The Best Things Come to Those Who ...

A few weeks back I blogged about 'Queryfail' - where agents were sharing on Twitter the worst approaches made to them by writers. This has caused rage and frustration in the writing community: go to http://bookendslitagency.blogspot.com/2009/04/agentfail-right-here.html to listen in to writers getting their own back by grousing about the dreadful behaviour of agents. I took a look at this last week and it was already a very lengthy thread and although I felt sympathy - and recognition - I also felt that it was a bit of a Pyrrhic victory to sneer at agents and complain about them. Sadly, many of the complaints were badly spelled and expressed - and this does the would-be clients of agents no favours. We need to stay calm, professional, icily articulate. Do go across and take a look: some of the experiences recounted are truly shocking. After a while, though, I bet you'll start feeling weary or uncomfortable - where does it get us all? I enjoy a good bleat as much as the next hard-done-by writer (oh, you noticed that, did you?) but there comes a time when you have to detach yourself and think of ways of taking practical, independent action. You have to have your pride, even if you don't have the cherished book-deal.

That said, I did recognise one of the cardinal sins of agents, and publishers, repeated over and over and over, and I have been at the receiving end of this so many times. What is it? Cruelty, a sneering dismissal, a promise unfulfilled, a stolen idea? No. It's SILENCE. It's the hardest thing of all to cope with. You put together the best submission package you can, you write a smooth, brief, ultra-professional letter, you dutifully follow all the guidelines on the agency's website, you act keen but not insanely desperate. You send material off by snail mail or through the ether. Then you wait.

And wait.

And wait.

And wait.

You know you should be writing something new but you can't settle to it until ... until you know, once and for all, whether your beloved project has found a home.

You wait some more.

You agonise about when it would be permissible to make a brief, humble enquiry - did my material, perchance, reach you safely? When do you think you could let me know whether you're interested? You draft an email enquiry with more care than you put into the whole novel. You wait.

And you wait

And you wait.

Christmas comes. Another birthday. Your children grow six inches. So does your waistline. The photo you fondly thought might do as a publicity shot bears less and less resemblance to your current haggard state.

You keep waiting. Weeks, months - and sometimes years - down the line, an answer comes. When it does, it's a weasel-phrase, a wriggle-clause, written by an overloaded overworked agent (or minion) who, in spite of the fact that an entire geological epoch has passed since you submitted the thing, hasn't really had the time to read much of it, or read it with care. You suspect that these time-delay judgements are also, paradoxically, snap judgements. Not quite right for our list, bleh bleh. We wish you luck placing it elsewhere, blah blah. The knowing for sure, is cruel - but it certainly beats, believe me, the NOT knowing for sure. Tread on my dreams if you must - just don't skirt them and wander off without any comment at all on their pretty colours, their soft textures.

Several writers on the Bookends blog were particularly upset by failure of agents to reply even when material had been solicited! Another grouse is that agents put up on their websites that they will reply in four or six weeks - and then don't. Or they say that if you don't hear in a certain time, it's a no. Hmn. You'll still be left wondering - did it get to them safely? I must know, I must know! So you'll still chase them. Glitches do happen: when I revised my last book for my agent and waited several weeks for her response, then emailed her, I was told she hadn't received it. In fact it was at the agency, lying on somebody else's desk, for the best part of a month, further delaying the time when it would be sent out to publishers.

Now then, because God forbid we should sound biassed and unfair, let's take a look at an agent's perspective. Go to agent Nathan Bransford's excellent blog (in my blogroll to the right) - he's been conducting a very interesting experiment. He posted, with the writers' permissions, fifty genuine query letters he'd had and invited us to judge whether we would, as agents, have requested material from those writers. If you go to the blog, scroll right down to the beginning of this process: it's a lot of material and takes a while to read. I have to say I just read the queries rather than the hundreds of comments people were making on them, because I do actually have a life and it's really too short to follow up all of this. What is fascinating is that he buried in the midst of this three queries where the writers did go on to get publishing deals. He invites you to spot them. (This is why it's important to scroll right down to the start of the process and read upward, as it were). Well, I didn't. In fact, I can't remember any of the queries making my pulse go faster. Maybe I'd be a really mean agent! Try it for yourself: be an agent for a day. It'll fill up some of that waiting-time.

Winchester Writers' Conference Programme

My regular readers (you're still with me, aren't you?) will know that each summer I teach at the Winchester Writers' Conference. This is a busy, packed affair which this year will run from the weekend of the 3rd July. The programme is now at last up on the conference website at http://www.writersconference.co.uk, so do go and take a look as there's a huge range of courses, talks and appointments available with writers, editors and agents. The Saturday programme is so full that the biggest problem is always what to select from so many talks. I'll be teaching a mini-course on the Friday called 'Making Memorable Scenes' and on Saturday I'll be giving a talk called 'From Short Hop to Long Haul' about making the transition from writing short fiction to tackling a novel. The conference also runs writing competitions - when I started going there as a delegate, before I was published, it gave me a real thrill to win some prizes there: anything that validates you as a writer is an encouragement. To be amongst other writers who are sharing the same hopes, dreams and doubts as you is also balm to the soul, especially if you are unlucky enough not to be supported in your ambitions by those around you. People who attend Winchester tend to be exhausted by the experience but also pepped up, their enthusiasm refreshed, their knowledge of the publishing industry broadened. It's a great place to network and make friends.

Carrion Jane Follow-up

My last post was about Seth Grahame-Smith's 'mash-up' novel 'Pride and Prejudice and Zombies' - well, prepared to be sickened further: Publishers' Weekly reports he has now landed a two book deal with Grand Central Press, for a rumoured $575,000. The first book is to be 'Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter'. Yup. There's a film proposal too.

So, we know now where we've been going wrong: how about 'Prince Albert, Royal Werewolf'? 'Little Nell, Awaking the Undead'? 'Hamlet: Ghostbuster of Denmark'? 'Dante, Scourer of the Underworld'? 'John Knox and his Monstrous Regiment of Lesbian Zombie Fighters'? 'Churchill and the Black Dog Revenants'? 'Scrooge and the Time-Raiding Spooks'?

There you are, now. Loads of ideas. Get mashing.

Carrion Jane

I actually came across this a few months ago - but assumed it was some kind of spoof. Apparently not: yes, there really is a novel called 'Pride and Prejudice and Zombies' (with a truly gruesome cover), which has reached number 12 in the Amazon charts. This literary 'mash-up' by LA TV writer Seth Grahame-Smith sees Netherfield overrun by the undead and Elizabeth Bennet as a Regency Buffy. Apparently all five Bennet girls have been trained in martial arts by Shaolin monks in China. Well, of course. We knew that. The blending of the original Austen and the new take on her world is virtually seamless: sisters at a ball are described as 'fine women, with an air of decided fashion, but little in the way of combat training.'

Aren't you just kicking yourself you didn't think of this, when it's blindingly obvious that modern readers want to move away from quadrilles and needlework to ninja action, from conversing at an elegant ball to kicking a zombie in its decaying balls? We are promised a lot of vomiting. Goody. Grahame-Smith promises that 'at least one major character slowly becomes a zombie in the course of the book.' Apart from the reader, that is?

If putrefaction isn't enough to satisfy your tastes, dear Jane will be forced into arranged marriages with other genres, so here's more for you to look forward to: in a Marvel comic the Dashwood girls will gad about with the Fantastic Four. There will be a vampire novel, called 'Jane Bites Back'. And this is my favourite, I have to say, because of the title: a film in which Austen fights with aliens: 'Pride and Predator'.

I bet you think I should have posted this on April Fool's Day, don't you?

Now pass me the hartshorn, my dear: I feel a fit of the vapours coming on.

Diagram Disappointment

Back on the 25th of February I posted the shortlist for the Diagram prize which is awarded to the year's weirdest title. Now I told you, didn't I, to vote for 'Baboon Metaphysics' - a title worthy of a novel on the Costa or Booker shortlist. In fact, I might just well go off and write it. Sadly, it came second to 'The 2009-2014 World Outlook for 60-milligram Containers of Fromage Frais', which was the front-runner all along but just didn't do it for me. So where were you when those baboons needed you?

Query Letters - the Right Approach?

Back on the 6th March I posted about the 'Queryfail debate', where American agents were sharing jolly tales of the worst approaches made to them by writers. It's a guilty pleasure looking at them (my favourite is 'My name is Maya and I'm an elf') - but also, you may find, rather depressing. How to approach, pitch, query the gatekeepers of the industry - it's a scary topic. So you may be interested in this (although daunted too): the agent Noah Lukeman has made his e-book How to Write a Great Query Letter available for free download at http://www.lukeman.com/greatquery/index.htm You can download it once only. He has already written a book some of you may be familiar with, called The First Five Pages (I think the title says it all). In his 95 page e-book he covers formatting, common mistakes, what you should and should not include in your query pitch, so there's a wealth of information there. His take is always this: agents and editors are looking for reasons to turn you down, not take you on. If you make the slightest error of tone or content, you're heading for the wastepaper bin. So it's good to know that you shouldn't tell the agent your family laughed like drains when you read it to them, that you shouldn't use green ink, that you shouldn't use bold or underlining, that you shouldn't drivel on about sub-plots, that you shouldn't be arrogant, that you shouldn't be defeatist either, that you shouldn't ignore the agent's own submission guidelines. You knew all this, of course, didn't you? You would never dream of thinking that the rules are for other people but not your sweet genius self.

There's a wealth of quotable stick-on-the-fridge phrases, starting with 'Writing is an artistic endeavour and the query letter is a marketing endeavour'. He tells us that a query is pointless if you've sent it to the wrong person. That it won't work if it's too fulsome. That its purpose is to get that agent to want to read more. That you shouldn't give up. The whole text is packed with practical advice and an insider's knowledge of the industry. So do download it.

BUT. I do have caveats: because he is part of the American publishing industry, his approach is intensely prescriptive and proscriptive, to such a degree that you wonder whether any originality or individuality can filter through. This may not be such a problem if your work is very genre-specific and you can define your market with some exactness. There are pages and pages of Rules - what to do, what not to do. If I tell you that chapters are devoted to The First Paragraph, The Second Paragraph and The Third Paragraph (because you're only allowed three paragraphs and your letter absolutely must not be more than one side long) I think you'll get the drift. You are told, continually, that this or that infringement is a 'red flag, a sign of an amateur.' He even tells you how many sentences per paragraph: 'The first paragraph should consist of one sentence.''Limit your plot synopsis to three sentences.' Aargh! Not for the first time, I find myself wondering, wearily, how any of us ever get published. It's like Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom: one miss-step and you're kebabed by a spear or plunging, shrieking, into a pit of snakes.

I do think he means to be genuinely helpful but his tone of encouragement veers towards the platoon-sergeant's 'Pick up your feet you 'orrible shower!' When he tells us to be patient and persevere, that's all very well. I think most of us are quite remarkable in that regard: we keep picking ourselves up, dusting ourselves down and coming back for more, God knows why. So there isn't much consolation in being told 'most writers dig in for a 6 month battle when approaching the industry. If they are not successful by then, they give up. Dig in for a 10 year battle instead. Or better, 20 years. If you love the craft of writing and are truly in it for the passion of it, then 20 years should not seem like a long time'. Well, Jeez! I suppose that by the time success dawdles up to your door and rings the bell, you'll have decided to use the royalties to buy a Stannah stairlift. Now there's something to look forward to.

In the meantime, some of you may want to hit the bottle. I'm off to crack open another box of Lindors.

Journals, plots and sailing to Byzantium

My blog is coming up to two years old now - which seems incredible. And, as I've said before, during the (non)publishing vicissitudes of those two years, it's been such a comfort to me, an outlet for my thoughts and a way of communicating with some great people. A little while ago the editor of the newsletter of the Writers in Oxford society asked if any of us had thoughts about the usefulness of diary-writing, so I forwarded one of my blog posts (17 April 2008), where I'd discussed what it meant to me. I'm delighted that he's included the whole thing in the current edition of the newsletter, which arrived today. In print again! Yay!

Tomorrow I'm teaching on the University's Diploma in Creative Writing course. After this blog I have to boil down a course which usually takes a whole day to under two hours - and why is this difficult? Because it's about plot, that's why! It's a challenging but exciting topic which many a new novelist feels daunted by.

I've also been doing some writing coaching/mentoring, so the techniques of plotting are very much on my mind, as the writer I'm working with is brimful of promising ideas but needs to knock them into some sort of shape. In these cases, you often have to take a deep breath and write your way into the structure of the book - if you wait for it all to be architecturally polished, you'll never get the thing done. Certain scenes - the opening, the ending, the showdown, the betrayal - these may be present in your mind in utter clarity: it's the bits in between the showboating scenes, the areas where vision can fail and pace can flag - that's where you need to trust the process. You need to grind on, keep writing, be prepared to dispense with what doesn't work, believe that it will all bed down in the end. It will. Honestly! One of the joys of writing is that, as you write, you find yourself writing what you never expected to write: serendipitous connections are made, exciting developments come to you - and you could never, at the start, have foreseen they would come along. If you keep turning up and putting pen to paper, the Muse thinks - hey, I think I might join in. It's that old chestnut: inspiration plus perspiration. The yin and yang of the creative process.

On Thursday I went up to London to meet my friend Anna and visit the Byzantium exhibition at the Royal Academy. There were certainly some very gorgeous items there, as you'd expect. Jewellery to die for, sweetie. A Fayum-style coffin-lid portrait of a young girl with lustrous dark eyes. Beautiful embroidered textiles, taffeta and silk and gold thread. Silver chalices, ivory reliquaries. A chest full of the bones of saints (or are they?), all wrapped and labelled in little bundles. A child's linen tunic (this was very touching): a little seventh century hoodie. Finally a gorgeous golden painting on wood of holy aspirants climbing a long ladder to heaven - some of them being pulled off it by spiky, black, malicious devils.

However, the exhibition was very crowded (it closes tomorrow) and one had to shuffle past glass cases at a snail's pace, often stopping, in the human traffic-jam, in front of the items of least interest. The exhibits were described in black script on small silver plaques in each of the cases - and in the dim lighting you had to be right in front of the plaque in order to read it. This was intensely frustrating, expecially when the thing wasn't all that informative. I suspect this was because they wanted you to hire an audio guide which would give you more of a spiel. Well, I balked at this, true Scot that I am. Having paid £12 to go round the show, and with a pair of eyes in my head in reasonable functioning order, I'm quite happy to read information if it's there for me and refuse to hand over another three quid to know more. Anna had no such qualms, so learnt a lot more than I did - there you go.

Sated with drooping saints and painted vellum, we emerged out onto Piccadilly and treated ourselves to afternoon tea, dahling. And Anna treated me to a sharp talk about my current lack of productivity. Thanks, Anna ...