Never Tell Me the Odds

Photo Credit: Lucasfilm

Like many writers, I’m currently looking for a literary agent. I self-published my first novel Storm Orphans without even attempting to go the traditional publishing route and I learned a valuable lesson. It didn’t matter that readers enjoyed the book. I simply couldn’t reach a broad audience without mass media exposure. Social media and word of mouth only travel so far for us non-celebrities. I needed professional reviews, magazine interviews, and brick and mortar bookstore shelf space. Without those, my book and hence my writing career to date have been doomed to obscurity.

So I’m querying agents with my new book, a piece of middle-grade fiction that I believe will appeal to the same kids that enjoy stuff such as Harry Potter, Percy Jackson, Narnia, and The NeverEnding Story. It’s a fast-paced, fun story but after doing my research, it’s become clear to me that I need to approach the task of finding professional representation in the same fashion Han Solo approaches navigating an asteroid field in the Millennium Falcon. I simply can’t worry about the odds being stacked against me.

Several of the agents I’m targeting post statistics regarding how many queries they receive, respond to, and ultimately sign. The odds aren’t good. Here are a few comparables.

On one hand…

The lowly Atlanta Braves are five times more likely to win the World Series this year than I am to sign with an agent.

I have about the same odds of being assaulted by a firearm as I have signing with an agent.

I also have about the same odds of impregnating my wife post-vasectomy as I have signing with an agent.

That baby is twice as likely to be a genius than I am to sign with an agent.

But on the bright side…

I’m ten times more likely to sign with an agent than Han is to successfully navigate that asteroid field according to C3PO.

And I’m 20 times more likely to sign with an agent than I am to be named the new lead singer of Stone Temple Pilots.

So there you have it. Though the odds may be stacked against me, I’m confident that I’ll find the right literary agent in time. Even if I am a stuck-up, half-witted, scruffy-looking nerf herder.

Winter is Coming

Image Credit: Pat_Photographies/Pixabay

Based on celebrity news these days, one might think George R.R. Martin is late delivering his next book because he’s too busy killing off well-known entertainers. Scott Weiland, David Bowie, Glenn Frey, Alan Rickman - those are just the ones I’m a big fan of. We also lost Lemmy Kilmister, Dan Haggerty, Meadowlark Lemon, Natalie Cole, Wayne Rogers, and Robert Loggia in the past two months just to name a few.

Death is always tough to accept despite the fact we all must face it in the end. Whether it’s the loss of a loved one or the loss of someone famous that we admire, we have to come to grips with the fact that our memories and their past deeds are all we’ll have of them going forward.

Although my little known debut novel Storm Orphans received positive reviews, I caught some flak from several readers over the deaths of a few major characters. I actually consider this something of a compliment. If they cared about their demise, that means they cared about the characters themselves. That in turn means I did at least part of my job as a writer. In the end, no matter how well laid out a plot might be, if the reader isn’t invested in the characters, they aren’t truly invested in the book.

My WIP (that’s “work in progress” for any of your non-acronymers out there) is MG fiction. MG stands for middle grade which is the term used for books geared mainly toward readers ages 8-12. Given that audience, you won’t find a lot of death in this one, but yes, it’s still there. I’m hoping to make a much larger splash in the literary pool with this book. I plan to go the traditional route: entice a good agent via a well-worded query letter and then participate in the necessary voodoo rituals with said agent in order to obtain a deal with a top publisher. If that fails, I may just go door to door visiting elementary school libraries and leaving copies behind like a paperback-planting Johnny Appleseed.

No matter what happens, I promise a story with characters you’ll care about. Winter may indeed be coming both to Atlanta this weekend and to HBO this April, but my next book has a decidedly sunnier outlook.