Mar
27

Ten Minutes

Posted in pitching, Romantic Times, writing | 1 Comment
It doesn’t seem like a lot of time, does it? Or maybe it’s too long – but in either case that’s all I’ve got to work with. I snagged my first choices of publishers and agents to pitch to at RT (a big surprise to me, honestly), and now it’s put up or shut up time. I get 10 minutes to convince a publisher or an agent that my work is worth reading. Actually – it’s more of a 5 minute pitch and 5 minutes of questions, but the end result is the same. The reality of it is that the pitch is nothing more than a foot in the door – it’s not a guarantee of anything other than a chance to not have the manuscript tossed on the slush pile. Still – I’d rather get my toe crushed than be standing around picking my nose. I debated it,… Read more
Mar
18

Pitching

Posted in craft, pitching, tentacle dick | 1 Comment
Ha! I’m still hoping to pitch to *someone* at RT at the end of April, but I’m starting to realize my chances of having the WiP done by then are probably nonexistent. Actually, I might have the rough done, but it certainly won’t be edited enough for any kind of submission. Which isn’t really the point of pitching anyway – as far as I understand, you don’t actually show up with a finished manuscript – you just ‘pitch’ the idea and if the agent/editor/publisher or whoever likes it, they tell you to send them a few chapter or whatever. Doesn’t mean anything except that it’s no longer an unsolicited manuscript, so in theory, you have a better shot. So I’ll need to practice that, I guess. On the other hand, I have to admit I feel like a total doofus trying to explain the ins and outs of my story… Read more