Shopping for Clients: Fun with Publishers Marketplace

While I await your questions and to-be-critiqued first pages and the manuscript from my February 1 client, I'm going shopping.

Not real shopping, since I've already blown through my book budget for the month (recommendation: Jen Lancaster's Bitter is the New Black and Brunonia Barry's The Lace Reader). I'm going client shopping.

I do this about once a year, sometimes twice if the summer slowdown adds enough wiggle room to my schedule. Ninety percent of my clients find me through Google or other search engines, friends, coworkers, or members of their critique groups. The other ten percent come my way through the various online and offline writing and publishing groups to which I belong - fellow members whose writing seems like a good match for my services and background. And once in a blue moon I'll work with a client I've "met" through my Operation Rescue the Craigslist Writers (in which I skim through the writing gig listings and respond to authors looking for agents with a link to Preditors and Editors), although that isn't really the point.

But every now and then I go looking for a manuscript that is exactly what I feel like working on right now. Sometimes I'm in the mood to work on Chick Lit. Sometimes I'm in the mood for some crazy vampires. Sometimes I really want to read a good mystery or a psychological thriller. Sometimes I'm looking for something sweet, subtle, and thought-provoking. Sometimes I'm just waiting for something to jump out at me. So where do I go to "shop"? Publishers Marketplace Offerings.

I love reading the listings - both those coming from agents (it's fun to see who is selling what at any given moment) and those coming directly from the authors. It's like a clearinghouse for completed manuscripts and the creative minds behind the big ideas. It's like strolling through the aisles of Brookline Booksmith (my favorite bookstore), except the books (manuscripts) here are raw and ready to be transformed and refined and shaped into what their authors always hoped they could be - agent-landing manuscripts. I tend to get lost in these listings for hours (okay, once for an entire business day). Because I know it's there - that one (or those two) manuscripts that I really want to work on - those authors who I really want to work with and to help succeed.

It has been nearly a year and a half since my last trip through the Publisher's Marketplace Offerings. So if you don't hear from me for the rest of the day (and maybe tomorrow), you'll know where I am. And if you do hear from me, then I probably found you on Publisher's Marketplace, and I want to read your book.

UPDATE: Found two!

Grand Reopening

Welcome to the Grand Reopening of Murdock Editing, with your host and editor, Lindsay Murdock!

If you're a long-time reader and somehow still have this poor neglected blog on your blogroll, welcome back. If you're a writer who I've had to turn away over the past year, welcome back. And if you're just joining us for the first time, nice to meet you! I'll be posting a most-read posts list tomorrow afternoon. 

A few points of business.

(1) I do apologize for closing my digital doors to some outstanding writers over the past year. I experienced an overwhelming (and gratifying!) surge of queries and requests from authors in 2009. Although I've considered partnering with other editors, I'm still a one-person show, and I only have those measly 24 hours in a day, and every once in a while my family actually makes me stop working to do things like cook and change the cat litter. The nerve! Once the Murdock Editing waiting list stretched to cover 7 months worth of manuscripts, it was time to put the brakes on things.

(2) I'm back, but at half capacity. As mentioned in an earlier post, I'm currently developing and testing an online course system using Google Wave. My first test class (Get it Down on Paper, OR ELSE: A Guide to Writing The Book You've Always Meant to Write) begins next week. To ensure that ALL clients and students get the attention they deserve, I will only be taking on TWO (2) clients at any given time. 

(3) Because I'm a big fan of fresh starts (and giving myself time to breath now and then), there is no current waiting list. The next available slot is March 15. I've decided that 5 months is the longest I'm comfortable allowing the waiting list to get, so there are 10 slots available as of now. Want to discuss making one of those slots yours? Shoot me an e-mail at editor@murdockediting.com. 

(4) The blog is back. Really. No, I mean it this time! Let me know what you want to read about here. What are your questions? Would you like to see/offer your first pages up for sample critique? I look forward to hearing from you!

Where Oh Where Has Your Editor Been? Google Waving, and waving, and waving, and waving...

As some of you know, I've been working on a modified schedule of late. I am not currently accepting new clients until March, or, more likely, April.

So what am I up to?

I am continuing to work with several of my talented clients on their revisions, as well as one new voice whose premise was too good to turn away.

Most of my time, however, is currently going toward creating/developing two online courses that will be held in the magical world of Google Wave. The first course, Self-Editing for First-Time Novelists, will most likely begin in April or May. The second course, Writing Your First Draft Now, will be held this summer (assuming all goes well in the first class, of course!).

So, if you happen to pop by here and notice not much is going on, or have trouble accessing my main site (www.murdockediting.com, which will hopefully be undergoing an overhaul over the next several weeks), never fear, I'm still here! Just buried in a new project. Please continue to feel free to e-mail me with editing- and publishing-related questions, and if you found your way here looking for a manuscript evaluation, I'm happy to provide referrals to other editors who are currently taking on new clients.

And finally, for the most exciting part of the post: Want to be part of my test class? If all goes as planned, the course will be held in March. It will be free, with only 5 students, and a Google Wave invite if you need it. You'll learn the basics of self-editing, and I'll get to hone my online teaching skills - it's win-win! If you'd like one of the 5 spots, please e-mail me the query letter for the novel you'll be bringing to the class, plus the first ten pages (sorry, only writers who have a completed manuscript will be considered).

Happy Holidays!

Weekend Work

Sorry things have been a little slow here at the Murdock Editing Blog. I'm already booked for manuscript evaluations for the summer, and just starting to take queries and complete sample evals for slots in September and October.

Today (and yes it's the weekend, and yes, I "should" be taking some time off) I'm sitting out on my back porch in the middle of a spectacular summer thunderstorm working on a manuscript evaluation. Why? Because it's that good. Because I don't WANT to stop reading. Because I'm willing to bet price of this eval that if the author sticks with it, I'll be seeing some iteration of this manuscript in bookstores within the next two years. In fact, I'll lay down that bet now. May 24, 2011 - if this book hasn't sold, I'll donate my full editing fee to First Book. Check back with me and hold me to it.

Just one of those days when I truly love my job.

Why Those Aren't Your First Ten Pages - Memory Lane

Earlier this week I offered some twitvice to an aspiring author. She said she'd just finished proofreading her manuscript and felt it was ready to submit. She wanted to know what her next steps should be.

My response:

Next step is to write the best darn query letter and synopsis you can and make sure your first 10 pages ROCK. Then agent.

Her response (slightly edited):

It's the first 10 pages I dislike the most! The first 10 pages are taken up with detailed descriptions of the characters. I feel like they're too long, but backstory is needed.

Then those aren't your first ten pages. In about 85% of the manuscripts I evaluate, I end up suggesting that the author cut the first ten page they're currently using entirely. Sometimes it's the first 50. Sometimes the first 100. Why? Because those pages are filled with backstory and character description.

But isn't that stuff important? Yes, of course it is. It's vital that YOU know everything about the characters and their histories. But when a reader first picks up your book, that backstory is the last thing they want to know. They don't know your characters yet. They haven't become involved with them - haven't had the chance to connect with them. So why the heck do they care when they went to high school or what their parents did to screw them up? There are ways to work those details into later parts of the book if it's important (sometimes it is; sometimes it's not).

Start with story. Start with plot. Start with things happening. Make your reader WANT to know more about the characters BEFORE you tell them. It's okay to be a tease.

There's another reason those first ten pages MUST be more than description or backstory. Let's ignore the reader altogether for a moment (but just a moment!).

The first people you want to impress? Literary Agents.

To emphasize just how important those first ten pages are, let's take a little trip down my memory lane, to a time when I was the only intern/assistant at a large literary agency.

Every week, hundreds of queries land on my desk. Hundreds and hundreds. Mounds of them. We didn't accept e-mail queries back then.

We did accept the first fifteen pages in query packages, which is still fairly common.

Every-other morning I sat at my little desk in the back hallway (really) reading those queries and pages and pulling out submissions my agents might be interested in reading. Within two months I could correctly gage which ones they wanted to see and which ones they didn't about 95% of the time.

If you wanted to get to them, you had to go through me. And all you had to impress me - and stand out from, again, HUNDREDS - was a query letter (1 page) and the first ten pages of your manuscript. That's it. If you haven't made me sit up straight by the end of those pages - if I'm not thinking "I must read more! This is great! What happens next? Tell me!" then you haven't stood out from the pack, and you become one of the hundreds of authors to receive our form rejection letter every week (I HATED that part of my job - which is part of the reason why I do this).

Okay, so, let's say I loved the pages or the query and thought my agents would too. Generally, that means you're one of about a dozen per week. Now you have my recommendation scrawled across the bottom of your query, and you're on their desk. They have a million things to do every day, and will, most likely, get to your pages sometime that week. What are they going to be judging you on?

The same thing I did. The query. Your first ten pages. And that's it.

If you grabbed the agent with those first ten pages, a request came back to me, and I called you up and requested the rest of the manuscript. And yes, if that wasn't darn-near perfect and publish-ready, you'd end up getting a rejection letter anyway (with a comment or two if we'd requested a full - so at least there was that). But if those first ten pages don't do their job, you never even get to that stage.

So kill your backstory. Kill your character descriptions. Kill anything that's "tell" instead of "show." Or at least work all those things into later portions of the book.

You have ten pages to make me want more. Give me story. Give me action. Give me reaction. Give me flavor. Give me the best writing you've got.

Anything else is NOT your first ten.

Go Read This! Website Edition

This week our Go Read This! feature is a blog I just found through Twitter (yes, yes - you were right, it's highly addictive).

 

Nixy Valentine's blog includes fun writer's groups, writing challenges, publishing news, and book reviews. If you're looking for a little distraction or inspiration today, head over to www.nixyvalentine.com, and enjoy!

You Win, Twitter.

Okay, fine, my Web 678.0 adept friends. Fine. I will follow the great Oprah and join Twitter.

 

I can now be found at https://twitter.com/MurdockEditing.

 

What will I do with it? I have no idea. For right now, I'm thinking once-a-day inspirational/advice posts for my writers/readers.

 

So here's the deal for now - you follow me, I'll follow you. So please go to https://twitter.com/MurdockEditing. Be my friend. Or Twit. Or whatever we're all called in Twitterland.

 

And if you have any advice on getting started with Twitter, please leave them in the comments!