Thursday, June 27, 2019

Are you?

Are you open to queries?

Are you open to poetry submissions?

Are you open to middle grade fiction?

Are you up for a little skullduggery?

These  emails get discarded with no reply.

Well, except for that last one.
I'm always up for skullduggery, foreign and domestic.
.

If you don't know, just query.
That will be less annoying than the email you send asking if I'm open to whatever you're wondering about.

And better yet, you'll hear back. I respond to almost all my queries. 

I'm not going to shame you on Twitter for querying outside my stated interest areas.
The last three clients I signed write in areas you're going to be surprised to hear about. (No, it's not dino-porn, and no, it's not fantasy.)

And even if I was one of those loathsome agents on Twitter who make fun of writers, what do you care? You're not going to let those boors stand in your way. Are you?

20 comments:

K. White said...

1) "...it's not fantasy." Did you real want to crush my hopes this early in the morning?

2) Any agents who make fun of writers on Twitter or elsewhere aren't worth bothering with. Neither am I going to spend my money on their clients' books.

Jennifer R. Donohue said...

Honestly, Ms. Reid, you always say to take the chance. So, when I'm ready to query, that's what I'll do. Though really, I'd happily send you copies of my stuff just to read for pleasure, if you wanted. I always investigate with interest the writers/books that you talk about here and on Twitter!

Plus, nobody stands in my way, not even my puppy. "Move" is a cue in this household!

Colin Smith said...

The last three clients I signed write in areas you're going to be surprised to hear about. (No, it's not dino-porn, and no, it's not fantasy.)

I know one of these. It was THE PERFECT CANDIDATE--a work of political fiction.

;)

E.M. Goldsmith said...

Yes, my dreams crushed alongside K. White. No fantasy. Well, I'm going to query Janet just the same. She can happily reject and then I will move on with my life. In an undisclosed location under an undisclosed rock.

Megan V said...

@EM

Does your rock’in realty space have room for company?

E.M. Goldsmith said...

@Megan - yes, and it is getting a new couch on Saturday so we can sit in our undisclosed location for wayward fantasy writers

Cecy H said...

Does it have to be skulduggery or would you be open to shenanigans as well?

Anonymous said...

Been there, done that.

LynnRodz said...

Are you up for putting a fresh coat of paint on my walls? They're screaming...well, actually tbey're asking politely to be painted.

Craig F said...

Then I guess that I should toss a query into your section of the trenches. I have a new focus on the book, a new query and you will no longer have to worry about Aliens popping up in the 14th chapter. They are right there at the start. Other than that, it is close to a Patrick Lee thing.

I have always thought of Patrick as sci-fi anyway.

julie.weathers said...

There's always room for skullduggery. That being said, the editor I paid to look at pages commented that I really had to try hard to set up the skullduggery joke and it was just lame. Anyone who knows me knows I don't go out of my way to set up jokes, I just have a warped sense of humor. Regardless, I took out the conversation and haven't used skullduggery again in the script as now I am self-conscious about it. Yes, I know, stupid.

You never know unless you try. As a friend used to say, "What's it going to hurt? They can kill you, but they can't eat you."

And agents won't even kill you.

Sally forth.

Now, I have a bone to pick with some of you. How many times do we hear people say there are only so many plots and the way you tell your story is what makes it unique? It's been said hundreds of times here and it will probably bear repeating in the future when someone doubts their ability to tell a unique story.

And then yesterday I see this:

"Elise: Agreed. It's okay not to comment if you have nothing new to add. What's really frustrating is when you offer an insight, and someone repeats that same insight a little later, as if (more than likely) the person didn't bother to read previous comments to see if what they were going to say had already been said.

And for those who are curious, that about sums up why I've not been as present here in recent months. :)"

So what if someone already said what you were thinking? Maybe it doesn't hurt to have a few people confirm it so it doesn't look like it was just one person's opinion.

Maybe you've got a different spin to add to it.

Maybe we want to hear how dear daughter is doing.

Maybe we want to hear about this topic makes you feel.

Maybe something you've got to add will spin off a question or comment that adds to the conversation.

Maybe if everyone stops commenting because someone already said something similar to what they were thinking before long it will be a pretty dead place to hang around.

Selerial said...

@E.M.: I’d like an invite to this undisclosed hole in the wall, I mean rock. I’ll bring pizza!

@Julie: I thought the same thing about that...but I didn’t comment. ;) Thanks for saying so. I often find value in comments repeating what others have said, since they usually do so in their own words.

KDJames said...

What Julie said. (there, both repetition AND recognition)

Sometimes you want a preponderance of agreement, as it makes a point more strongly than a single voice. Sometimes you just want to hear all the different voices, even if they're saying the same thing.

Sometimes you want to hear the voice that agrees but adds a qualifier, "Yes, but . . . "

Sometimes you don't necessarily want to hear disagreement, but discover it has value too.

I understand not wanting to be part of an echo chamber. I'm far more likely to be quiet when I agree and to speak up when I don't, or when my agreement is partial or comes from a different viewpoint. I value all the voices over here, the different ways of saying the same thing, the different examples that make the same point, the disagreement that isn't disagreeable.

I've also been around internet communities long enough to know that people move on. Other people move in. Interest wanes or increases. Communities change; no point in trying to stop it. It's one of the best and also most heartbreaking things about the internet.


John Davis Frain said...

If you're writing a query letter, you write fantasy. Your ms might be a different genre, but most query letters are fantasy, right? Some might even be dark or comic sub-genres and often include a touch of science fiction in the bio section. Maybe, in a rare moment, you might get lucky and write a query with Magic Realism and get a request.

Then comes the synopsis, generally shelved in the mind under Horror. At which time you check your email nine times daily (read: hourly) for a short story from the agent, which is Suspense often mis-labeled as Thriller. Or vice versa. And finally, the rejection, undeniably categorized under Crime.

AJ Blythe said...

Hah, John. you made me laugh =)

Panda in Chief said...

Sort of off topic, but Samantha Bee referenced dino porn in a recent show. :-)

S.D.King said...

Hi old friends - I have been away from writing and participating at the Reef for awhile. I would like to do the Flash Fiction, but I can't figure out (and neither can Google) what Lipplib is! Anybody out there who can help me?

Megan V said...

@SD King

LippLib is from an earlier blog post. I’m having trouble linking it, but the newest LippLibs happened this Tuesday.

AJ Blythe said...

Okay, let me try that again...

SD, Janet's reference to LippLibs is a link (in the FF post).

But here it is as well (the address should be clickable):
https://jetreidliterary.blogspot.com/2019/06/a-return-to-lipplibs-while-i-return-to.html

S.D.King said...

Thanks, Megan and AJ! This was a tough one!