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- Sep 10, 2015
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Hi All,
This is my second post in a few days. I had another and got some good advice, but I decided to make a new one to further explain my question because my first posting may have seemed a little vague so I wanted to clarify.
I've written a book (yes a lazy person like me actually spent 5 years writing the thing through blood, sweat and tears). It is a story that predominantly takes place in a college atmosphere set in the late 1950s. I purposely chose the 1950s because it seems to be a very charismatic decade, one where America was more prosperous and things were a bit simpler. We live in an age nowadays where kids run into schools and gun people down. I wanted to bring the reader AWAY from that. Although I'm sure the 50's were fraught with their own issues (nuclear war being predominant amongst them), I view this as a more idyllic decade, perhaps partly because of the nostalgic element.
I'm trying very hard to figure out how to label this for an agent. Although it is SET in the 50s, there is no particular social issue the story revolves around. I just wanted to put it in the 50s, so I do. It's not like it's tied to contemporary issues of that time like the red scare or the Korean war or any of that. I just have a fondness for the 50s (even though I didn't live through them, so I am probably idealizing them-although I probably wouldn't have like all the smoking).
I've heard of the category YA - Historical fiction. Does anyone think that would be accurate? Like I said, it isn't tied any particular historical event, just set in that time. The best comparison I can think of is something like Stephen King's Stand By Me in that it is just set in that time frame, though that story is more of a first person retrospective. My book isn't told from first person, and isn't as if a person who has become older is looking back on his youth and telling the reader about it. It's told from 3rd person omniscient. It starts in 1959 and ends in late 1960. You read it as if you are living in that time.
I'm racking my brain trying to figure how to classify it. Historical fiction or not? Came upon an agent online who seemed to describe what she wanted and it had so much in common with the material I'd written, until her last line said: no historical fiction! Doh! If I sent it to her I could just imagine getting a flaming rejection saying:"I said no historical fiction, can't your read?". I guess every writer has nightmares of such a response.
So what do you think? How would you categorize it? I'm giving myself an ulcer because I truly feel that I put a huge amount of work into this thing and I've gotten it to the best state I know how to, to only be flummoxed by a little detail like categorizing. Such is the writing life, I suppose. Any thoughts are welcome. THANKS!
This is my second post in a few days. I had another and got some good advice, but I decided to make a new one to further explain my question because my first posting may have seemed a little vague so I wanted to clarify.
I've written a book (yes a lazy person like me actually spent 5 years writing the thing through blood, sweat and tears). It is a story that predominantly takes place in a college atmosphere set in the late 1950s. I purposely chose the 1950s because it seems to be a very charismatic decade, one where America was more prosperous and things were a bit simpler. We live in an age nowadays where kids run into schools and gun people down. I wanted to bring the reader AWAY from that. Although I'm sure the 50's were fraught with their own issues (nuclear war being predominant amongst them), I view this as a more idyllic decade, perhaps partly because of the nostalgic element.
I'm trying very hard to figure out how to label this for an agent. Although it is SET in the 50s, there is no particular social issue the story revolves around. I just wanted to put it in the 50s, so I do. It's not like it's tied to contemporary issues of that time like the red scare or the Korean war or any of that. I just have a fondness for the 50s (even though I didn't live through them, so I am probably idealizing them-although I probably wouldn't have like all the smoking).
I've heard of the category YA - Historical fiction. Does anyone think that would be accurate? Like I said, it isn't tied any particular historical event, just set in that time. The best comparison I can think of is something like Stephen King's Stand By Me in that it is just set in that time frame, though that story is more of a first person retrospective. My book isn't told from first person, and isn't as if a person who has become older is looking back on his youth and telling the reader about it. It's told from 3rd person omniscient. It starts in 1959 and ends in late 1960. You read it as if you are living in that time.
I'm racking my brain trying to figure how to classify it. Historical fiction or not? Came upon an agent online who seemed to describe what she wanted and it had so much in common with the material I'd written, until her last line said: no historical fiction! Doh! If I sent it to her I could just imagine getting a flaming rejection saying:"I said no historical fiction, can't your read?". I guess every writer has nightmares of such a response.
So what do you think? How would you categorize it? I'm giving myself an ulcer because I truly feel that I put a huge amount of work into this thing and I've gotten it to the best state I know how to, to only be flummoxed by a little detail like categorizing. Such is the writing life, I suppose. Any thoughts are welcome. THANKS!