Interesting Links again

What do you think about this? Unbound, a fund raising platform for authors BEFORE they've finished the book. A bit like fundit for books.

Beta readers for your book at Glass Cases

You know there is a league of literary magazines. Premiership or third division? Check out the (poetry specific) recommendations from Happenstance Press. Irish magazines mentioned are Poetry Ireland Review and The Shop. (What's missing? Stinging Fly for instance.)

Really interesting article with American writer and editor Robert Gottleib at salon.com

5 Openings to Avoid from Nathan Bradsford I've seen them all in my time, and also written some! Writers take note.

Poet Meg Peacocke, has her words cut in stone via Padaig O'Morain's blog.
I'd love my words cut in stone, or wood or metal. I can see it now...

Revising is Cake

Check out this video blog from Jackson Pearce on revision. She has some others worth snacking on. Yum. One on finding time, characters. Don't miss Imaginary Writing Process. I wish.

Write your first draft with fire in your heart. Edit it with ice in your veins.

Editing/Cutting - Learn From The Best

There was a fascinating article in Saturday's Guardian (unmissable reading for anyone interested in the arts) on editing in relation to Raymond Carver.
This American short story writer and poet died in 1988. His writing is wonderful, sharp, pignant and sparse and again unmissable reading. And it's the sparseness that's under discussion here.

His widow, the poet Tess Gallagher who spends a lot of time in Ireland, has brought out a new version of his collection "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love" published in 1981. The difference being, similar the director's cuts of Blade Runner amongst others, Raymond Carver's writing was heavily edited by his editor Gordon Lish. This publication is the stories as written before Gordon Lish worked on them.

Lish, an editor at Esquire magazine and Alfred Knopf as well as a novelist in his own right, made major changes to many of the stories in What We Talk About When We Talk About Love, cutting about half of Carver's original words and changing more than half of the endings. Gallagher, who was closely involved with Carver's later work, plans to reverse many of Lish's changes. Her plan is publish the results under a title Carver originally gave to one of the stores, Beginners.

Carver wrote to Lish in 1980, before the collection was published, and after he had met Gallagher, asking him to do everything in his power to stop the book from being published.

"If the book were to be published as it is in its present edited form," he wrote, "I may never write another story, that's how closely, God forbid, some of those stories are to my sense of regaining my health and mental well-being."

Lish ignored Carver and the changes he suggested. The book went on to cement Carver's reputation as the poet of American suburban despair.

According to William L Stull, who has edited several posthumous Carver collections, Lish cut some of Carver's stories by half (others say up to 70 per cent), removing flashbacks and interior reflections.

So here is the end of "One More Thing" from "What We Talk About When We Talk About Love" L. D. is a drunk. Maxine, his wife, is obsessed with people's star signs. The story is largely dialogue, pointed up by "L. D. said", "Rae said", "Maxine said". Anything more expressive is seldom permitted to reach the page. Eventually, L. D. is making his way "out of this nuthouse". The final three paragraphs of "One More Thing" - and of the collection itself - read like this:

"L. D. put the shaving bag under his arm and picked up the suitcase.

He said, 'I just want to say one more thing.'

But then he could not think what it could possibly be."

The original manuscript of the story that Carver submitted to Gordon Lish has several comparatively long-winded paragraphs ending with

"It came to him with a shock that he would remember this night and her like this. He was terrified to think that in the years ahead she might come to resemble a woman he couldn't place, a mute figure in a long coat, standing in the middle of a lighted room with lowered eyes.

'Maxine!' he cried. 'Maxine!'

'Is this what love is, L. D.?' she said, fixing her eyes on him. Her eyes were terrible and deep, and he held them as long as he could."

Which do you prefer?

The Slush Pile - and how to avoid it

Positive thoughts.

Every author, every single one had to start in some kind of slush pile. An editor, an agent, whatever. Personal recommendations help.
There are 200,000 books published in the UK each year. It only takes one publisher to say 'Yes.'

Less Positive.
Very, very, very few books are picked from publishers' or editors' slush piles.

Things that don't help:
- Not following the submission guidelines
- Including little gimmicky gifts.
- Including a photo, naked or otherwise.
- Sending in a handwritten manuscript, especially in green ink
- Calling the next day to see what the reader thought of it
- Including an endorsement from your mother/father/aunty/child doesn't help )unless he/she is Alan Bennett/Margaret Atwood.)
- Spelling/grammatical errors
- Not addressing a named editor or agent
- Not sending an SAE

Literary Agents Numbers
In 14 years of reading 25-30 manuscripts a month, one agent said they had found 5 good ones.
A Curtis Brown agent received 1,200 manuscripts in a year and took on 2 authors.
Other agents reckon on about 1 in 3,000.
One UK agent said he received 50 manuscripts a month and took on one author a year.
My agent gets 3,000 manuscripts a year.
Another UK agent says he gets 500 submissions a week and takes on and get deals for
maybe 18 a year, mainly non-fiction.
UK agent Carole Blake gets 50 novels a day and takes on 6 new clients a year.

Publishers Numbers
Hutchinsons receive about 1,000 manuscripts a year and only published 1 every 1 or 2 years.
Mills & Boon received 6,000 manuscripts a year and take on about 10 new writers.
Anthony Blond, the publishers writing in The Spectator reckons a number of about 1 in 2,000.
A UK publisher said he gets 20 manuscripts a week from agents alone and reckons he takes on 7 or 8 of them a year. He had never published from the slush pile.

Check out the article from the fabulously wonderful Philip Hensher as well as the Guardian one on the title link.

More Rejections

Oh yes. Here we go again. Another rejection from Hodder Ireland. The editor kept it for an extra two weeks beyond the date my agent requested though and had others in the office reading it, so I have to take that as positive. She also asked to see it again when rewritten and will send an email with some bullet point comments as guidance. She mentioned she found bits confusing, which is worrying. I'm so close to the book now, and obviously know what's going to happen, I can't see any confusion.

Feeling very low.

Also have had to bite the bullet and take a 3 month contract job for the money. Mortgage rates being what they are. I hate the idea of the commute, the hours in an office environment and time away from writing and reading. The whole family will have to adapt to the new regime too. I foresee tears (probably mine)

The worst thing is I have to cancel my week in Annaghmakkerig as it is right at the start of the contract. The house is closed from the end of October to January so little chance of a late respite and I was really looking forward to going.

Have a week now to beef up the book as best I can for sending out in the next round.

Another Rejection

Well the next round of responses from the list of publishers has started. Little Brown said no though they liked my book.
Fed up.
It only needs one publisher to say yes though. That's what I keep telling myself.
Just finished Harry Potter. I do think this last book was better written than the last few. I have been avoiding reviews until now in case there were any spoilers but now I'll go trawling and see what else people think.

Waiting

I have an agent. She is very enthusiastic about my book and sure we will land a publishing deal. I have polished it and taken her suggestions in hand and finished it and emailed it to her. She has sent it out to 4 top of the line, premiership publishers, to editors she knows already. Personal relationships are the key here. And given them a deadline of some kind of a response within 2 to 2 1/2 weeks.

The first one came back. Random House with a negative. The editor couldn't engage with my main protagonist. I'm down in the dumps. This is a senior editor who hasn't got where she is today without knowing what she is talking about. I know I am not the best at showing my character's emotions and emotional characters (the right emotions) are the best for readers to care about so I need to warm her up.

Hum.