The Number

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Drachen Jager

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See, what I need now is a bunch of my writing friends e-mail addresses.

:)

Oh, and 100? Pfft. I'm aiming for 1,000 before I get settled in with an agent.
 

Jold

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Took me a minute to understand what you meant... You are thinking deeper than I am! : )

We have 1,000. Do I hear 1,500? Anyone?
 

CheshireGrin

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Wow, if that's true then I have paid my dues in this life and the next (according to the article). I have probably been rejected over 300 times, but that is over twelve years...at eighteen I wrote my first novel...epic fail....went to college...still a fail, just not as epic (got a BA, but no agent). Now, two agents requested partials...got rejected (sigh). But hey, they are starting to ask for it so...I'm getting somewhere...I think. I think we must have to be tortured, for our gift is a great one :)
 

Jamesaritchie

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Well, "paying your dues" isn't really about the number, it's about writing long enough to actually produce something readable before you inflict it on the reading public. For some, the number is one. For others, it's twelve. For quite a few, it's at least one hundred. For most, five thousand wouldn't do it.

These days, just abut everyone seems to believe one is their number.
 

MsJudy

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Well, "paying your dues" isn't really about the number, it's about writing long enough to actually produce something readable before you inflict it on the reading public. For some, the number is one. For others, it's twelve. For quite a few, it's at least one hundred. For most, five thousand wouldn't do it.

These days, just abut everyone seems to believe one is their number.

QFT.

I've never sent out a hundred queries for any one book. Because if I can't get some full requests, then there's a problem that needs fixing.

And once I had a good query and good first pages, I started getting the full requests.

Which came back as rejections. With feedback.

Why would I keep sending out more queries, if the feedback points me in the right direction? Doesn't it make more sense to fix the problems?

I don't want to send out hundreds until I find some agent willing to take on a flawed project everyone else had the good sense to pass on. I want to write the Wow! story that people can't wait to represent.

And that may take me a while.
 

Fuchsia Groan

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QFT.

I've never sent out a hundred queries for any one book. Because if I can't get some full requests, then there's a problem that needs fixing.

Or the book is in a hard-to-sell genre. I sent out about 70 queries over several years before I started getting full requests and, finally, an offer. I was revising the book that whole time, but I only saw a dramatic difference in responses when it became YA.

I'm glad now that I queried in small batches, because it took me so long to figure out how to pitch the book. And to make it faster-paced and more readable.
 
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Hmm... I actually think I like these generated rejections much more than what I'm currently gettin. Pretty sad. ROFL.
 

Justin_AC

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The three novels I've submitted have garnered a total of almost 170 rejections.

Of those, maybe 10-20 were partials.

5-7 were fulls.

2-3 were revision requests to resubmit.

Some of the feedback I got made no sense or was completely daft ("Needs more romance." It's a frigging horror story, you dumb sod), or conflicting with itself (in the initial feedback she said "Change this from blue to red (example)" when i changed it and resubmitted, she said, "You should've changed this from red to blue, no thanks." )

Some of the feedback was super helpful and I liked it a lot and it made the book better.

I once submitted to an agent, got a form rejection. Months later, I had forgotten I'd submitted to him, sent the EXACT same query, got a request for a full (?!!).

I do not have an unusually high opinion of myself as a writer. The best I will say about my own stuff is that it's coherent. You can understand what is happening. And my dialogue is pretty good. That is actually a helluva lot more than I can say for some of the things I've seen on physical and digital shelves.

So, after paying my dues for 9 years and working my tail off in a void and getting doors slammed in my faces that whole time; after getting a degree in this stuff, winning some contests, and getting so damn close to the finish line it almost kills me to think about it, I have well and truly paid my dues. Is Ms. Picoult or anybody else says otherwise, they can pound sand.

So I'm self publishing. I will make at least $1 off my writing and somebody who I've never met, or spoken/written to before will read at least one paragraph of mine before I die. Because I've banged my head against the traditional route for years and it sure as hell isn't gonna happen that way.
 
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