All right, someone please convince me not to quit.

Good to see you around again!
All I can offer is don't quit yet! Before you give up, why not go back to where you started: you wrote, and had published, 2 short stories. Just because some editor said 'Try novels' doesn't guarantee that it'll work.
Why not go back to short stories? At least you'll get a feeling of accomplishment sooner, and who knows? Maybe short stories are your thing.

As for your other point, I suspect it's more luck than social skills, if that feedback you've been given is accurate. How many of these agents and editors have actually met you, to be offended? (Provided you're not starting queries with "Look, idiot, buy this!"?)

On the other hand, if writing really is 'poisoning your life', put it aside, at least for a while. Find something else that brings you pleasure.

RemusShepherd said:

I sent my last novel to nine agents. Three replied; all rejections. Six of them didn't give me the courtesy of a reply.

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RemusShepherd said:

So. I am unable to break into traditional publishing.

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I hope you've not reached this conclusion after sending out so few queries for your previous manuscripts. Nine is ... nothing.

eta: Wait, sorry. My bad (maybe). When you say "sent your novel", do you mean you had nine full requests from your queries of which 3 were rejected and 6 were CNRs?

Hey Remus!

So I don't know you, and I'm going to say some tough love kind of stuff and you might ignore it which is of course your prerogative.

RemusShepherd said:

I've got nowhere to improve and I have nobody that can help me improve.

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This is almost certainly false. There's not a writer on this planet who can't improve. And you don't need better writers to help you. You do need better critters than you have. If you decide to keep writing, I'd suggest a new crit group.

RemusShepherd said:

I sent my last novel to nine agents.

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That's a very small number.

RemusShepherd said:

Three replied; all rejections. Six of them didn't give me the courtesy of a reply.

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This is pretty normal.

RemusShepherd said:

A Hugo winning editor, at a workshop where he was supposed to edit submissions, looked at one of my shorts and declared no edits were needed. That same editor then asked me to send him a novel. He never got back to me. Over the next four years I sent him two SASEs and he never replied. I hope he at least steamed the stamps off and used them again; be a shame to waste the postage.

(If anyone wants names to connect to the people I've mentioned, I'll give them. I no longer give a damn about protecting the guilty. Some of them are, or were, on these boards.)

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What you're describing isn't bad behavior. What you're describing is insanely busy people being insanely busy. You were offered a back-channel read, and as it turned out they didn't have time to accommodate that. That's disappointing, but it really doesn't rise to the level of unprofessionalism, never mind guilt.

RemusShepherd said:

So. I am unable to break into traditional publishing.

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From what you've written here, most of what you've done hasn't been by the book. By the book, you've sent out nine queries that have gone nowhere. For most writers, that's not even getting out of the gate.

RemusShepherd said:

It's not lack of determination. After 20 years of doing this, I think I have displayed my stamina.

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Stamina? Sure. Knowledge of the process? Not so much.

RemusShepherd said:

All I can think of is that I'm weird, and offputting, and socially awkward. And it appears that the ability to socialize outweighs writing quality when it comes to getting published. Luck and social skills matter, writing does not.

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Nobody cares if you're socially awkward, I promise.

They do care if you approach them with the attitude that you should somehow be queue-jumping all the people who follow their guidelines.

RemusShepherd said:

So tell me why I shouldn't quit.

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I can't even tell you why I shouldn't quit.

RemusShepherd said:

At this point, my inability to publish has poisoned everything in my life. I no longer want to write, or even read, because those activities feel like gateways to a world where I've been unfairly excluded. Spending 20 years on this pursuit prevents me from beginning any other long-term projects. I feel worthless and alone, and I hate, hate, an industry which I used to love.

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So there's two things here. The first - that lack of publishing has poisoned everything - I get. I'm struggling with similar emotions myself atm. Some days I honestly don't know why I still give a damn.

It is perfectly okay to choose to let it go. Your emotional health needs to be paramount.

The second - your "unfair" exclusion - is where I think your ego is burning you. You know you're good - that's terrific. Self-confidence can help us through a lot of discouraging days. But based on what you've written here, you seem to feel there's some moral imperative that you be recognized as so much better than everyone else that you shouldn't have to play by the rules.

I'm not going to tell you what to do. But I am going to tell you that going down the path of positioning yourself against more successful writers on some "deservedness" scale is the road to hell. You know the saying: resentment is like taking poison and expecting someone else to die.

You do not have to write. You do not have to stop writing. But if you can figure out how to stop expecting the world to align itself to your idiomatic sense of justice, you might find yourself some peace.

You can write something really good--a lot of really good somethings, in fact--and if an agent doesn't feel like there's a market for it, they still won't sign you. I've been told by agents that my writing is terrific, but I don't write what sells, so... My options are to change what I write or just know that I'm not writing to market. Maybe something similar is happening with your work and you just haven't had an agent spell it out like I did.

Hey Remus,

I love your dog. I'm a hoosier, too, or at least I used to be, and so maybe we're old neighbors kind of.

The sentiments you're expressing - - It seems pretty standard for a lot of folks I know in a lot of careers and businesses. I don't know if you should keep at writing or not. I decided to give it a whirl about a year ago so that I could stretch some new brain muscles and learn some new things. It's been a lot of fun in that sense. Maybe there's another thing you've been wanting to try? You could try that other thing while keeping your books on the back burner.

You just need the right agent. That means persistence. If you want it, find more agents to query and go for it. I personally expect to self publish in the end but I don't think this is a fail. I think it's an attractive option. Creative license, get the story into the world. Imagine being able to write a story and make it available to anybody with an internet connection. Amazing. I'll try for an agent first but expect to query in batches and eventually reach, I don't know, a hundred agents? I expect to fail, then self publish. It'll be fine. i know some folks that do great with this route. Like $10,000 per month great, if that's the goal.

A lot of amazing artists have some form of the feelings and experiences you are describing. So don't quit on the basis of those, but do keep listening to yourself. If you need a break, take one.

RemusShepherd said:

All I can think of is that I'm weird, and offputting, and socially awkward. And it appears that the ability to socialize outweighs writing quality when it comes to getting published. Luck and social skills matter, writing does not.

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Well, if that was true, I'd be completely arsed.

I wonder if the problem is with story structure rather than writing. You say your short stories get a good response but then novels fall flat. No amount of gorgeous word wrangling will save a story that lacks drama. Maybe you need a developmental editor to have a look. It'd be expensive but it could be worth it if they spot the problem.

Alternatively, perhaps your stories are too niche and an agent can't see finding a big enough market. In which case you might be a good candidate for self publishing if you can see yourself doing the necessary marketing work.

RemusShepherd said:

The other novels I've sent to 20-30 agents before giving up. But that takes some research into what agents want and which are still in business -- the landscape changes every few years. I haven't done in-depth research for this novel yet.

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Okay, firstly, unless you're in a niche genre, 20-30 really isn't many queries at all.

Secondly, yes ... agent research takes work. If I'm getting this right, you're annoyed about not getting requests on the 9 queries you've sent out for this MS despite not having properly researched the agents you sent it to? I'm not even sure where to start with that.

Anyway, you're working on such a small sample, it's hard to know where the issue lies. Could be your MS is superb but your query letter's terrible. Could be the opening chapter/s need reworking. Could be you've sent it to unsuitable agents (having not, yanno, researched them properly). Could just be bad luck/bad timing (frex your genre not currently selling).

Have you considered putting the query in QLH and/or the opening chapter in SYW?


eta: FWIW, I know any number of brilliant writers who haven't managed to get rep yet. Some of the best books I've read over the last few years were ones I beta read ... and most haven't found an agent to take them on (and the writers who are repped are struggling to sell them). Basically, there are a LOT of talented writers with wonderful MSs out there. You can't rely on talent alone to get it done -- you have to do your due diligence (agent research, query research) and have patience when submitting queries for each new MS to give yourself a shot.

eta 2: Sorry, yes - CNR = closed no response.

RemusShepherd said:

Online workshops are a crapshoot and generally have onerous critique requirements.

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Good news! You currently belong to a group that includes some really good critters, and you've fulfilled all the requirements already.

RemusShepherd said:

I disagree. I think it's a sign of a moribund and callous industry.

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Well, you're entitled to think what you like. The reality, though, is that publishing, like pretty much every major industry out there right now, is understaffed and overworked. I don't know the circumstances of your promised read by this editor, but I do know that's an unusual thing for someone to have offerred. I get the disappointment that it didn't pan out, but the odds that it's personal and not just someone who got sucked into other work they're actually being paid to do are pretty low.

As for callous? Of course it is. It's capitalism. No matter how they personally feel about your work, the gating question is "can my house make money selling this?" This doesn't make them moribund and callous. This makes them people who have to get paid to eat.

RemusShepherd said:

No, no, I want to play by the rules. I'm just sick of seeing crap like James Patterson and Twilight succeeding all the time. Yes, I'm awash with envy, I realize that. I don't know what to do about it.

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I don't know what to tell you to do about it, but I do know you're trying to put some sort of literary value on what does and doesn't catch the public consciousness. Both Patterson and Meyer hit on something - repeatedly, both of them, despite popular criticism of the literary merit of their work - that resonated with a large number of readers. I can't tell you why; I haven't read either of them.

If that's the kind of fame you're chasing...I mean, I get it. But you're setting yourself up for almost certain failure. You could sell every novel you've written and the odds you'd become Patterson approach zero.

(Also, other writers aren't your competition. Really. And nobody knows why some titles go viral and some don't.)

RemusShepherd said:

I have a loving wife and a good job, I could give up and have peace anytime.

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Take it from someone who knows: if giving up would genuinely give you peace, you'd have done it by now.

You sold two short stories, switched to novels, and haven't had any luck. (Your emotional disappointments are perfectly valid, but career-wise? Not relevant, except that they're holding you back at this point.) If you want to keep writing, find a better crit group.

And yes, it's possible that your work is as sublime and perfect as if it were dictated to you by angels, and for whatever reason nobody thinks they can sell it. (There are more than 30 agents who rep SFF, btw, so while I always advise caution when choosing an agent, you're not exhausting your possibilities.) That is a thing that happens, and it sucks a lot.

But it sounds to me like you had your head turned by a few people with some creds, and your expectations got over-elevated.

You want to write? Start over. Take your current work to Share Your Work. Listen to critiques, even the ones you ultimately disagree with. Critique others. Let the community shred your query letter. (Don't know how many of those nine queries included pages, but if they never got past your query, your writing doesn't matter one way or another.) If you want this, regroup, reset, and start again.

You are not the only writer who's been through this. You wouldn't be the only writer who took 20+ years to get traction. You're not the only writer who struggles with the green-eyed monster and loses. But that jealousy will kill any hope you have of a career faster than anything else. That's the enemy you need to fight.

Do you enjoy writing? If so keep doing it, and keep submitting. Postage is cheap. You never know, maybe one of your books will be the right one. If not, you have a hobby that's more fun and less expensive than golf.

I read this, decided not to comment but then felt I needed to come back to it. Take this as you will, but I am a big believer in mindset. I am new to the writing world so I cannot attest to the frustration of years of work without results, however, focusing on the positives in a situation can change your thinking and your attitude. Have you enjoyed writing those books? Would you have preferred to have never written them? Why did you start writing in the first place? I found your post riddled with negativity. If you never publish will it have all been for nothing? I personally feel that to be untrue. Our experiences, the things we do all shape who we are and I believe that your writing is not in vain. Push through, don't back down, keep at it.

Write if you want, don't write if you don't want. A little humility goes a long way. Have you tried that?

You have some excellent responses already (particularly from Lizmonster) so I shan't duplicate many of those points in a lengthy responses. Suffice to say, though, I've felt bitterness exactly like you have, and I know how you feel - it really, truly sucks, and it can be hard to see other writers being successful when you're yet to, say, get an agent.

What I will say, however, is that publishing is brutal and, yes, unfair. There's no point railing against the unfairness of it - and I've done that plenty - all you can do to maximise your chances of success are the things within your control, Which, broadly, are:

1. Make sure your book is as good as it can be. I don't care what anyone says, a book can always be improved. My published books could be improved. My unpublished MSs certainly can.
2. Try more agents. 9 is nothing. 9 Rs could just mean your query isn't right, or be explained by random factors. Even 20 Rs is still low.
3. If things aren't working, try something different. Query agents in another country. Try a different genre.
4. Do use QLH and SYW here. I have. Some of the responses I didn't agree with or didn't apply in my case, but the majority of the feedback really opened my eyes and reminded me not to be complacent.

It may well be that your writing is fine but the books lack that hook which makes them saleable. There have been plenty of excellent writers who've got nowhere because agents and publishers don't think their work suits the market (which, in itself, is a highly nebulous thing, but something we all have to deal with). How much do you read? Reading other books and getting your market knowledge really ship shape and up to date may be a helpful thing to do. There's always something to learn.

RemusShepherd said:

I believe I'm properly researching agents, but I'd like to know where you find agents to research. I search through agentquery.com and marketlist.com for any agents that take sci-fi and have open submissions. I then rank them as high or low priority based on their listed interests, and try to find their submission info.

Doing that, I found 39 possible agents. 10 of them are not open, despite what those sites said, or have since retired from the business. (One disappeared and is listed as a missing person!) That leaves me a total of 29 agents, some of them at the same agency so I can't submit to both. That's it, that's all there is in the industry available to me. How can I find more? How do you find more?

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I haven't found as many agents as other people have, but I found over 50 easily by just googling 'literary agent young adult' and then checking the ones I found in a different search to make sure they were legitimate. There are also sites, like the Official Manuscript Wishlist site, which give you an even more precise idea of the type of things that are going to appeal to particular agents. How did you go about finding the 39, out of interest?

Twenty. Years.

I feel I've had enough patience, and am allowing myself a moment of fury.

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That's fair, but no one here can give you a reason to keep writing. If you want to write, you want to write and that's that. If you don't, maybe you can drop it for a while and see how you're feeling in a few years.

RemusShepherd said:

I believe I'm properly researching agents, but I'd like to know where you find agents to research. I search through agentquery.com and marketlist.com for any agents that take sci-fi and have open submissions. I then rank them as high or low priority based on their listed interests, and try to find their submission info.

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First, sorry if I misread what you wrote. It's just this:

RemusShepherd said:

But that takes some research into what agents want and which are still in business -- the landscape changes every few years. I haven't done in-depth research for this novel yet.

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...rather gave me the impression you'd sent out (at least these most recent 9) queries without doing "in-depth research."

Anyway, how I've find agents to query:

1. Checked books acknowledgements. I look at books I love and books in my genre and see who the author's agent is.
2. Query Tracker. I went through it alphabetically, checked out all the listed agencies.
3. MSWL. I've found plenty of agents I'd never previously heard of that way.
4. Twitter. Just general browsing - a lot of writers (not yet published) list their agent in their bio.
5. Publisher's Marketplace. I looked through the "top 100" dealmakers in my category. Researched them.
6. Also, plenty of agencies let you query more than one agent (though not usually concurrently).

And yes, this is all time-consuming. But it's part of the process. Whenever I wasn't in the mood to write, I'd do a bit more agent research. I made a spreadsheet. Made a column for whether an agency would let you submit to more than one agent there.

RemusShepherd said:

Twenty. Years.

I feel I've had enough patience, and am allowing myself a moment of fury.

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Heh. Yeah, I feel you. But if you reread what I wrote, I said patience on each MS. Twenty years is a hellishly long time to do this for no reward. But when you look at each MS individually, you've quit on it pretty soon in the process (acknowledging that you've thought you'd exhausted your querying options). It's like wanting to be a pro tennis player, but walking away to join another tournament each time you win a set then getting annoyed you haven't won a title.

So, to try be clearer what I meant: You've shown great patience with your writing long term, but seem to be rushing once you have a manuscript written and ready to go. (Sorry, I'm not actually sure that is clearer!)

Don't you have the urge to craft stories, to make characters, settings and plot-lines?

Keep the magic alive. Is publishing the end of end alls? Just because something isn't published doesn't mean it's not good-- and the reverse is true as well. Look at some of the trashy books that get published, does that make them successes? No, it doesn't.

You can keep going and you should. You have already been published and, in my opinion, anyone that does so has a degree of talent.

Do not give up. Shine on!