It's the waiting that's a killer...

Everything on my life right now seems to depend on waiting. To give you an idea, I am selling a flat and waiting to hear from potential buyers after viewing, waiting to hear interview results, and on top of that I have two novels currently sitting with publishers and agents. So as I checked my email for the third (probably closer to thirtieth) time today, I realised this is getting ridiculous. It's very difficult to work on another novel, when every time the door goes, the phone rings or you even think that someone might have emailed you, you immediately check and *poof* there goes your train of thought.

Since I've now get 42 items on Bukisa and need a break from rewrites, I took some time away from the PC and spent the morning clearing stinging nettles to get the vegetable patch ready for this year. Both because it needed to be done, and because its the furthest away from house and PC I can get without going out. Unfortunately, since I'm waiting on the plants I put in last week to sprout, even gardening now involves waiting!

On the short story front, since a Perfect Set-Up did so well (34 views on Redgage in the first hour) I've starting promoting Escape - Part One.

I just hope I hear something soon on at least one of these fronts as the silence is very hard to bear.

Articles and More

After real life got in the way yesterday, I'm now back to writing articles on Bukisa. Porting my old game reviews is taking longer than I thought - not least because my writing style and voice has changed over the years so instead of a direct port, I am re-writing them. Great for search engine rankings and traffic, but not so good for my schedule!

I've also taken a chance and put one of my short stories up. Originally written for a messageboard writing section I thought I might as well see if anyone liked it. In addition, the first part of "Escape" is up - after all if I can use lulu preview and let people read it for free, I might as well let them read it for free on Bukisa and get paid for the views. If enough people ask I'll put the other two parts up there as well, and leave the e-book version for die-hard fans if I have any. (Let's be honest. The way I'm feeling now "Enough people" would probably be one.)

I am still waiting for any more feedback on the novel, although between the article writing, a few real life complications and gardening work I'm not really thinking about it at the moment.

• A Perfect Set Up - short story on Bukisa

A feline opinion...

Well after all the rejections I took the plunge and went overseas with no.3. Now I'm just waiting to hear back, which is not good for my nerves. The temptation to just stop writing and snuggle in front of the TV with icecream is very, very, strong. However I can't.

I am currently facing a huge clean up job scrubbing the hall clean, and trying not to laugh every time I look at it. This is unusual for me when faced with a huge mess caused-by-cat, but I'm not going mad, honest. Put quite simply:

My cat's just been sick on my latest form rejection letter.

I think she has great taste.

A small problem and an injury

I've been feeling a bit light headed all day. Despite that I got everything done and finally slumped in front of my PC about half an hour ago. Which was when I touched my head and pulled away a red hand. And then I remembered what I'd done at the weekend and that there was a reason I should be taking it easy.

Hearing what I thought was one of the cats getting into a fight, I dashed off to retrieve him. The retrieval was successful, but as I straightened up, hampered by a twenty *ahem* pound cat, I stepped back to keep my balance. Which was when the chestnut tree walloped me in the head as the other cat jumped out of it.

I have a nice raised red line across my forehead, an onimous grey shadow behind it, and apparently scrapes to the scalp which I just found the messy way. The last time I felt this bad I was concussed, and that's still a possibility. In the future I should probably avoid cats and gardens.

What really worries me is that I sent out another submission this morning, and the way I'm feeling I don't think there's any guarantee it's particularly lucid. So to the poor agent out there, if you get an oddly disjointed and outright weird query letter, I apologise.

Frustrations of writing

There's an issue with novel #3.

• I have a complete manuscript.
• My writing group loved it.
• An editor said that he was having trouble editing it because he kept reading it.
• A fan club and regular article readers who liked the concept and signed up to be notified if it was published.
• I have a marketing plan, distribution conections, and links to areas the publishers usually cannot access to promote it.
• I even have people asking about the one to follow it.

And after six months I have an ever growing stack of form rejections. Two more this morning.

And I really don't get it. I'd say it was the writing, but if a professional editor I paid to tear it apart says there's nothing wrong with it (losing himself more work in the process) then it probably isn't. The concept is old fashioned, but then so are adventure stories/thrillers themselves, and no agents have checked whether there is a spin on it.

I'm probably not going to send this out again to another agent, and just let the remaining no's trickle in.

So am I giving up? Not a chance. An agent and a large publishing house would be nice, but there are always other options, and I need to take some time to prioritise those.

On the good side, we just shipped a pile of my earlier books off to the US, so at least I've still got distribution over there.

New lenses and updates

I've completed two more lenses, on the Hawker Hunter and Folland Gnat, but have also been having a look at Squidoo's new options for the sidebar.

My Hammond Innes lens have just got a full revamp, including these modules. Overall I'd have to say I like them, although having them show up in the Table of Contents is a little distracting.

Finally I've sent a query off to a US agent. After all, the worst they can say is no. So, fingers crossed. Again.

Rejection, and a confidence boost?

Another form rejection, so I've sent it out to a new set of agents and cast my net a bit further a field this time. After checking the Association of Authors Agents lists I found four who appear to take this kind of thing - and who oddly aren't in the Writers and Artists Yearbook. So off it's gone and fingers crossed.

On the other hand, my aviation lenses gave me a quick confidence boost when I got an email dropped asking permission to use some of my images for a presentation. This was granted very quickly.

And Gatwick Aviation Museum are looking for a fundraising and media PR person, so anyone based down that way who loves planes and is good at PR, please contact them

Also, a new lens just went up: http://www.squidoo.com/folland-gnat is about the Folland Gnat Light fighter, used by the Red Arrows and in combat by the Indian airforce.

No news is good news?

Anti Stress Therapy - Tin Sign
Buy at AllPosters.com

No real updates, but reviewing the current state of play it is interesting.  Every agent who has rejected (aside from the one who sent me someone else's rejection slip, and the interesting one I got last week) has said there is no market for the genre in Britain. Ironically these are all agents whose websites and Writers' and Artists' Yearbook 2010 entries state that they specialise in it...

One did stand out however, as being particularly honest right upfront: They said they loved the book but could not sell it because none of the publishers they dealt with would be interested in adventure stories. However if I sold it, I should get back in touch as they would happily take me on as a client.  Since agents rise and fall on their authors' reputations and these ones are reasonably established it's the closest thing to a vote of confidence I've yet had, although my nasty cynical side suggests that most companies would be happy to make easy money at the point.I'm going with the good version:

Thanks guys, I needed the boost.

On the other hand, spending the last week dealing with four net scammers, an escaped cat and a nasty computer virus (rogue anti-virus which we suspect was sent by one of the four previously mentioned) has pretty much wiped me out. Can this week be better please?

An email problem - and technorati oddness

I've just found out that the reason I have not received my emails from several sources over the past few months is that emails through that provider are not arriving. Effectively it is a dead email address.

This took some tracking down as emails sent from my own IP address or webmail address get through. Unfortunately they are the only ones. This has cost me at least two clients, and I am furious. Right now I am trying to recover the situation, but it is likely to cost me more before the end of this month since I can't contact everyone - several people were supposed to send their contact details to that address.

Back to hotmail.

On the other hand, at least I have somewhere to send all my spam. Fortunately I did not use that email address for any manuscript submissions, although my professional memberships all have to be updated.

And on to technorati. For anyone who doesn't know technorati is a rating system for blogs. It rates the blog based on followers, links, and popularity. Rather typically, I've worked pretty hard on this blog, and it has a grand total authority of 1 (one).

My cats' blog (http://stephen-and-matilda.blogspot.com) is at 113. Now I haven't exactly promoted this, and it's just quick stories about the two wannabe rulers of my life.

I'm confused.

A week for it?

And on the e-commerce front, I've just had two scammers to deal with in 24 hours. Strangely enough, like most companies, the one I work with does not commit:
1) Customs fraud
2) Postal Fraud
3) Visa fraud
or in fact any form of fraud. So why on earth we'd get requests to do all of the above in one day I don't know. And since I was up half the night dealing with this (so we could report it first thing this morning with evidence lined up), an ill cat, major engineering works, and am very tired, I'd like to get some sleep.

Or good news. Good news would also be very welcome! It might even wake me up...

Class Two rejection

Warning: post may be severely tongue in cheek in parts.

Wow, I'm so touched. I just had my first class two rejection. For those of you who don't follow the blog that is a ( Lady Bracknell voice) "How dare you presume to let your trifling little manuscript cross the threshold of our great and glorious agency!"

They were indeed less than polite. My partner is very annoyed. I'm trying not to kill myself laughing, which is apparently an odd response.

You see, it's hard to take it personally. They haven't read the manuscript or synopsis - that's stated clearly and the papers were returned in exactly the same condition and bundle they were sent in so I believe them. From the content of the pithy two lines (personally written, not form letter so they have no excuse) they haven't even read the cover letter. They don't give a reason for the rejection. So what's being rejected?

My writing? They haven't read it.
The idea? They didn't get that far.
The cover letter? They didn't read it.
The genre? They don't know what it is.
Me personally? They know nothing about me.

It's actually quite bizzare. To be quite honest, the most likely explanation for what I received is an agent with a large slush pile deciding to cull it. It's not hard to imagine: the frantic agent, surrounded by piles and piles of unsolicited manuscripts which tower over her, coffee on the small patch of clear desk, grabbing an envelope from the precariously teetering pile, pulling the contents half-out as her elbow hits another pile and sets it rocking, scrawling urgently across the top of the first sheet, and then shoving it back in the envelope and sticking "return to sender" on it as she clutches the piles before envelopes can cascade everywhere...

After doing three hundred of those I can imagine the urge to not be terse, not polite. However, as someone whose business runs on goodwill and excellent customer service, I will also add I'm not impressed.

The only thing I will thank you for is the return of my unused SASE, which will be departing here shortly on its way to another agent. After all, if I let a nasty comment stop me writing I wouldn't be any kind of author at all.