Querying: Magic Numbers

I love Query Tracker. It's like excel for querying.

As of this moment, I have 9 queries out. 4 agents were speedy with their form rejections. I really appreciate the speedy ones because if there's anything that makes me all fuzzy and itchy on the inside in a bad way, it's not knowing. I am an inherent pessimist at heart, so I can honestly say that I'm not upset by any of the rejections, even the ones from agents whom I really admire. I had already braced myself for rejection**

**Not promoting this as a great philosophy of life. Please don't be a pessimist :)

What I am worried about is the Magic Number. Call me stupid, but I'm convinced that such a thing exists. That number that tells you to step back. That number that makes you start doubting the quality of your query or your MS. That rejection after sending out a full (I have yet to send mine. I know, I should get on it) that makes you seriously consider whether or not you should revise...again.

There's a number floating around: 10%. Apparently, if you are getting a 10% request rate, you can relax and pat yourself on the back for being on the right track.

But if not, then what?

The average number of queries before getting a request is 65.

But if not, then what? What if I hit 100 queries? What do I do then?

I guess my point is that these numbers scare me. Maybe they actually mean something. After all, there are so many writers out there and so many bits of data about rejection rates and number of queries sent and whatnot that these number MUST hold some validity.

At the same time, I'm a writer, not a mathematician :D

Do you ever worry about the number of request you get in relation to the number of queries you have sent?

More Tools! Story Analyzer

Geez, she's on a tool-spazz, you might be thinking. And I kind of am. But I need all the help I can get when I need a boost from revisions, so here you are--tool #2, a pot of gold that I can't believe I just discovered:

The Story Analyzer

My MS is cowering in fear in some dark cranny as I drag it out onto my blog, because that's the only way I can show how the analyzer works. Sorry, MS. Bear with me. You're starting to look prettier.

 You start by going to this lovely website. Then you copy and paste 60k or less of your text into the text box, between the fancy computer jargon that makes no sense to me (should look like a bunch of weird symbols like this-ish: </br...>). I tried to select the do not read quotes button, but that screwed up my analysis, so the program did analyze all of my dialogue, but if you can get the button to work then do select it because the beautifulest of dialogue is not always diction and syntax perfect. Since my story is in first person, I also checked the account for "I" button.

I find it kind of hilarious that I'm just under the ratio for acceptable frequency of starting sentences of conjunctions. I feel like I use them quite often, so this merits a happy dance! Let's just hope that my ratio stays at .49 :D

 All I can say is...where the heck did the ?? come from?!!! Must go through MS. That is horrible. Really.

And not sure how I feel over that 13% -ly thing. Seems kind of high...

 Once again, I can escaping by the skin of my teeth for acceptable frequency of passive voice. I guess it's a good thing. It's not quite as bad as .49 out of .5 for beginning sentences with conjunctions.

 Wade in=weighed in? I did not know that--learning something new everyday. Hehe, I'll probably change the wade in to wade through.

The wordiness is no surprise. Completely guilty. I'll go back and comb out those redundancies.

 Viable is a fad word? I'll look up on that. In the heat of the moment definitely is. Oh goodness me.

I think that age level is just in the right range. That's a relief. And no sentences over 20 words. Does that call for celebration?

I strongly advise those who are in the process of revision to check out this amazing tool! Here's the website again if you missed it :)

(All stats are from my MS INGENICIDE. First person, 64k.)

TV Tropes

A great writing tool that doesn't get half as much credit as it deserves is the website TV Tropes. Don't let the name fool you--TV Tropes contains tropes from all different sorts of medium, from plays to fanfiction to literature to anime, etc.

Sometimes, when I'm stressed and don't feel like being productive, I turn to anime (guilty pleasure, besides chocolate). Those days. I can blow out 10, 15 episodes, no sweat. Anime was actually the vehicle for my discovery of TV Tropes. The site does an amazing analysis of ALL the tropes in many animes. And I confess, I read them! Now, you may be asking why I'm such a dork, to which I'll answer 1. I am and 2. 50% of animes are actually very worthwhile if you have a taste for it, but the other 50% is hilariously bad, and reading up on tropes for the bad ones always result in great laughs. Reading up tropes on the good ones is also helpful for inspiration--tropes get a bad name sometimes (people call them cliches or stereotypes) but you have to realize that many things in writing are tropes. In fact, there are 7 basic kinds of plots (or 9, check me on that) and you might be like no way, but read them on TV tropes and you'll find that is it, in fact, true. There are 7 kinds of plots. Gasp! Does that mean we are unoriginal as writers? No! What matters is your execution of a trope, your own personal twist.

Like I said, tropes can be helpful. You can see which tropes were done well in which works (the database in HUGE. Most books with a respectable readership have a trope page), and which tropes were done not so well. I'm writing this post because I've come across a trope in my MS called ESCAPE BY AIR VENT. And now I'm sort of in a pickle. I can't seem to remember if I was being lazy when I had my main character escape by air vent, of if it served a purpose. Because if I was being lazy, that is a big no-no. Tropes are not crutches to use when you can't think of your own original twist.

*sigh* Now I must think of how to revise the air vent scene.

What tools do you like to use to help you write?

WDC Part 1

 

Pitch Slam

Alright, let's get right to it. Sitting in the West Metropolitan for the last speaker of my one day conference adventure (the day absolutely flew) as I type this. I had a lot of notes in my bag that I will type up later and post, but for now we'll review the highlight of the day (for many. Or the nightmare of the day. Which I was beginning to think would be my case):

THE PITCH SLAM

Brief breakdown to a pitch slam, for those who may not know what it is (me a month ago):

• Huge conference room
• 50-60 agents sitting behind tables
• Chairs in front of these table for you, the writer
• Lines. Many lines.
• 3 minute intervals--90 seconds for you to pitch, 90 seconds for the agent to respond
• Passing of business cards

 Add all of these elements and you get a great opportunity to wow potential agents with your verbal pitching skills, dazzling charisma, and witty sense of humor**

**And if you don't have any of these skills (me), then you can load up on free coffee prior to the event and let the buzz distract you from your nerves.

Here's what I learned after recovering from over-dosage of 90 minutes of pure exhilaration. Or Frenzy. However you'd like to view it:

1. Writing all fancy and nice is...great. But when you memorize fancy and nice writing, you end up sounding too polished and your voice kind of sinks into a monotone and you start worrying oh no, did I memorize this part wrong? Did I skip a word? Another thing about memorizing your pitch is that you end up talking in one big, fluent stream. Which is great. But it's hard for an agent to break into that stream and maybe start up some meaningful conversation of let's-get-to-know-each-other or ask any questions about your story. I'll confess that I didn't realize the difference between a pitch and a query until last night. Then I was frantically scrambling to put together my pitch, bugging my CP at 10PM to look at two versions (Thanks, Deborah!). I recited it about forty times before I went to bed, forty more times on the bus ride. But ultimately, after pitching to two agents that way, I realized that it wasn't working. So I forgot about the memorized pitch and just went with it, tried to tell the story the best I could and as naturally as I could. Writers are still humans after all, not pitch generating machines.

2. Be flexible with your agent list. Last night, I finished up my research (stalking) and finalized my Top Ten List of agents to whom I knew I wanted to pitch. But let me tell you that the minute you walk into those pitching rooms, it's chaos. The mere line to the room wound up and down the hallways of the hotel. Once you're in that conference room, you have to be expedient with your time. Quickly, I narrowed down my list to my top three and promised myself that no matter what, I would get to those agents. The rest of the time, however, I was vigilantly searching for the shorter lines. The agent packet was my best friend. If a line was short and the agent repped YA, then I'd hop in. I didn't get all of my top ten, but I got to more agents than I would have gotten to had I stuck to my original plan.

3. It get's better. It does. I'd be the last person to say this because I honestly wanted to crawl into a hole after pitching to my first agent--I turned SO red and completely butchered my pitch and had to read it off the paper because I was blanking and my hands were shaking and sweating and I bumped into the table as I rose to get up (Bad, right? Surprisingly, I got the standard request of query+10 pages--maybe she felt a bit bad for me :) ). After that, I walked around in a bit of a daze. Could I do this? Could I go through the same ring of fire six, seven, eight more times? But the fire does go away after you adjust and by the third agent, who was lovely and extremely friendly (the writer before me had finished early so we had time to chat), I felt a lot more confident. I was still nervous before each new agent, but some old-fashioned heart pounding doesn't hurt anyone.

4. Watch out--I stood in line for ten minutes before I realized that the agent was from an agency that I had already pitched. I'm sure that it's not strict like querying, where etiquette dictates that you only submit to one agent per agency, but it'll still be awkward if both of them request material. So don't be like me and waste time standing in a line. Little bumps here and there such as that probably cost me a few agents (though I did get to talk to a writer all the way from Seattle while waiting in that line!).

5. Do not drink too much water before the Pitch Slam. Holding pee is a really, really bad sensation, especially when exacerbated by anxiety. Which also brings me to my point: SIGN UP FOR THE FIRST SESSION IF YOU CAN (if there are multiple pitching sessions). I don't care about the whole "there are too many people" excuse. The rest of the conference will feel like cotton candy and clouds if you can muscle down the harder part first.

Highlights!!!!!

•   I MET JULIA. The one who introduced me to the whole concept of a writer's conference in the first place. We were standing in parallel lines from each other. It's always to exciting when you meet people whom you interact with online via blog/twitter/email in person :) I also met Mel, writerly buddy of Julia and another all around awesome person. Heck, everyone was super nice at the conference--the speakers, the line-waiters, and the agents. Pretty unbelievable, right? Who knew that the gods of the form-rejection could actually laugh and smile?

• I actually got materials requested. Here's the boring breakdown of stats:
• 7 agents total
• 5 requests
• 3 standard query+first 10 pgs
• 1 larger partial of 50 pgs
• 1 full MS

• Lastly, the food! Actually, no. The food was kind of eh. But when you've been on your feet for one and a half hours and fidgeting in line and talking a lot, any food will taste pretty good.
  
  That's all for this post! If you've ever been to a conference, share your tips/advice/success. If not, ask me any question and I will answer!
  
  

Upcoming! Wrtier's Digest Conference

You know, I'm glad that I'm young. Grateful, actually. Because I'm still slightly sane after functions off 4 hours of sleep for the past three days. Yup, this week has been a rough one. There's just so much to do and so little time.

As a consequence of this, the Writer's Digest Conference that I signed up for a few months back is now staring at me right in the face. Originally, I came across the event on the awesome Julia's blog (check it out!). Before this, I didn't even know what a writing conference was. My idea of a conference was always more along the lines of what is actually a writing retreat, but soon I found out that there are some amazing speakers that I'd love to listen to, some fancy notes I'd love to type (I'm a pro note taker. I love Uniball pens and spiral notebooks with pretty covers. Do not judge!), and more importantly, some celebrities (coughagentscough) that I'd LOVE to meet/pitch to/exchange contact info with. That's me being opitmistic.

Pretty soon, I knew that I had to go. Try one out. Now, these conferences are cheap. The WDC one runs for three days and as you can guess, is pretty darn expensive. As a compromise, I'll be waking up tomorrow at 4:30 (sleep is not important), catching a megabus at 6, and arriving in NY by 8--HOPEFULLY. I really have my fingers crossed for a traffic free day. Then I'll be in heaven from 9-7 (or more accurately, working myself into a palm-sweating heart-beating frenzy as I prep my pitch) and will be catching a bus back to PA so that I can hit the snooze at 10. With this plan, there's no need to dish out extra money on crazy-expensive NY hotels, but I'll still get a full experience of speakers and pitching.

I'm really excited :) I'll definitely blog about the conference so keep an eye out! Meanwhile, let me entertain you with randomness:

What I'll be bringing to the conference:

-Maybe my laptop, but definitely a notepad and pens
-last minute business cards AKA pieces of paper that I'll cut out with my email address, name, and phone number
-water
-comfy shoes
-layers of clothing

And that's all!

If you are looking into going to a conference, my best advice is to search for all the ways you can cut costs without sacrificing its value. If you live within a decent distance, maybe think about hoteling at home. OR, if you must stay near the conference, I'd look outside of the hotel suggestions that the conference itself offers. Conferences, especially big name ones like WDC, have to keep up their reputation, so they aren't likely to suggest a motel, but hey, you can make the decision here :)

Okay, wish me luck this weekend! Tell me of any conferences that you have been to or would like to go to.