- Joined
- Mar 21, 2007
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- 1,293
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- Website
- www.teenebooks.com
My Latest Five Attempts At Literary Suicide
Okay, no matter what I try and write I have some genius way of making it completely unmarketable. Last month, I had an epiphany: screw the market and write whatever the heck I feel like.
So...my latest WIP is my favorite so far (at least fav story that I've gotten onto paper) but these are some major barriers I'm going to encounter comes subs. What should I do?
1. It's first person present tense. I am breaking the first rule of contemporary YA here. I think it works, but I know there's an instant bias against this.
2. It can only be labelled as 'quirky' but it's going to be at least 75,000 words now, probably 80. I think most people who want quirky want short and spunkey and this is kind of long.
3. It's quirky and semi-epic. Can I call it an 'epic, quirky, YA novel'? Can you even call your stuff epic in query letters? I don't want to turn of agents who are looking for more serious works by calling it quirky.
4. It gets increasingly literary. It starts off at about a grade 2 reading level and increases gradually throughout. This is deliberate: I like it. But I'm worried that my partial will be a horrible representation of the actual work.
5. I like words. Too much. I think it moves at a good clip, but I am blind to my own 'wordiness'.
So there you go. Am I dead, or just paranoid?
Okay, no matter what I try and write I have some genius way of making it completely unmarketable. Last month, I had an epiphany: screw the market and write whatever the heck I feel like.
So...my latest WIP is my favorite so far (at least fav story that I've gotten onto paper) but these are some major barriers I'm going to encounter comes subs. What should I do?
1. It's first person present tense. I am breaking the first rule of contemporary YA here. I think it works, but I know there's an instant bias against this.
2. It can only be labelled as 'quirky' but it's going to be at least 75,000 words now, probably 80. I think most people who want quirky want short and spunkey and this is kind of long.
3. It's quirky and semi-epic. Can I call it an 'epic, quirky, YA novel'? Can you even call your stuff epic in query letters? I don't want to turn of agents who are looking for more serious works by calling it quirky.
4. It gets increasingly literary. It starts off at about a grade 2 reading level and increases gradually throughout. This is deliberate: I like it. But I'm worried that my partial will be a horrible representation of the actual work.
5. I like words. Too much. I think it moves at a good clip, but I am blind to my own 'wordiness'.
So there you go. Am I dead, or just paranoid?