So, the big meeting at the RWA Annual conference with Linda Fildew from Harlequin Mills Boon. I wrote about the meeting with her several weeks ago. She was one of the reasons I ordered business cards. I prepared diligently for my appointment weeks before the conference. I wrote and rewrote my sentence for pitching my book several dozen times. I tried not to obsess over my pitch. When I got to the conference I listened to conversations going on around me at lunchtime or standing in line at a book signing or sitting and waiting for a workshop to begin. I listened to other writers who were preparing to pitch to an agent or an editor. All of them seemed to be saying the same thing. You need to have your pitch down to a sentence and then leave the rest of your time open for questions or conversation. I did this. I sat in on a workshop called The Tiny Art of the Elevator Pitch. The presenter emphasized having your pitch to a sentence and to use words that gave your sentence punch. I submitted my sentence for review, but time ran out before mine came up. But I took the advice to heart and rewrote my sentence one more time. I also made a list of high points I didn’t want to forget to talk about after presenting my pitch sentence.
I arrived for my appointment the requisite 10 minutes early for my 10 minute appointment. Along with the other appointees, I dutifully lined up. Then we walked by rows to the line of tables were the editors and agents were seated. Ms. Fildew was lovely and welcoming. I gave her my card, sat down and she invited me to tell me about the book I’d written. I gave her my pitch sentence. She asked me to elaborate. She told me she thought my story sounded interested. Then she told me about a contest that Harlequin Mills Boon is sponsoring. A writer submits their first chapter. If the judges like the first chapter they will ask for the second and the submission will continue until they may request the whole manuscript. The idea being for the judges/editors to see how you write and hear your voice and decide if what you have will be a fit for Harlequin Mills Boon. She gave me the information for submitting to the contest. I thanked her and left. I went back up to the main conference floor and listened to the excited phone calls other authors were making to family and friends. I knew they had been accepted, while I had been given something just shy of a rejection. I didn’t bother calling my husband, who was off riding roller coaster and other rides I no longer enjoy riding. There wasn’t anything to tell him. At last year’s conference I had an agent appointment. She requested partials of both of my finished books. Which lead to my making a couple of very excited phone calls. But I never heard another thing from her, even after I sent numerous e-mails and left messages. I understood the excitement of the conference attendees who’d had successful editor/agent appointments. I felt that way last year. I only hoped that these authors had better luck than I’d had.
But I’ve decided not to let this disappointment color what I am going to do. I WILL enter the Harlequin Mills Boon contest. I will take what I learned about writing query letters at the conference and begin sending them out. Jayne Ann Krentz said she had decided she would keep trying until she had 1,000 rejections. Luckily for all of us it didn’t take a 1,000 rejects before someone took a chance on her.
One thing is very clear. To be an author means to be tenacious. That if you really want to be a writer and make a living doing it you have learn your craft, work hard and you can never give up, never take no as an acceptable answer and never let anyone get under your skin. Of course knowing or understanding those things is a whole lot different from actually living it. Yes, I will still suffer the self-doubt all writers struggle with. Yes, I will want to throw in the towel when I receive rejection after rejection. Yes, I will probably let someone’s unflattering review get to me. Yes, I will have set backs, big and small. And yes, somehow I will find a way to move passed all that and continue on because I have never wanted anything more in my life.
Any thoughts? I’d love to hear from you.
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