-travel and what you sometimes see in space opera. It also includes alternate history. In other words, it's a big genre.

If you're curious about near future SF stories, check out Nicola Griffith's Slow River or some of Margaret Atwood's work.

Thanks for the clarification, I will. Also, I oversimplified, and I apologize for that.
What I meant to say is that an SF friend of mine said that even though I do have the hard core science, my genre is not SF because I don't have futuristic projections or other worlds. In that I think she was right, my science is plausible and in the present.

So maybe it's more of a techno thriller? I wonder if Steampunk is considered SF/F, because it's low tech/high tech set in the past.

SF doesn't necessarily have to be set in the future, nor does it have to be set in another world. For example, the Terminator movies - they were set in the present (at the time), but included some time travel and AI. And steampunk is considered SF (and it's not always set in the past either ;D).

Remember, SF stands for science fiction. Fiction with science-based goodies (bear in mind that's an extremely loose def, but you know what I mean). With other elements allowed, of course (horror, romance, fantasy etc.)

Frankly, sciri, I think we'd have to know a lot more about your novel before being able to inform you whether it's SF or not.

May I suggest you go to a bookstore, go to the science fiction section, and grab a half-dozen recent books, titles you've never read by people you've never heard of.

Try to be as random as possible.

I've spent the past several days working with Ben of VKA, exchanging emails with him as I revised the SF novel he was interested in. He's still very interested. Hopefully, within the next few days, I'll be an official client-- a huge break for me.