Laren’s Blog

Hey peeps. We have yet to hear from the publisher (good or bad) concerning WoF but as planned we’re also preparing for our agent hunt. If you follow on twitter, you know I follow  a lot of agents of all genres. We have come up with a list of 10 for submission-most of whom are on twitter as well, some of whom I feel I’ve gotten to know well. A few just crack me up.

I’m half way though my query writing course and am amazed at the complexity required to make some one write something simple. It is indeed an art unto itself, but for those experienced at it, its gotta be child’s play. I questioned (myself) why instructor CJ Redwine didn’t just take queries and chew them up, but her method is providing understanding that will no doubt put an end to this topic for me.

If interested, I’ve posted my latest query, though I’m sure it won’t be my last. Like everything else on this site–its justa (no pun intended) draft.

I can’t tell you how many times I have read and tweaked WoF and still I find silly mistakes ie “hear” instead of “here”, or leaving in a “the” or “is” after I’ve edited a passage.

This is where having readers really comes in handy. I’ve read my writing so many time that I subconsciously know how it is supposed to read and I overlook the little goofy things. Now, one of my biggest flaws is that I’m impatient and I don’t want to wait for several days or even weeks for someone to look at my stuff.

My old man used to say, “Give the laziest ( or most impatient) person the hardest task and he will find the easiest way to do it. Well, I have a system: Write draft, Rewrite, Edit, Edit, Listen. I have found that if I use a program that converts my writing to clear and understandable speech, I will pick up those 1 or two typos per chapter I’ve missed.

Other stuff:

My little experiment to attract agents to the website (and my revised query which technically I can’t send out yet) by name dropping has not panned out. In a sense, I’m stalking representation but in reality I’m really just trying to learn about self promotion without being too obnoxious about it–and I’m having fun with it.

In regard to da book, We still have not heard back from the publisher. Ideally, if they ask for the manuscript it will buy me a little more time to self promote and fine tune my query before sending it out to agents, if necessary. Goofy thing is, I’ve learned so much about a select group of agents, I almost hope the publisher doesn’t bite the first time so I can submit to these others.

I know, its wierd; who says physicians can’t be weird?

PS. Lastly, even though JVR is a little thing self published and not really promoted, I have decided to post the cover on a few controversal blog/websites. It’s another little experiment. If you have a blog or web page and got room to show the cover of JVR, please let me know (WoF cover shown on this site is a concept–it’s not been published).

Later

Ok, so I can’t sleep (even though I’ve got early rounds tomorrow-I can always tell my patients I was up late attending to another overdosed drunk in the ICU).

So here we go. Kids, take your seats and open you science text to experiment 34 on page 208.

Time: 11:58 PM, Denver

Amy Boggs

Amy Boggs

Amy Boggs

Now Ms. Boggs, junior agent with Donald Maass Literary Agency, if and when you investigate this post please comment with the time (and time zone) please.

It’s in the name of science.

I was back at the hospital for the first time in about a week and I was asked about WoF and JVR; if they were published, if they were selling… I thought I’d take the opportunity to clarify what the kids and I have done so far.

Warriors of Faith was the first project we started. Initially, it was a writing project; I’ve always tried to be involved in the kid’s education. A carrot was that we would try and have the book published in the end.

Well, a few things happened next. First I realized how long it takes to learn to write and put something special together, then I realized that I love writing–frankly more than the kids do.

It became apparent that the “big book” was not going to get done quickly but I wanted the kids to be published, so once we finished the background story and a couple chapter drafts we stopped and started Justa and the Victorian Rogue.

Justa was to be a short, fast paced book focusing on a few characters. My goal was to have this self published  for the sake have recognizing the kids as authors. I did take a haphazard shot sending JVR through agents but in retrospect, my attempt was a joke. There was no real intent to actively market the JVR but I have thought that if Warriors of Faith ever was published by traditional means, we would prepare an expanded version of JVR.

This is in keeping with another initial idea that we had, that we would have the main books but, because of the way we designed the story, we could add an endless number of related novellas, each involving a historic setting or individual. Edward “Ned” Kelly was the first and boy did we have fun picking him out.

Once JVR published in 11/08, we got back to WoF. It took us a while to finish the the big book and after splitting the thing we now have 2 ~90k books (one complete, one awaiting edit). My goal is for these to go through established publishing routes, and I truly think they’re good enough.

What does the future hold? Who knows; I can always stay a doc. Would I give up my day job if given the opportunity to earn money writing-well my first response is YEAH BUDDY, but that would depend  on whether I could legitimately replace my current income–got to feed the minions and send them to school.

What about other writing ventures? I love fantasy, but I also love politics and medical related issues. I want to write a sure-to-be controversial book on healthcare and end of life issues from a doctors perspective, but I better wait till I don’t need to practice anymore–I know a lot of nephrologists, oncologists and cardiologists who are not gonna like what I have to say.

Actually, the background story of WoF involves a physician who stands against certain trends in healthcare, trends that eventually bring about WWIII. Perhaps one day I will combine politics, healthcare & fantasy in a WoF prequel.

Yeah, how ’bout we get WoF published first!

So, we’re still waiting to hear from Tor but no one is resting on the proverbial laurels (OK, maybe the kids are).

In hope not to waste time, I’m in the process of honing my admittedly-lacking query skills. I REALLY think WOF is a great book but, fact is, no one will ever see it if I can’t produce a one page sales pitch to hook an agent–that is if Tor passes or offers a weak contract.

Certainly the draft information on this site reflects some of the complexity of WOF: portals, time travel, historical figures, prepubescent male wizards… Question is–how do you promote 90k words using only 250? That’s where The Query Shark and CJ Redwine come in.

Previously, I floated a few balloons over websites like Fanstory but now I need professional help (not the kind my wife has been encouraging). Query Shark is a blog run by an established book agent, and she happily accepts sample queries for review. From the look of her site, she can be harsh, but it gets results–the kind we’re looking for. Interestingly, since making my submission to her (Janet Reid), I’ve already revised my query twice based on her tweets and information on her site.

CJ Redwine is an established author and I found her site by visiting Writer’s Digest. She is conducting a query workshop over the next couple weeks. As I understand it, this is much like what the shark does, but its more personalized. Hopefully between the two I’ll get the “edgemication” (thanks Frank) I need.

That brings us to the Agent Hunt. Again, assuming Tor doesn’t work out, I want to be ready to submit to agents directly, but which agents. Well, there are a zillion book agents working for a quarter zillion agent companies, each specializing in a handful of very specific story genres. Some of these agents have sold books to the major publishing houses while some are “fresh out of the box” eager for their first kill. A few, if you’re not careful, can get you published through some rinkydinky org where you might sell 20 books (to yourself)-if you’re lucky.

I started playing with twitter and browsing other resources when we finished Justa and the Victorian Rogue. Since then I’ve learned a great deal and I think we have things boiled down to a dozen interesting individuals that include: Colleen Lindsay/Janet Reid, Amy Boggs, Ginger Clark, Kate Schafer and a few others, any of which we’d be honored to talk to about WOF in the (near) future.

For now however, the wait goes on. But thats OK, I think we have a time efficient plan: We submit a book proposal (sample and summary) to a popular established fantasy publisher who does not require agents, and while we wait we find that perfect agent and learn to query.

Sounds smart-I think, but if I don’t get something done around this house today, before I head back to the hospital tomorrow, my ass is grass!

Its been a long time coming but WoF is in the can. We’ve decided to give the publisher of Tor Books an exclusive proposal and option to proceed. The final product is about 89800 words; very respectable for a first installment fantasy novel. As you recall, we got carried away and wrote twice this much and ended up having to split the book. Nice thing is, if WoF sells we can have book two ready within 6 months, much sooner if the advance or projection allows me to focus more time on writing.

Of course we will have to write a new opening chapter  for the second book and the kids and I are brain storming this now. My favorite idea is opening with a “wizards & warriors” battle taking place which turns out to be someone playing a video game, which is interrupted by some criminal disturbance. A young hero displaying superior strength and a familiar weapon steps in and wins the day but this turns out to be an older man reminiscing about his past. He mumbles, “I’m getting too old for this crap,” before putting on a mask over his grey head and heading out to stop another disturbance. In this one scene we can sum up a lot about what has been going on in that character’s life.

Anyway, writing is on hold for now while we wait to hear from Tor–hopefully soon.

Its been so long I’m not sure if we have any followers left (well, maybe Justin and his Club Penguin pal).

Warriors of Faith entered final edit earlier this winter/last fall and with the demands of work and school it was a bit of a slow go. The story came in at over 800 pages and this meant we needed to split the work (Justin and Gab insist that is way to long of a book). It wasn’t easy splitting the story before the main climax but we did it and today we’ve sent a book proposal out. Excerpts posted for feedback on this site are no doubt dated (and more than just from a spelling/grammatical/editing point of view).

In the end, we are extremely happy with the final product. Big thanks to those who have provided their input/previously on this site and also the various writer’s sites we’ve used. While the delay was necessary, and at times painful, now we have 2 books done instead of one.

WoF part 2 (the second half of this book) is entering edit and rewrite now. Changes in the storyline include more elaboration on Nie’s character as well as Myrddin, who we pulled from the background story to spice things up a bit. We also gave Myrddin a sounding board; a wife who happened to be a famous pilot in the 1930′s and who now enjoys flying her L-10 Electra with the winged drakes over Myrddin’s castle. Great life!

We are still interested in individuals willing to read and input on the complete manuscript. We’re also still looking for a fantasy artist to help with a video presentation of the story.

Well, I got feed back from the Marvel folk and the response was mixed. In case you did not know, one of the main characters from WoF was to adopt a role/image similar to the action hero, Captain America. The idea was to throw in something that might ring familiar with some people while taking another fictional story and absorbing it in a way that makes it sound as though it has some foundation in fact. Marvel legal services did not nix the character or his activities but did ask that we avoid the use of certain names, which shouldn’t be too hard to do. Mean while editing on WoF continues, albeit at a snail’s pace. An out line for book two has been completed however.

We’re still editing WoF and slowly moving towards submission. The story has really taken off and the characters are even more vivid. There are no less than 3 cliff hangers and ideas are floating about a “big bang” opening for book two. I’ll be sending out a chapter to Stan Lee to get his permission as one of the characters in our book is beginning to sound more and more like one of his cold comic creations–very subtle but I want to make sure he’s OK with it. Here’s a little  elaboration on Thomas’ arrest by the Nazi. More later.

**************

The streets of what must have been a beautiful Polish village were filled with rubble and an occasional corpse. Wisp’s of smoke rose from many of the broken buildings, many of which were now little more than stone footings surrounding the collapsed remains of stores, apartment buildings and even places of worship. Across the road, Thomas saw a dozen people, men, women and children, lined up against a scorched concrete wall. A man in the middle of the line called out loudly, hurling slanders at the “French Vichy collaborators and the America First antiwar movement,” accusing the two countries of being home to cowards and of being no better than the Nazi. “They sit on their soft sofa’s or hiding under their beds making excuses while we die!” The man spat on the ground as the soldiers moved before them and raised their weapons. Thomas turned away, his hands on his ears in hope of muffling the sound of gunfire and of bullets striking stone, a sound that he had heard once in the past. He roared and struggled to break the chain locking his shackles to the truck.