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RSS10 Tips on How to Stay Sane as a Debut Novelist, by Jennifer McVeigh
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1. Don’t quit your job before you have a book deal. Very sensible advice that I spectacularly failed to follow. I left my job as a literary agent and stepped into the terrifying world of no salary, no professional support and no real hope of achieving what I was setting out to achieve. It was a very rocky ride.
2. Do join a writing group – they will keep you sane, help you to stay on track, and remind you that there are other people in the world crazy enough to be battling all day with words on paper.
3. Don’t divulge your plot, or writing problems for that matter, to friends at dinner – they’ll say very unhelpful things like: Isn’t that a bit predictable? How can you not know what’s going to happen at the end? And – most grueling of all – hasn’t Wilbur Smith written a novel just like that?
4. When you’re writing sex scenes, don’t imagine your parents looking over your shoulder – a passionate kiss will quickly disintegrate into a prudish peck on the cheek.
5. Don’t obsess over the perfection of other novels. Read them, learn from them, but don’t let them cast your own into shadow. I always wanted my protagonist to be as dynamic and real as Cathy or Emma, but it wasn’t until I had reached the end of her story that I felt I really knew her.
6. Don’t let yourself imagine all the unpublished authors in the world being turned down by agents, like the millions of lost souls waiting at the gates of heaven. If you have written something good, then someone will spot it – you just need to have faith and determination.
7. Don’t be your own judge. After I had written my novel I shelved it in despair, convinced that it was worthless. It was only by some stroke of luck – a chance meeting with a literary agent – that I was convinced to send it out into the world. Thank goodness I did.
8. Don’t demonize the agents who reject you. More than likely your manuscript fell into the hands of some poor, unpaid 17 year old intern with a hangover, desperately trying to reduce the size of the slush pile. Wait a few months, and send it in again. I was offered representation by an agent who must have afterwards let my manuscript fall into the slush pile. A month later I received an earnest typed letter from the agency: “Dear Miss McVeigh, many thanks for sending in your manuscript. I’m very sorry to inform you that…”
9. Once you are published – in the interests of sanity – try not to check your sales rankings more than twice (OK – that’s not realistic – perhaps 5 times) a day. If sales are good your publisher will tell you, and a shift from 3050 to 2095 is almost certainly meaningless.
10. Don’t make the mistake of thinking that because you’ve got one novel behind you, the second will be easier. It won’t. Sweating over a novel is part of what makes it brilliant. Or at least that’s what I tell myself. I do have a very frustrating writer friend who keeps telling me that her second novel is a breeze…
Going for a stroll with dad
This how we felt walking to work in the slush today.
Love this!
The end is just the beginning, right? #endpapers
Begin today!
THE STRIKER by Clive Cussler: Amazon | B&N | iTunes | Books-A-Million | IndieBound
NIGHT MOVES by Randy Wayne White: Amazon | B&N | iTunes | Books-A-Million | IndieBound
{Amiable Authors: Dave Barry and bestselling author Harlan Coben connect in NYC}
Dave Barry is on tour and in the media with INSANE CITY out this week from Putnam! Take a look at some of the great coverage the book has received so far:
Watch Dave on NBC’s “The Today Show”, and MSNBC’s “Morning Joe”
Listen to Dave on NPR’s “Weekend Edition” , “On Point” and “The Leonard Lopate Show”
Read about Dave and INSANE CITY in the Associated Press, New York Times , USA Weekend Magazine, USA Today, Reuters, Chicago Tribune Printers Row, Philadelphia Inquirer!
Four friends, recent college graduates from Montana, travel to Kenya to work at a giant refugee camp for Somalis feeling their country’s chaos. Two men, two women, each with their own reasons for being there, but after twelve weeks, they’re all ready for a break. They pile into a Land Cruiser for an African adventure.
They get more than they bargained for. Very soon, John Wells will be all that stands between them and a very bad outcome. But what exactly happened that day?
In The Kidnapping, we find out how it all began.
Download the FREE eBook short story preview by Alex Berenson to your eReader today!
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Continue the story on February 12th when THE NIGHT RANGER by Alex Berenson goes on sale!
If you like reading, fashion, and laughter - or any combination of the above - you don’t want to miss Rebecca Dana’s New York events!
JUJITSU RABBI AND THE GODLESS BLONDE is launching 1/24 - mark your calendars now and we look forward to celebrating with you soon.
Let’s Pretend This Never Happened is the perfect holiday read!
Jenny Lawson realized that the most mortifying moments of our lives—the ones we’d like to pretend never happened—are in fact the ones that define us. In the #1 New York Times bestseller, Let’s Pretend This Never Happened, Lawson takes readers on a hilarious journey recalling her bizarre upbringing in rural Texas, her devastatingly awkward high school years, and her relationship with her long-suffering husband, Victor. Chapters include: “Stanley the Magical, Talking Squirrel”; “A Series of Angry Post-It Notes to My Husband”; “My Vagina Is Fine. Thanks for Asking”; “And Then I Snuck a Dead Cuban Alligator on an Airplane.” Pictures with captions (no one would believe these things without proof) accompany the text.
Click the links below to snag your copy of Let’s Pretend This Never Happened from your favorite ebook retailer!
Amazon / Kindle | Barnes & Noble / Nook | Apple | Google | Sony | Penguin
Let’s Pretend This Never Happened and Jenny Lawson on “Best of” 2012 lists:
GoodReads – “Best Humor Book of 2012”
GoodReads – “Best Books of 2012”
Itunes.com – “iBookstore Best of 2012”
Hudson Booksellers – “Best Books of 2012”
BookRiot – “Readers’ Top 25 Books of 2012”
Houston Chronicle/Bookish – “Best Books of 2012”
BookPeople Blog – “Best of 2012: Nonfiction”
Babble.com – “Top 100 Mom Blogs of 2012”
Funny man and INSANE CITY author Dave Barry is hitting the road in 2013! Check out his tour schedule and look for INSANE CITY from your favorite book retailer on January 29, 2013!
Click here for more event details!
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Books-A-Million | IndieBound | iBookstore
![“Dirk Pitt is oceanography’s answer to Indiana Jones…Exotic locations, ruthless villains and many narrow escapes—Cussler’s fans come for swashbuckling [and] he delivers.”-The Associated Press
Clive Cussler Fans! Your wait for the new Dirk Pitt Adventure is almost over: POSEIDON’S ARROW is on sale Tuesday, November 6th!
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Books-A-Million | Hastings | IndieBound | Target | Kindle | Nook | iBooks](http://25.media.tumblr.com/tumblr_mcvbsum5tO1roikcyo1_250.jpg)
“Dirk Pitt is oceanography’s answer to Indiana Jones…Exotic locations, ruthless villains and many narrow escapes—Cussler’s fans come for swashbuckling [and] he delivers.”-The Associated Press
Clive Cussler Fans! Your wait for the new Dirk Pitt Adventure is almost over: POSEIDON’S ARROW is on sale Tuesday, November 6th!
Amazon | Barnes & Noble | Books-A-Million | Hastings | IndieBound | Target | Kindle | Nook | iBooks
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