. . . and one other accomplishment

The other big thing I did today was write an e-mail to a publisher for a kids' book I wrote, wow, two-and-a-half years ago now. It was never meant to be a big deal -- just a quick thing I wrote after I put out The Big Bang Theory book, since I already knew the subject matter so well.

And my editor at this publisher is GOOD. She really made the kids book lots better.

But she -- or perhaps the publishers as a whole -- are not apparently the most organized, since I haven't heard from anyone in three months, and haven't gotten the final edits of the draft I sent in a year ago, despite being promised them pretty much every other month.

The whole point of this was NOT to make it a big deal, just to publish a kids book if it worked out. But this lack of momentum is getting a bit ridiculous. Normally this is the kind of thing I ask my agent to deal with -- but she's not a children's book agent, and so she doesn't really have a lot of pull here, as well as she's not going to be a lot of help if we decide to shop it elsewhere. So I don't have a lot of options and have mostly been just sitting around, waiting to see what happens and trying not to worry about it too much. . .

BUT, I really LIKE the book. And I want to see it published. So today I sort of reached my limit and sent the following:

As it is coming up on a year since I sent you my last version of The Universe's Birthday, I have the feeling this project is stalled in the water. Since our contract and commitment to each other has always been a loose one, I am not chafing under this -- but I do like the book very much and would begin shopping it elsewhere if Charlesbridge no longer planned to go forward.

I know you have many other things on your desk, but please let me know where things stand.

I am torn between thinking I was too nice and that I was too abrupt. I mean hey, I get pretty disorganized too sometimes, right?

Disorganization

It's just being one of those days. I wrote two words today on the book. TWO. They were: "Good afternoon!" And I just can't seem to force myself to stick with it and do more.

Instead I have been playing with the computer, sending out the occasional e-mail, washing my dishes, doing things that basically one could argue need doing but even still aren't the BIG non-writing things that need doing. Like paying my bills, say.

I just forced myself to do a few important desk work items however, and so I am not declaring the day a WHOLE loss. First, I just got myself off of some horrible charge-you-once-a-month-so-you-can-have-home-shopping-discounts thing that I have been on for possibly like FIVE years and never once used. The amount of money they made off of me is so painful that I can't even record it here. Worse, I've called to cancel three times before and always they've convinced me to stay. This time I was firm. I am finished. It is canceled.

HEY, that's actually a major accomplishment for the day, I should be proud of that.

The Subtext

I just got SO side-tracked in the last entry -- 'cause what I really meant to talk about was the panic in my stomach that I have just let people read the first 20 pages. I mean that stuff is virgin territory. No one has read it except for me. And while I have done a wee bit of that "first chapter" honing I talked about -- mostly it's a realio-trulio, first, un-edited, Please-Don't-Judge-Me-On-This draft.

Total panic time.

Meeting #2

Met with the new writing group again this morning. . . and I actually, gasp, handed out the first 20 pages of the book I've been working on. It represents about 1/5 of what I've written so far, but the first part is always the most important thing to get right. It is, perhaps, the ONLY thing.

My good friend Misha Strauss was the first person to get this through my skull, though many writing teachers tried. The first 'graf is ALL. The way she, a philosophy grad student, put it was: A professor has decided by the end of the first page of an essay what grade they're going to give you. There is something a wee bit scary about the fact that the "grade" metaphor delved into my cortex more firmly than any other attempt to explain this concept to me. Decades of being a goody-goody and grade-grubber apparently . . .

BUT, the point is that after Misha told me that, I finally got it. I could, in fact, look at papers I wrote (I was taking courses in Philosophy of Science at UMD at the time) and point at the exact sentence on the first page that turned my A into a B+. And I pretty much never had the problem again.

Whether it's a book proposal or an article or a novel or a query or, hell, a letter trying to get out of paying for a parking ticket, you've pretty much got the first paragraph to convince the reader of your worth.

In the case of this book, I've got the first bit to convince

--a publisher to publish it
--a publisher to give me LOTS of money for it
--a reader to buy it
--a reader to read it
--a reviewer to like it

Now it is, of course, entirely possible that I could write a glowing first chapter and then a horrible book and lose any chance at the above . . . but the opposite isn't true. No matter how good the book becomes, it's entirely impossible to get a decent grade without that glowing first chapter.

So, I handed out the first 20 pages, and hopefully we can hone that baby over and over until it's perfect.

Animals

Oh, I also want to pitch a story to Zoogoer magazine -- the magazine of the National Zoo, which gets sent to all the FONZ members. It's a tough magazine to pitch, because the stories tend to be fairly general without a major news hook. I.e. they're in the category of "All About Flamingos!" (with often an added dash of ". . . and here's how their habitat is being destroyed.") So how do you manage to come up with something that is somehow both streamlined and simple, while still interesting and different enough to catch the editors' attention?

So far I have negged the suggestion of two friends who suggested capybara and peacock recipes ("Tastes like quail on the grill!"). With the latest National Zoo PR, I figure that wouldn't fly.

But I am looking for any and all ideas -- suggestions?

More Magazine Contacts

I'm on a tear. Having written that one e-mail to the editor in California, I have gotten my act together to make more contacts. The embarrassing thing here is that these "contacts" are, like, my friends. I mean, it's inexcusable that I haven't mentioned to them before now that I want to write for them.

Of course, one reason I have motivated to do all of this is because it was one of my homework assignments from the last writing group meeting -- so that's a material bonus of this new writing group right there.

So, the editor in California on the big, new physics magazine wrote back. He was very nice and said he knew who I was and that he was hoping to have a budget for freelancers set up in the next few months -- he couldn't hire on outside help at the moment but I should write back in a bit. Good, positive feedback, even though not any immediate writing assignments.

But THEN, I also followed up on a note that was mailed out to a listserv I'm on about a need for writers for a watercraft magazine. The note was to a general DC audience, but it happened to have been sent by a friend. It also had the words "Freelancers willing to ride personal watercraft for assignments are especially desirable." Am I willing to be paid to go out on the water? Um, YES. So I sent her some clips and my CV, and she made it sound like we'd be a good match, so that's exciting. It's also a bit of a start on every freelancer's dream to become a travel writer.

Next, I have had in the back of my mind that I need to contact another friend who just got a job as an editor at a fairly big magazine. But these things are kind of delicate and I didn't just want to say -- "Hmm, haven't seen you in a couple months, but hey can we talk about what you can do for ME?" Anyway, we were e-mailing today and of her own accord she asked if I wanted to do some writing for them. Whoo hoo! We're having lunch the first week in June to discuss.

So, all in all, I'm feeling good about my prospects at getting back into magazine writing after my 2 years of just focusing on books. . .

Checking Things Off the To Do List

I know this is SUCH old news. . . but why is it so hard to check off some of the most basic stuff off one's to do list? You put it down there at a moment of total organization and motivation. This, these things, that bullet point, THAT'S what I'll get done this week.

And then it just sort of sits there, getting transferred from one list to the next, gathering metaphorical dust. . .

. . . until one day you just DO it. And you can't figure out why the hell it took you so long to get around to it, since it was so damn easy.

Case in point: Last week I cleaned up my balcony and planted flowers in the 17,542 pots that I had lying around from the last time I bothered to plant flowers three years ago before a sub-tenant killed them all and I decided it wasn't worth it. My balcony is now so gorgeous that I have to run out there almost every two seconds to see just how many femtometers the morning glories have grown since I last checked. And -- including the time it took me to go to the plant store -- the whole shebang took me three hours. Absurd that I put it off for so long.

More to the WRITING point: I have been meaning to send a note to an editor in California for three months. I wanted to strike while the iron was hot, back in February after I had just met his supervisor -- but not him, since he was out of town -- and gotten the low-down on the brand new physics magazine they are putting together. It's a magazine with heady goals, as they're trying to make a really glossy, interesting, culturally-relevant magazine out of high-energy physics. From what little I know of the people involved, and the amount of support and enthusiasm behind the project, I think they've got a decent shot. And BOY do I want to write for them.

And yet, that "send e-mail introduction" to the editor has sat on my to do list for months. It's embarrassing really.

So, I just motivated to do it. A quick e-mail introduction, a quick edit of my current CV to make sure it was appropriate -- and boom, it's been sent into the ether.

WHY ON EARTH DID IT TAKE ME SO LONG???

Perhaps I just needed the inspiration of my balcony. . . I think I better go check on my morning glories.

Inspiration! (Or is it Structure?)

We had our first writing group meeting this morning. Wow. I was nervous about it like Mary Tyler Moore throwing a cocktail party. I kept worrying yesterday that I might just forget by accident, and not show up -- like the way people who are afraid of heights vaguely worry they might suddenly jump off a bridge. I kept worrying that the people I didn't know who were coming wouldn't like me and the people I did know and they would walk off like this had been a waste of time. I worried no one would come.

The meeting was for 9. . . by 9:15 we had three people. By 9:45, we had five -- though all people I already knew. Still a really good group, and they didn't all know each other, which helps for rolling ideas around. At 10:30 one woman whom I hadn't met before arrived, nervous because she'd overslept-- but a great addition.

So all in all today we had. . . a playwright, three science writers all in various stages of book writing, a Knight-Ridder editor and UMD journalism professor who wants to start writing fiction, and a security journalist who was also a Bosnia war correspondent. I mean that's some firepower.

What I hadn't anticipated was that we would talk BUSINESS as much as anything today. I'm sure we'll do more editing in the future -- but we have so much to share in terms of how to get motivated, how to write book proposals, how to deal with the people who want their share of the money (agents-- good! randoms who late in the game announce they think they deserve royalties -- bad!), and how to stay organized.

Next time we'll bring stuff to share. . . which is SCARY. I haven't let anyone see what I've written for this Kepler book yet. But in the meantime, I'm totally charged up, and think a bi-weekly burst of energy from this group is going to do wonders for all of us.

SO -- my assignment for our next meeting is to
a) psych myself up for sharing some of my work
b) write three sections from the perspective of the crazy emperor
c) come up with one story to pitch as well as have the info from some magazines to pitch it to.