What I'm Listening To: Paparazzi-Lady Gaga
So basically I just spent the last couple of days in New York where I worked on my query letter. I would definitely recommend to anyone who is serious about getting published to do to a conference. You will feel a lot better when you do. Face to face contact is crucial, and no where else can you get the expertise of an agent who will look over your work and say yes to this or no to that. They were brutally honest and harsh, but I liked that because that's what I paid for. I needed them to tell me what in the world was wrong with my work so that I could turn it into something that they might possibly represent. Although they did tell me that usually the first book never gets published, that won't stop me.
The one reason I knew that I had to be at this conference, was because Janet Reid was going to be there. She was signed up to be in my workshop group, but for some reason wasn't. That was okay because I immediately went up to talk to her afterward. She was really nice and hilarious, and when I asked if I could query her, she told me yes, if I cut the word count. So clearly I have a lot of work to do in the next few days if I want to query the agents over Christmas break and hopefully have an answer by next July before I go to Spain.
I visited Kevin, one of my old friends from high school who now goes to NYU. We went on the Upper East Side, 5th Avenue, and traipsed around Time Square. I ate extremely well and expensively. I felt the vibe and also felt much more in my element. If I transferred from Madison to NYU, I would probably adjust well. Also, New York in itself is much more diverse than Madison and even Milwaukee. Many races walking together in perfect symmetry. It was beautiful. My hotel was great, and I really enjoyed my time there. I bought three books that were recommended by the agents and am excited to see what I can do. I plan to have this book revised, at least over Thanksgiving, and sent out again to agents in the beginning of December.
Hopefully I can go to a conference in London when I'm in Europe next year, and the conference has only bolstered my hopes that I am a good writer because a lot of people at the conference were just coming to learn about it instead of already having done the research. I think I'm probably going to join Backspace because they seem like a pretty good network, even though I'll have to pay, but I'll try my hardest to get published and I plan to do it by the time I'm 22. And I will.
Oh, and the Yankees won their 27th Championship, so everyone was in NYC and there was a huge uproar over it which made time there even more fun.
