Purgatory's Pit of Doom

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Parametric

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I have an epic fantasy I could revise and submit, but I'm feeling so sad and dispirited about querying that I don't see the point. Yet more time spent just to get more form rejections.
 

kellion92

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(((Para))) You didn't give up on writing it. Don't give up on getting it out there.
 

Parametric

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Thanks, team. It's good to be able to hang out with equally depressed people from time to time. :tongue

Part of my problem is that I'm way too slow of a writer. It took me 4+ years to get my urban fantasy ready to query. 2 years to write and revise my epic fantasy, which is still easily 1-2 years away from being ready to query. I'm finishing up the first draft of my YA UF now, so that's 18 months just for a first draft. I first got serious about writing a decade ago and I have nothing to show for it but a pitiful handful of form rejections.

But don't give up! It only takes one! A professional is an amateur who didn't quit! And so on and so forth.
 

Teriann

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I've had the same best friend for 30 years. Even in high school, I was the type to pair up with one girl and ignore the rest of the world. BF has been it for 30 years.

She has read every thing I've written, from my first bad manuscript on. In fact, I think we bonded partly because she was fascinated by someone who wanted to be a fiction writer (she is now a cancer research professor in a major university)
She is the trusted reader I've come to depend on. she isn't a writer but she's a voracious reader and very very smart. Her advice about how to fix a manuscript usually isn't right, but she always, and I mean always, knows the exact point a manuscript goes off the rails.

Her parents are in their 90s and sick. she's been under so much stress the past few years she isn't like her old self at all. she and her husband literally have to leave the country or she can't relax.

I've been worried about her and it's been hard.

I just told her I have a new manuscript . . . and for the first time in 30 years she isn't able to read it.

Am I the most selfish person in the world to think about what I am going to do with out my best reader?
 

Teriann

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Para, I wish I could say it gets easier . . . but it doesn't. I think people have blips when they're euphoric with success, but in this business it rarely lasts. You're back to the pits, figuring out what the heck to do next.

I feel the exact same way. I've been at it so long with so little to show . . . . I have more to show BUT I've been at closer to 30 years.

The only thing is that you may end up getting faster during your second decade. :) Sometimes writing speed picks up with time. I'm much faster now then during my first 10 years. Now I'd go so far as to say I'm a fast writer, but one of my early books took a few years.
 

Amarie

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Am I the most selfish person in the world to think about what I am going to do with out my best reader?

No, good readers are hard to find.

Para, I don't know if this happens to everyone, but I now do write much faster than I used to. It didn't happen very quickly, and if you had asked me a year ago, I'd have said I was a slow writer. I'm only up to medium at this point, but it's a step forward. So where you are at now may not be where you are always at.

And I am thankful we have no snow here.
 

Red-Green

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Para, I'm a pretty fast writer, but it seems to make no difference. After all, it took me 10 years to find a publisher for a book that took me less than a year to write. So I'm not sure being fast was any kind of boon. It also doesn't mean you should give up the writing, or the trying to get it published. I mean, ten years to publish, but hey! Ten years to publish.

Teri, selfish or not, it's how we work. We always think of how a thing affects us. And losing a key reader is deadly. I *used* to think I had this stalwart reader I could always count on. Then one day she read a book of mine and said she found it "unbearable to read." Never read another one again. In fact, she doesn't even call me anymore. So ... 20-year friendship that just couldn't make the next decade.
 

SteveCordero

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Para, like Amarie I don't know if it happens to everyone, but I too have sped up my writing time over the years. I went from 3 to 4 years to about 4 to 6 months from creation to ready to go live. It's taken me 9 completed books to get there, but still. There's no way I'm speshul. It's just something you learn to get comfortable for you.

Teri, it's called being human. We all have our comfort zones (it's a survival mechanism) and using someone for so long fits squarely in there.
 

kellion92

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Well, we all know there are plenty of ways to get books out there that don't involve agents. But if that's what you want to do, Para, that's fine. That's a path many want.

One of the many pieces of common wisdom I don't believe is that a book has to be perfect to query. So if you're aiming for perfect, forget it. It seems to me that agents sign good concepts with potential before they sign decent concepts that are exquisitely polished.

Like right now I'm revising my contracted book, and it's definitely better. But would it be more likely to have found an agent and/or a bigger publisher if I queried now? Absolutely not. They rejected me on my query and sample. Anybody who read the full read a similar enough book to the one I have now that they should have been able to judge its merits based on what I sent them.
 
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Catwoman

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Teri, selfish or not, it's how we work. We always think of how a thing affects us. And losing a key reader is deadly. I *used* to think I had this stalwart reader I could always count on. Then one day she read a book of mine and said she found it "unbearable to read." Never read another one again. In fact, she doesn't even call me anymore. So ... 20-year friendship that just couldn't make the next decade.

Surely that didn't happen because of the book, did it?

My very best friend of 22 years and I parted ways when she essentially stated I was too negative. She changed after she had a kid, got more conservative and stuffy. I pretty much stayed the same...maybe that was the problem. I've been negative during the entire 22 years of our friendship, and now it bothers her? (See, this is why I never venture out of the Pit.)
 

Teriann

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Losing a friend of so long is devastating. I saw a button once: a woman was crying and said, "My best friend ran off with my husband . . . God, I'm going to miss her!"
 

ink wench

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Just a flyby because I'm suddenly swamped, but Teri, it makes perfect sense. We get used to constants in our lives, and when they disappear, it's very disconcerting and upsetting.

Para, what everyone else said. I'm a fast writer, but all it means is that I get to trunk a lot more books.
 

Snappy

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(((Teri))) (((Para)))

(((Red))) "unbearable to read"? How is that helpful in any way? Probably better off that friendship ended.

It's Monday.

Weekend was good. Went up to the wolf conservatory. Will get pics up once I get them onto the PC and off my camera.

Now, back to work though. And wondering if I should go to doctor. Have been dealing with massive bouts of fatigue lately. Same thing happened to me about four years ago and lasted 6 months. Docs didn't find anything and it went away. Now, I'm feeling very similar and it's lasted for about 4 weeks so far. *sigh*
 

kellion92

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Quick thank you to everyone for commenting on my blog! I have a different perspective than my blogmates so I don't know if our usual followers are quite on board.
 

K. Taylor

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Para, consider how many comments I've seen from Purgies loving your work, I think you're too hard on yourself and maybe too hard on your books. Querying seems to have a much reduced response rate across the board, so I doubt it's you, especially if you haven't been doing it very long.

As for speed, it gets better with practice.

When I can work without interruptions, deaths in the family, family layoffs, and pain in my arm, I revise fast once I've figured out my goal. But it took me 4 years to get the novel to the version that's on sale today because of 3 out of 4 of the above. Now it's my highest-rated product.
 

SteveCordero

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{{{Snappy}}}

Kell, I missed your blog post request yesterday, but posted a comment today. Great topic.
 

Red-Green

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(((Teri))) (((Para)))

(((Red))) "unbearable to read"? How is that helpful in any way? Probably better off that friendship ended.

It's Monday.

Weekend was good. Went up to the wolf conservatory. Will get pics up once I get them onto the PC and off my camera.

Now, back to work though. And wondering if I should go to doctor. Have been dealing with massive bouts of fatigue lately. Same thing happened to me about four years ago and lasted 6 months. Docs didn't find anything and it went away. Now, I'm feeling very similar and it's lasted for about 4 weeks so far. *sigh*


You know, I'm not sure it was meant to be helpful. Perhaps just intended as explanation for why she didn't have anything helpful to say. Oh wells. I don't believe her distaste for my writing caused the death of the friendship. I just think it's illustrative of why she perhaps has chosen not to be my friend anymore. Maybe I'm just too negative. ;)

Snaps, that's an awful dilemma. Because yeah, go to the doctor and get another *shrug* lack of answers. Or not go and wonder if you should be going.
 

Snappy

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(((Para))) Agree with KT. Sounds like you're too hard on yourself. Writing fast is a learned skills. I still have not learned it well enough for my tastes.

Kellion, commented on the blog. Love the topic.

Red, nah seems more realistic view than negative.

Made an appt for the doc for Friday. We'll see what she says. I guess it's better to go and possibly get no answers than to not go? :Shrug:
 
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