Tuesday, December 27, 2005
happy camper not
First, I had to go back to work today. Ick. I hate 5:00 am. Just on principle. Then today I really really really
HAD to put the stuff into the mail to my agent. It's a lot of stuff. I'm not happy with it, but she supposedly understands that most of it's draft. More on that later, because I really don't want to miss out on the rant that has me most upset. I have a LaserJet 4200 that I've been slowly falling out of love with. Today, with 77% of the toner unused it is not printing clean pages. Yes, I cleaned it. Via the paper procedure and the manual procedure. Twice. I admit, it's been doing this for a long long time. Back when I had a window of opportunity to get it serviced, I couldn't find anyone who would come to the house (which I have done in the past) So now I must find someplace to
DRIVE to with the stupid printer. I had to apologize for the crappy print outs in my cover letter. And now I have to find someplace to take the printer to get fixed. (any one tempted to point out any of the glaringly obvious things I should have done to prevent this is missing the whole point so please, just make those comments in some other blog. Thank you for taking pity on me.)
PLUS! I do not have mailing envelopes large enough to send the material so tomorrow I have to go do that, too. This is worse than it seems. I know you're thinking, so what, Carolyn? You have to go to the post office in the drug store anyway. Well, there's a difference between going to the Post Office (in the drug store) with stuff ready to mail and stuff that isn't even in an envelope. Normally, I only send synopsis and three chapters. My regular Tyvek envelopes are more than sufficient for that. But this package is two synopses, plus chapters, three short erotic things (short as in 20 pages each) and two "project descriptions."
And now you're asking, Carolyn, what is a
Project Description because there is nothing in the Manual for Neurotic Writers that describes the format and requirements of a
air quotes Project Description
end air quotes. That's because I made it up. She asked for a description of the projects that are not in proposal form. Writers have been known to be sucked into an alternate dimension and beaten with old typewriter ribbons for failing to follow TO THE LETTER the format requirements for sending materials to a literary agent. I'm already a client, so I guess they won't use the typewriter ribbon. Probably I'll be pelted with empty bottles of white out.
Which seques into the stuff that I will put into an envelope of the required size sometime tomorrow, probably in a driving rain because that is the kind of weather we have here this time of year. I read the chapters for Shift and parts were awesome but the parts that were not just need to be cut and there just wasn't time to cut and make the appropriate adjustments. When I read the synopsis, I hate the whole thing. I sent the synopsis and the first chapter. I expect to be told to resend when there's more. Well, she
whine said
end whine. Today at the gym I ripped apart the synopsis for Possession and decided that the chapters were far too passive in effect (not grammar) and that it needed A LOT more of my heroine's baggage in it. I have the synopsis fixed, I guess. But again, the chapters need work. That's why there's the concept of DRAFT. The PD's are OK I guess. I like Dark Elf. It's cool.
It's the 3 shorts that have me worried. Last night I read the massively revised one and, setting aside any personal issues I ought to worry about from the story I wrote, damn it was good. And I think the 2nd one is good, too. The third made me laugh while I was reading it. But here's the thing. Not one of the 3 is like anything I've ever read before. Seriously. There's sex and stuff, which was the whole point, but the people involved have issues and they don't necessarily resolve them. Well, I appear to be babbling. I think that's the precursor to getting sucked into the alternate dimension.
