I have just completed something that, for most people, would be a cause for celebration, or at least relief: I finished rewriting my novel, making it certifiable for resubmission.
But I’m not like most people, and in this case, the difference is not for the better. For while I restructured and rewrote and re-everything, I came away cutting 30 pages. Only 30 pages. For a 380-page book, that’s less than 8 percent. That works out to about 1 percent a month.
Wife, far wiser and pregnant than I shall ever be, noted quite correctly that size doesn’t always matter—even when less is more—and that 30 pages consigned to the dumpster, of itself, is not bad.
But if the dumpster is not full, the author is then sure constipated still. My expectations were cut about 50 or more pages: a lean mean fiction machine. In rejecting the novel, almost all the editors said what held them back was that they’d lost interest by the end—the plot was too confusing, and while they dug the characterizations and writing, it wasn’t enough to ultimately win them over.
(It is creepy to read letters that are about you but are addressed to someone else, in this case, my agent. You’re referred to in the third person — “Bookfraud left me a little cold”—as if you were a corpse being examined by medical examiners. )
I am missing the point, of course, which is if was the right 30 pages, I done well. Streamling is not my natural course of action: when in doubt, I’ll lard on characters, description, action, and exposition.
A lean mean writing machine
What is ironic about this was when I first sat down to write the novel, I feared that the premise was too vaporous upon which to build a book. Unconsciously, I went over the top in some places, as if filler would somehow confer “weightiness” to my labors. It’s always better to overwrite than underwrite, and if this was not a rationalization, it certainly gave me the thinnest of reasons to stack word upon word, building a tower that would surely fall if I were to remove a single sentence.
So I came away with an unwieldy door-stopper, some 450 pages of this novel, of which, I’d gather, at least 200 pages were crap. I rewrote and rewrote, until I got it down to the 330-page, sorta-kinda-perhaps streamlined machine of fiction that resides on my hard drive.
Mind you, I’m not expecting miracles. The book has been turned down about 20 times, and even though many of the rejection letters said the same thing, my agent was steadfast in insisting that I shouldn’t rewrite it. “It’s like giving Christmas gifts,” he said. “You have to find the right present for the right person.”
Sears probably had fewer returns on Dec. 26. To make matters worse, I’ve been given advice from another agent, who told me, in so many words, that I’m fucked. He told me that agents hate taking previously rejected work, don’t want to look like they’re “stealing” clients, and don’t resend work to editors who have rejected books in the first place.
Fair enough. But he told me directly that I should probably stick with my current agent, because nobody else is going to want to take me.
Not to put too fine a point on it, but I’m at wit’s end. It makes me feel like the past eight months rewriting the damn thing is a waste, no matter how different it is. Add the fact I only pared 30 pages, and you get one seriously neurotic fellow whose idea of fun is curling into a fetal position more tightly than his yet-to-be born child is in right now.
And then I woke up
Rarely have I felt more at a loss about what to do. I’ve even written Miss Snark in the desperate hope she’ll answer my letter (sadly, she did. Advice: you’re fucked. Though said in a nice way.). I’m thinking about having a Bookfraud Burns the Novel Party, one last shot at merriment before the baby comes.
I realize that I have ventured far from the original thread of this post, but certain topics simply drive me nuts, and it is extremely hard to keep focused, and hell, let’s face it, I just wanted to get all this stuff off my chest.
Once you think you have this writing thing licked, it licks you right back. After eating at Taco Bell.
i didn’t know you have an agent. that’s better than the rest of us goobers.
well, good luck with getting that novel into shape. if all else fails, rearrange the chapters and call it an experimental novel. or add some drug addiction and call it a memoir.
i didn’t know you have an agent. that’s better than the rest of us goobers.
well, good luck with getting that novel into shape. if all else fails, rearrange the chapters and call it an experimental novel. or add some drug addiction and call it a memoir.
i didn’t know you have an agent. that’s better than the rest of us goobers.
well, good luck with getting that novel into shape. if all else fails, rearrange the chapters and call it an experimental novel. or add some drug addiction and call it a memoir.
Yeah.
You’ve got an agent.
You poor thing. I can feel for you but I can’t find you.
You can re-title and re-submit, sometimes works they say.
Editors move around, die, take up macarame.
Or, best of two, write another novel.
le: your suggestion is an excellent one. i will, at the least, try the drug addiction angle.
bernita: i am an ungrateful man indeed, and the more i think about it, the more i wish i had not written this post. i am not the type to inventory my blessings — the mere fact i have a literary agent, for instance. your advice is well put and thank you for it.
I really feel for you fraud. What a painful and gut-wrenching position you are in. When people reject my work it is because of price, not because it is something I created.
Damn, I really want to read what you have wrote.
Yeah.
You’ve got an agent.
You poor thing. I can feel for you but I can’t find you.
You can re-title and re-submit, sometimes works they say.
Editors move around, die, take up macarame.
Or, best of two, write another novel.
Yeah.
You’ve got an agent.
You poor thing. I can feel for you but I can’t find you.
You can re-title and re-submit, sometimes works they say.
Editors move around, die, take up macarame.
Or, best of two, write another novel.
I trimmed away nearly 20 pages from my 340 page novel last year. It’s about as lean and mean as it’s going to get. Anymore tinkering and continuity goes right out the window. 30 pages is a good chunk…be proud. Now get that book back out there.
le: your suggestion is an excellent one. i will, at the least, try the drug addiction angle.
bernita: i am an ungrateful man indeed, and the more i think about it, the more i wish i had not written this post. i am not the type to inventory my blessings — the mere fact i have a literary agent, for instance. your advice is well put and thank you for it.
le: your suggestion is an excellent one. i will, at the least, try the drug addiction angle.
bernita: i am an ungrateful man indeed, and the more i think about it, the more i wish i had not written this post. i am not the type to inventory my blessings — the mere fact i have a literary agent, for instance. your advice is well put and thank you for it.
I really feel for you fraud. What a painful and gut-wrenching position you are in. When people reject my work it is because of price, not because it is something I created.
Damn, I really want to read what you have wrote.
I really feel for you fraud. What a painful and gut-wrenching position you are in. When people reject my work it is because of price, not because it is something I created.
Damn, I really want to read what you have wrote.
I trimmed away nearly 20 pages from my 340 page novel last year. It’s about as lean and mean as it’s going to get. Anymore tinkering and continuity goes right out the window. 30 pages is a good chunk…be proud. Now get that book back out there.
I trimmed away nearly 20 pages from my 340 page novel last year. It’s about as lean and mean as it’s going to get. Anymore tinkering and continuity goes right out the window. 30 pages is a good chunk…be proud. Now get that book back out there.
Things that impressed me about your certain-to-be-published-before-the-end-of-this-decade book:
1. You wrote a book. A WHOLE book. I’ve written 5 1/2 short stories, 3 essays, and 2 very (very) bad poems. I have not secured an agent for any of them.
2. You have an agent! (see #1)
3. You trimmed a total of 150 pages from what was originally 450. I have a hard time trimming 5 words from 1,000. Trimming entire pages is a superhuman feat, in my world. You are my new superhero.
6. And, quite possibly, someone I will consider harrassing for editing advice in the future.
7. Miss Snark was NICE to you.
8. AND you survived Taco Bell!!
Clearly, you are just having a writerly angst moment. My Rx: any Danielle Steel novel. (They always soothe MY fragile ego, at least.)
If I could re-write history, Rush Limbaugh would never have been born. Oh, and also J. Edgar Hoover. He kinda sucked, too.
Things that impressed me about your certain-to-be-published-before-the-end-of-this-decade book:
1. You wrote a book. A WHOLE book. I’ve written 5 1/2 short stories, 3 essays, and 2 very (very) bad poems. I have not secured an agent for any of them.
2. You have an agent! (see #1)
3. You trimmed a total of 150 pages from what was originally 450. I have a hard time trimming 5 words from 1,000. Trimming entire pages is a superhuman feat, in my world. You are my new superhero.
6. And, quite possibly, someone I will consider harrassing for editing advice in the future.
7. Miss Snark was NICE to you.
8. AND you survived Taco Bell!!
Clearly, you are just having a writerly angst moment. My Rx: any Danielle Steel novel. (They always soothe MY fragile ego, at least.)
If I could re-write history, Rush Limbaugh would never have been born. Oh, and also J. Edgar Hoover. He kinda sucked, too.
Things that impressed me about your certain-to-be-published-before-the-end-of-this-decade book:
1. You wrote a book. A WHOLE book. I’ve written 5 1/2 short stories, 3 essays, and 2 very (very) bad poems. I have not secured an agent for any of them.
2. You have an agent! (see #1)
3. You trimmed a total of 150 pages from what was originally 450. I have a hard time trimming 5 words from 1,000. Trimming entire pages is a superhuman feat, in my world. You are my new superhero.
6. And, quite possibly, someone I will consider harrassing for editing advice in the future.
7. Miss Snark was NICE to you.
8. AND you survived Taco Bell!!
Clearly, you are just having a writerly angst moment. My Rx: any Danielle Steel novel. (They always soothe MY fragile ego, at least.)
If I could re-write history, Rush Limbaugh would never have been born. Oh, and also J. Edgar Hoover. He kinda sucked, too.
phoenix: thank you for the kind wishes. i just need to shut up and write another book.
collin: you are also correct. i need to shut up and do something about things.
amy: your eight-step presentation is a fine one, though i don’t see myself doing the danielle steel thing. please feel free to harass me for any advice, editing or otherwise.
phoenix: thank you for the kind wishes. i just need to shut up and write another book.
collin: you are also correct. i need to shut up and do something about things.
amy: your eight-step presentation is a fine one, though i don’t see myself doing the danielle steel thing. please feel free to harass me for any advice, editing or otherwise.
phoenix: thank you for the kind wishes. i just need to shut up and write another book.
collin: you are also correct. i need to shut up and do something about things.
amy: your eight-step presentation is a fine one, though i don’t see myself doing the danielle steel thing. please feel free to harass me for any advice, editing or otherwise.