Writing An Agent Submission Letter

Short and sweet…good information

Journey To Ambeth

After seven days of writing about an otherworldly weekend away with The Silent Eye, it’s back to reality with a rather prosaic thud – this post is all about crafting the agent submission letter.

I’ve written before about submitting your manuscript to agents – while I don’t consider myself by any means an expert, I have had a bit of experience in sending the things out. I also attended a workshop some time back at Bloomsbury, where a couple of London agents shared their idea of a perfect submission letter, and several other agents have commented that my submission package stood out from the others (although no-one has taken me on board as yet – boo-hoo).

So, how do you structure the all-important letter? (I say all-important because it’s the first opportunity you have to make an impression, and we all know how important first impressions are). Well, here are…

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Everyone interested in time travel, meet here yesterday

bluebird of bitterness

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Author SummerRead Exchange-Viviana Mackade

I’m visiting Viviana Mackade today. Stop by and join the conversation about alternate realities. https://viviana-mackade.blog/2018/07/26/in-my-own-shadow-by-susan-a-royal-and-meet-the-character/

~Music to Our Ears~

Music has always had a special place in our family.

 

Our older kids had record players before they could read. I had to draw pictures on the records so they could pick out the ones they wanted to play. By the time the youngest came along, we’d moved up to a Fisher Price tape recorder. Our house was filled with the sounds of Peter and The Wolf, Rudolph the Red nosed Reindeer, The Muppets. Old songs like Pop the Magic Dragon. Popeye the Sailor Man, and every Disney song imaginable.

 

We’ve continued our love of music. Traditional, Classic, Rock, Country. Some of just about everything. It brought our family closer. Drew it together. And still does. Even after all these years.

 

My husband passed away in 2015, but he’s always in our hearts. Whenever we share a new song with each other, someone always says “You know, Dad would like this.”

Character Basics: Choosing A Name

Some great suggestions reblogged from Rachel Poli’s post about naming your characters

via Character Basics: Choosing A Name [Character Development]

The Little Things

Winter has finally arrived in my neck of the woods. The sun is almost gone by 5:30 and one of my favorite things to do on a cold Friday night is to snuggle up on the couch in my pajamas with popcorn, hot chocolate and a good movie.

When my husband was still alive, it’s one of the things we enjoyed doing together. He preferred romantic comedies and I liked action flicks, but we both liked Sci-fi. And there was nothing better than finding a ‘sleeper’ neither of us knew anything about.

I still love a good movie. These days I watch alone or with my sister. But there’s another movie buff in the family. My 11 year old grandson, Caleb. Last night he came over to watch Skull Island with me, and we had so much fun.

At first, he wasn’t sure about the ‘scary’ parts. We had a lengthy discussion where he informed me getting scared really bad could lead to a heart attack. Finally we compromised. I told him if that happened we’d either fast forward the movie or he could go into the other room until the scene was over.

Halfway through he realized King Kong was a good guy and started rooting for him. When it was over and we were both full of various snacks, he said “Granny, this was fun. We’re going to have to do it again.” I don’t have to tell you that made my day.

I need to remember. Especially this time of year.

It’s the little things that count!

 

Classes/Workshops

Love this idea!

Dan Alatorre - AUTHOR

your humble host

One of the things we have been thinking about doing for quite a while is offering online classes or workshops.

As part of that, we created the Internet show, “Writers Off Task With Friends,” a fun internet show, and we also signed up to be presenters at this year’s Florida Writers Association conference (October 19 – 22, 2017). 

But

it seems a little silly to wait a whole year to get information you need.

So I was thinking I might have them here.

Well, not here, really. But on the regular Internet. You know, YouTube.

How it would work is, I would announce the date here, and share the link; anybody who signed up would be admitted to view the online presentation.

• It’ll be a live video chat
• you can ask questions
• you can be on camera (or not)

I would present a…

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Infographic: 28 Boring Words and What to Use Instead

Going to keep this list handy while writing!

Nicholas C. Rossis

Jack Milgram is a writer and blogger at Custom Writing. He recently published an Infographic with 28 Boring Words and suggestions of what to use instead. The idea is that, if you practice using these suggested words instead of the plain-vanilla ones, it will become a habit and enrich your writing. You can contact Jack on Facebook and Twitter, plus on Custom Writing’s blog.

[tweetthis]Infographic: 28 Boring Words and What to Use Instead[/tweetthis]

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How To Radically Revise Your Novel

Rachel Poli

Radical revision is a term to revise or rewrite your current draft. It’s a tool to help your reimagine your story.

This is a method I learned in school when I was working on my English degree. I’ve kept the notes these past two years because I found it to be helpful and a pretty cool method. It didn’t seem so at the time because it was homework, but I do think it helps.

What does radical revision do?

The point of radically revising your novel is to try something new, something different you wouldn’t normally do. Rewrite your current draft in a new way and see which one works better.

It may or may not work, but you’re experimenting, getting to know your novel and characters at a deeper level, and you’re practicing new forms of writing.

In a way, I guess you could look at this as a…

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Why your writing is important

Wordland

People often say that words aren’t dangerous. But writers know better than that. We understand the power that words have. When we wield them we are all aware how we’re casting lightening stolen from the Gods.

Events in the world prove just how fickle words are. Assaulted by ‘fake news’, ‘alternative facts’ and ‘post-truth’ a fiction writer gets concerned. People are using the words we love to spread fear not knowledge. Moreover, the seriousness of reality can make our whimsical tales feel unworthy of attention.

But fear not. Ursula Le Guin in her usual brilliant fashion, explained the difference between these ‘lies dressed as truth’ and actual fiction. You aren’t part of the distraction, you’re part of the fight against it.

Those words that you pull from your mind are not a distraction from current events. They are a mirror to it, deliberately or not. You have something to say…

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