Purgatory's Pit of Doom

Good to have a new baby to love, Princess.

Preemptive hugs, Ink. In the history of the world, has anyone ever nudged and heard, "Oh I was meaning to make an offer but it slipped my mind!"

Still more nothing in my inbox.

Mornin', Pit

Preemptive {{{Ink}}}

Since I was feeling un-Pit like with my WIP revisions, I'm deciding whether to make things more difficult--Turn limited 3d person narrative into 1st person with 2 characters. I had to strengthen the voice of the MC anyway (per beta suggestions) so I might as well go all in.

Don't know if I can pull it off, but I'm a "go down in flames" kinda guy.

I'm feeling the need to send out more queries. Restraining myself, but it might actually take a straightjacket or an internet outage.

Querying is oddly addictive, Kellion.

It's like being an old drug addict whose highs aren't as high anymore, but still takes the hits in hopes of feeling like he once did.

kellion92 said:

Preemptive hugs, Ink. In the history of the world, has anyone ever nudged and heard, "Oh I was meaning to make an offer but it slipped my mind!"

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Ha! Yeah.... I did once nudge an agent who'd had my partial for 3 months, and she ignored me. I wrote it off as an R, but a month later she requested the full. But that was a very different situation. I think the best I can hope for here is that she never got the thing in the first place.

Steve, better to do down with a giant swing and miss than to not try at all.

Kellion, querying is weird. It's painful and we dread it, but like Steve said, it's also addictive.

Yes, I badly want feedback or a new request. Last week I felt the same way, sent off a query impulsively, and I got my R back in 32 minutes. It seriously bummed me out -- I had only 32 minutes of hope on that one, then back to the Pit. It had me feeling the futility.

Gah, Ink I hate the nudge phase.

See, Clare, the Jacob B. / Native American character immediately rang a bell in my mind. But then, I used to be a school librarian and heard about NOTHING BUT TW!L!GHT for years. And I'll admit to having read and enjoyed the series - sometimes I like fluff. Also, Tw!l!ght is so high profile, books, movies, merchandise, action figures (<- yes...action figures) that it isn't far fetched to worry about using 'Jacob B'.

I think changing the first or last name would be fine if that's what you want to do.


Steve, give 'er!

Kellion, I say fire more queries out there!

Another R this morning. This one was from an agent I decided after sending the query that I decided I wouldn't go with, but I'm still kind of offended that he didn't want it, haha. Form R no. 2. Woot.

{{{Princess}}}

Kell, I know that feeling.

(((Princess))) I know that feeling too.

{{Princess}}

(((Princess)))

Querying is addicting and self-destructive.

Snappy, we unpubbed masses are both sadists and masochists

It is addictive. It's like, if I just send out more, I'll get a request. Just one more query. One more hit.

soulcascade said:

Snappy, we unpubbed masses are both sadists and masochists

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Too true.

So I decided whoredom won out. I have a ton of short stories that I never really knew what to do with, so I'm starting to publish them on the kindle (don't kill me!). I thought it would be nice to try and bring in some revenue from them, you know . It's hard to decide what to do with short stories. The Big 6 won't publish them (unless the author is really well known), but these are, on a piece by piece basis, good stories.

Hey, at least you can do something with them. Why not? Better than leaving them to rot. I just got a brand spankin' new idea for Script Frenzy. It's a 100-page challenge, but this is going to run me probably closer to 135.

Woot! Give 'er Princess

Leigh, yeah, getting short stories published is hard(er!)

PrincessofPersia said:

Hey, at least you can do something with them. Why not? Better than leaving them to rot. I just got a brand spankin' new idea for Script Frenzy. It's a 100-page challenge, but this is going to run me probably closer to 135.

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Woot! Nice .

Just curious, what does a 100-page script usually work out to in terms of running-length?

The rule is 1 page = 1 minute on screen. It can vary though. For example, a fight scene may be written in a few lines, but last several minutes. Or something really detailed but important may take half a page, but only represent a few seconds of screen time. Generally, a 100-page shooting script will be 100 minutes give or take a few. But these are spec scripts, so it could vary a little more (for example, a draft of Inglourious Basterds was 137 pages, but the running time is 153 minutes, and the final version wasn't too different from that draft).

ETA: Nothing in the mailbox today either. And nothing in the inbox since this morning's R.

Nothing today, but I just closed out a query from someone whose site says if he doesn't respond within two weeks to re-query. Seems to have gone no-response though, since the only queries he's responded to in the past month have been same-day partial requests.

Maybe he should update the website. Grrr.

Can I say how much i hate no responses, particularly when the agent does not have an official no-response policy? It's extra depressing because you have to reject yourself. You have to face facts and tell yourself there's no hope left. You've been sitting and foolishly hoping for a yes long after the agent read and discarded your query.

Three more RQs just went out.

(((Princess)))

Kellion, I hear ya. I closed out 3 more queries today. And agent I nudged has yet to get back to me. She's the sort who responds to queries w/in 24 hours, so after 24 hours of silence on my email, I'm just assuming an R. I was assuming an R anyway, but it bugs me because she always gives feedback on her full Rs, and I was looking forward to what she had to say. How sad is that?

(((Ink))) How hard is no on a full? A form is better than nothing, although I'm looking forward to getting my partial back because I'm hoping for some feedback with my rejection.

(((ink))) That's annoying. Maybe she hasn't gotten around to it yet, and you'll hear back in a day or so (even if it's an R, at least it'd be something).

Yeah, I'm willing to potentially blame this on email or something because she's not the sort who resorts to silence. She actually responds to most fulls in a month. So who knows. If I don't hear by the end of the week, I'm going to go ahead and query another agent at the agency with my UF.