All is Translation, and All of Us Lost in it

So while I spend my lazy Sunday watching TV and waiting for beta comments on my edited MS, I wanted to share some essential links for any of you looking to go on the agent hunt in the future. Some of these links heavily skew towards YA information, but they're extremely useful anyway:

Generally Useful Sites:
Agent Query - Search for agents by genre.
Absolute Write Bewares, Background Checks and Recommendations - Whatever agency you're looking at, it has a thread here.
Query Tracker - Looking into agent response times and submission guidelines, and make a spreadsheet of your own submissions.
Preditors and Editors - A listing of agents and agencies that keeps track of spam artists.
Literary Rambles - This blog has "Agent Spotlights" on several different kidlit-representing agents. It's awesome because they include as much info as possible, including specific likes and dislikes.
Publishers Marketplace - One stop shopping for all industry information. Sign up for the Publishers Lunch newsletter!

Agent Blogs:
Kristin Nelson's Blog - Extremely informative and helpful. The best part of this blog is that she posts and analyzes her clients' original queries.
Nathan Brandsford's Blog - Though he's no longer an agent, he still has great publishing industry info.
Mary Kole's Blog - Great information on the slush pile, the manuscript review process, and lots of beginners' writing mistakes.
Janet Reid's Blog - Hilarious and informative all at once.
Miss Snark - The blog may be defunct now, but the archives are well worth a read.
The Rejectionist - A (now former) agent's assistant ruminates on books, writing, reading, etc. Totally hilarious.

Query Help:
Query Shark - Janet Reid critiques queries! And she doesn't hesitate to point out when something works for her, either.
Writing A Killer Query - Elana Johnson's workshop is one of the best and most thorough. She breaks query down into five separate parts and walks you through all of them.
Query Letter Hell - If you are very brave and really need help cracking that query, this is the equivalent of query letter boot camp. You need an account at Absolute Write to access this forum.

Some Top Agents/Agencies Who Represent YA:
Writers House
Andrea Brown Lit
Curtis Brown Lit
Fine Print Lit
Dystel and Goderich
Nelson Agency
Maass Agency
Harvey Klinger Agency
And that's just a few to get you started.

I hope this is a good start! ♥

Because no one ever got anything by being half-assed.

Working the 9-5(:30) life, I have a lot of time sitting at my desk or riding back and forth on the bus to think about where I want to go from here. I really like my job, and I'm starting to settle into life here, but I understand, a lot better now than I did a year ago, what keeps me going.

So for the record:

I'm going to be a published author. And I think having failed once makes that more possible than it was before. It would have been amazing to get lucky on the first try, but I have something of an advantage, because unlike last time, I know exactly what I'm doing now. I understand the odds. I know how to implement edits and when to add my own, when to obsess and when to let everything simmer. Sending e-mails to agents gave me heart palpitations when I started, but I sent over fifty, and somehow my head didn't explode from all the bad news - and for my trouble, I found people that I dream about working with every day.

And, most importantly, from talking to so many different people who want the same thing I do, I found out that something I used to tell myself when I was feeling insecure is actually true. There are a lot of people who are better than me, and quite a few who love it as much as I do - but I've yet to meet anyone who loves it more.

So mark it on your calendars, ladies! I'm going to make this happen.

All right, time for bed. But tomorrow? I'm going to get back to work. ♥

It's my birthday tomorrow! How did that happen. I sort of missed it. Anyway, I'll be 22 on March 22nd at exactly 3:22pm. Pretty insane!

My celebration with my roommates was today because everyone's always so busy on weekdays. It involved Miranda casually suggesting we go out for a walk, getting back only to be lunged upon and thrown into the bathroom by Sarah in order to blow out candles (it's illegal to light candles in the dorm, and the bathroom is the only room without a window), and then going to Porter Square for delicious udon and croquettes and plum sake. And I flirted with the bakery guy again. Eventually I will just ask for his number.

All in all a lovely day.

No word from the literary agent yet, but I did come up with a list of things not to say to him if he calls me, ranging from "slightly damaging" to "never-work-in-this-town-again."

1. (When he tells me who he is) "Oh fuck."
2. (If he offers representation) "Oh, wow, this is amazing. It's even better than how my phone psychic said it would be."
3. "So what are you wearing?"
4. "I was a Velociraptor in a past life."

Actually, what with how many crazy people e-mail literary agents every day, I could make sanity my platform. I don't claim to channel ancient Native American spirits to write my books for me, Mr. Malk. Please love me.

I'm just hoping for some good feedback either way, since he's the first agent to take a look at the book. Anything else is extra. Well, the exclusive ends on Thursday, so we'll know soon enough! Eep.

Ouch! My first two rejections came in within five minutes of each other. Bam bam, just like that. One was from my first choice, and one was from someone I queried yesterday (who wasn't actually supposed to send rejections, but e-mailed me just to say that it wasn't a good fit. Double ouch.)

I am pleased to report that there were no tears involved. There's no crying in publishing.

As per Spring of Rejection and Heartbreak rules and regulations, I took two shots of vodka, one for each rejection. That sort of burns, by the way.

Oh well! Time to go back for more, for I am a masochist.

I finished one round of editing on Grandmaster Draw, and I currently have two rounds of editing going on simultaneously. The second is based on my mom's edits, and is almost finished except for the epilogue. I started the third back at the beginning to keep myself occupied in-between. Those edits cover chapters 1-13 so far.

It's kind of amusing, because the first one was mostly to add things that weren't clear before and clarify plot points and such... and the second and third have mostly been devoted to taking lots and lots of words out. Sometimes changing phrases to clarify them/make them less awkward, but mostly just slashing down adverbs without prejudice. The blood of many an adverb stains my keyboard. ;;

As it stands, I'll be getting the last batch of edits from Mom tomorrow, and I'll finish up my own reread not long after. I'll be at my friend Miranda's house for the weekend, which will help me take a bit of a break, and next week I'll do one more reread... and then probably start the querying process on Tuesday or Wednesday.

G-Gulp.

I'm not in a huge hurry to take everything down just yet because it's under lock and filter here, but I don't want to keep it up too long after I start querying, either. So as it is now, I'll probably take down all but the first few chapters in two weeks or so.

A-And then perhaps I can relax and do fun things, like write that Imperial Guard chapter and finish up the first book! And I want to think about my next YA project, too. It's definitely going to be horror in some regard, but I'm torn. I could either go the horror-comedy route start on the Possession is Nine-Tenths of the Law short story collection, or I could think more seriously about this horror/fairy tale/urban fantasy story that has been kicking around. I KNOW NOT. I need brain cells that are not tied up in Grandmaster Draw to think about that sort of thing.

Aaaanyway! Off to a JSA meeting, and then I must do some actual schoolwork...

My mom is a technical writer and editor at a small company, and therefore spends five days a week reading other people's lazy writing. Which means she is not about to put up with mine.

I sent her the current draft of Grandmaster Draw, because she's the best editor I know. She hasn't sent me her notes yet, but we talked on the phone, and in our brief writing-related discussion, she pointed out that according to my first draft, the following are now true:

- A deadbolt actually = one of those slide-y chain lock things. I did not actually know that they were something different. Now I need to find out what the chains are called. Maybe just "chains."

- Steel = aluminum. YES BECKY, BASEBALL BATS ARE TTLY MADE OF STEEL. And Thom has super-strength. Where was my brain that day, I wonder.

- 14 - 6 = 6. Or Liam is secretly 12. ONE OF THE TWO.

All goes to show that no matter how much editing you do, you can still miss the most ridiculous mistakes.

Mom also suggested that I change my first line a bit, and told me that tomorrow she'd send the first of many e-mails full of notes about sentences where I decided that verbs/articles were apparently optional, and places where I "connected too many dots."

This just in: my mother is amazing and I am way spoiled.