Another Rejection Letter

I know the title sounds horrible, but...
Yes, I did receive another rejection email yesterday.
And at first I was actually happy because...
I have been thinking of self publishing this particular book.
It's the first book in my series "Chris' Journey Turning Different Corners"
And then I was depressed...
What's wrong with this book? It's a great story!
And then I was...Hmm...I don't know...Understanding, maybe?
I have read countless blogs about querying and they tell you,
                       "Do your homework!"
And they are right! From the beginning I have questioned my genre with this particular story.
Is it a "Romance?" Yes, basically speaking, but it has all these other variables to it.
It starts out with "Chris" being a 12 year old foster child and gets to 18, falling in love,
having sex, getting married, and then tragedy strikes crashing her world down around her,
Then there's abuse, and new friends, and turning points, acceptance, and closure at the age of 22,
but no HEA, because...That's where book two comes in...

Okay, so to sum it up, this is what the rejection letter said;
"Unfortunately, after careful consideration of your manuscript, we have determined that it does not fit our needs"
And they are right! Even though the agents and publishers I have queried are looking for romance novels and series, mine really does not fit their needs.
They aren't saying it's not a good story, just that as a romance novel,
it doesn't fit with the typical ones that they publish. I also know, from doing my homework,
that the last book in the series (Which was originally written as a stand alone) would fit,
but I want the first three books out there first and then I'll look into querying the final one.

Just remember "Rejection letters" can be a good thing!
Just keep doing your homework and don't give up on your dream.

Stress? Me? Never! UGH!

First reason for the stress reduction kit...
The holidays are fast approaching!
And I'm NOT ready!

Second reason for the stress reduction kit...
I have been writing query letters and I have come to the conclusion...
I write Sucky Query letters!
The hook is okay. It's short, but says what I want to get their interest..
 I've got my contact information down to a "T"
But, It's that first part where you tell the publisher or agent why you are submitting to them. Do I really have to say why? I mean, I wouldn't submit to them if I didn't want to get their attention. I mean, I'm not sending out a million query letters, just a few hand picked chosen ones, that I have found in google search and that I have heard about through other writers and authors.

Okay well, most people request your query letter to be no longer than 1 page, so with mine they really don't have to worry, I think mine is a half a page long!
I know...But mine is short and to the point! It basically says, "Here's what I've got and here's where you can contact me." End of query. Hopefully, I will get better at it. I guess my main problem is, I'm not really good at sucking up, but will make you fudge and cookies to sweeten you up!

Well that's the reasons for my Stress Reduction kit. Feel free to print one up for yourself and use as needed!

Happy Wednesday everyone!

How to write a book?

I have read 10,000 help blogs on "How to write a book." Well maybe only 500, but it feels like a heck of a lot more! And every single one of them tell you something different. Not only do help blogs tell you how to write books, but there's also the ones who tell you how to write queries and synopsis'. And then there are the submission processes of agents and publishers.
First you have people telling you, "No purple prose" If you don't know what that is you can find out about it here;
http://www.debstover.com/purple.html and yes, there is one small line in my book that has it, but in my defense, that part of my book took place in the '70's. And I didn't know what "purple prose" was until about 10 minutes ago!
Okay so now you are done writing and it's time to query.
First they tell you how to write a query and you would think it would be a simple process, but no it's not. It can be one of the hardest things you'll ever do and I think I just submitted the shortest query in history! Very short and to the point. Oh well. It was my first submission and let's hope I get better as I go along.
Second they tell you, "Don't query a series." So what if they are asking for series?

So here's the deal;
I've written my book. I wrote it the way the story played out in my head. I proofread it and did the edits and reread it. It's done! It might be only 55,000 words, but it is a tragic love story with closure and I cried through a major part as I was writing it. Hopefully that's because of the story and not my writing. No, it doesn't have a happily ever after. Not yet anyways, because it is the first book in a series of four books and then you get the happily ever after. Which, by the way, has been written also and is apprx. 93,000 words.

So the moral of this story is...
Write your way, in your own words. Take time to double check spelling. Make sure the story flows and comes together nicely and do your best on queries and the synopsis and if they like it.... Read the help blogs either before you begin writing or after finishing the first draft. And once you've submitted that book to the agents and publishers you want, take a deep breath and don't start stressing on what you think you did or did not do. It's been sent and it's up to the the people you queried now.

No One Knows

I've been told that no one knows your book better than you!
So my question is, "How come it's so hard to write a query and synopsis?"

I was talking to a friend a couple of weeks ago. She is an English Lit professor and a writing instructor.
Right now she is grading and reading finals, but when she's done, she's agreed to read my book that I just finished. I told her she needs to be impartial.
 "Yeah right" she tells me. We've been friends for 18 years now.
Anyway, she was asking what my book was about and was trying to pull out all the details.
It didn't dawn on me until after I hung up that she was trying to get a synopsis out of me.
I should have realized this and maybe my synopsis would be done! Oh well. I'll probably get together with her next week and hopefully she can teach me some things about writing!

Have a great week everyone and if you get a chance check out my other blog on wordpress.
http://karensdifferentcorners.wordpress.com/

Query, Synopsis, Cover letter? EEK!

Okay, I know how to write the query.
I've figured out how to write the synopsis.
But what the heck do I put in a cover letter?

Yes, I know that should be the easiest out of the three, but.........

It's like my poor son, filling out job applications and he has no job history to report
 because he's never had a job!

Well that's me. I have written my first novel and yet have no history.
Nothing ever published, no awards....

So what do you put on that cover letter?
Do you list the blogs you write?
Your three facebook pages you have?
Your twitter account?
The guest blog you wrote for someone else's blog?

Queries!

Aak! Eek! Ugh! Okay now that I've got that out of the way...I want to ask a question...At least I think I wanted to ask a question....Wait, let me think about this. I've got all these questions rolling around in my head.  Stop! Okay had to stop the roulette wheel and pick the one I wanted. Okay here's my question... No wait let me give you a little history first then I'll ask.

I am writing a series of 3 books. I am almost finished with the third. I just need to fill in a couple of gaps, tie it together, and make sure it's flows and keeps you reading. But the thing is I haven't written the first 2 books. They are still in my head. When I first started writing the third book I had no plans on writing the first two, because the third book has enough merit to stand on it's own, is a good read, and has the happily ever after, and yet leaves some questions unanswered, that would make the reader wanting more, which then I could write the first two books. I just feel that if any get published, I want it to be the third.

Okay so here's my question for you....

When sending out my query letter, Do I just query the one book as a stand alone? Or do I need to put in the query, that it could be a series?

Is there a difference in tactics when sending to an agent? Or a publisher?

As to that I mean... Do you tell the publisher that you are querying that it could be a series or not?

Do you tell the agent that it could be a series or not?

Am I Backwards?

Good morning! As usual I have questions and tend to do every thing backwards.
 Is that unusual or do you happen to do this too?

I have had a fantasy roaming around in my head for about a year now and just about four months ago I decided to write a book about it. So sitting down with pen and paper I started writing. When I was into my third chapter, I told myself, "Wait a minute, maybe I should do some research on how to write a book" So I did find a blog that I thoroughly enjoyed and had thought I had bookmarked and can't seem to find it now. (But I will and will share it with you at a later date.)

Anyway, I was reading his blog and he had a checklist and helpful advice on what you need. So I was going through his list and saying, "Okay I've done this, and I've done that. Great it looks like I was doing everything pretty much right and was on track." When I came to his comment, "Now you need to have an ending. Your Happily ever after." OMG, I have no idea how this story is supposed to end! And I stressed on it. Mind you I was still only on my third chapter. I walked around for two days trying to figure out how to get my Happily Ever After. Lucky for me I woke up on the third day and there it was in my head. So my ending chapter has been written. Phew, now I don't have to stress on that.

   Currently I am on the 12th chapter! And once again jumping forward. I have been researching publishers, literary agents, synopsis, and how to write query letters!

I have decided I'm not backwards, I just tend to jump forward and get ahead of myself and then have to go backwards to get me back to where I should be! :-)

I did get a notice yesterday for a group on Facebook where the writer wrote his novel from "Ending to Beginning" I have to hand it to him. I don't think I would be able to accomplish that!

We all have our own writing styles to get us from point "A" to point "B" or visa versa and I will talk about those in my next blog.

Happy Writing everyone!