Saturday, May 28, 2005

Agent Pitch

Had my first agent pitch last night with Cheryl Ferguson of the Ferguson Literary Agency . She was extremely wonderful to me, especially when I choked during the pitch. The book, "Racing the Moon" I pitched to her is an epic adventure with a large cast and it was difficult to answer questions that might have been easier if the book were a traditionally crafted romance. So, just a warning to anyone who has a 'group' of heroes for their story--try to find a way to share that information in an agent pitch BEFORE you sit down with an agent.

Cheryl was extremely patient with me and seemed interested in my writing process, in the other works I have plotted or written, and did request a partial, so we'll see how it goes. Right now, she hasn't sent me the submission guidelines she asked me to email her for. It could be that it's just the weekend, or she could be having second thoughts.

In the end, I prefer the query letter. It's much easier to share a story of this magnitude. I do have a partial with The Knight Agency at this time, and a query with the Donald Maass agency, so I've got plenty to bite my nails over.

And I'm still trying to figure out how to share a photo of my book cover here, but for now, I'll put up the link to my newsletter. Feel free to sign up! I'll begin publishing in June with reader information, writing tips, contest news, and other fun tidbits :)
http://groups.yahoo.com/group/jrturner/

Tuesday, May 24, 2005

First Blog Entry--Stardate "Almost There"

Serendipity, co-inky-dink, or just plain weird. Who knows? All I can say is that my journey to become a successful author hasn't reached it's destination yet, but the events along the way have been fantastically interesting.

What author is rejected by a publisher, only to get a call a year later with a request for the full novel? I've never heard of this, but it's just one example of the 'weird but true' tales littering my literary journey.

Right now, I'm preparing for the release of my first book, "Stark Knight"--I'll put a link up soon so y'all can get a gander at the cover. But for now, I'll share the serendipitous co-inky-dink that happened just a few short weeks ago. The subject matter of the novel is now headline news--though I wrote the book two YEARS ago--go figure! Gotta love that ether :)

Here's a link to a great article describing the threat to our country:

http://www.wnd.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=44069

That's it for now, I'll be back with more strange and wonderous tales of my journey!