GUTGAA: Finalist Entry

I made it to the final round of Deana Barnhart’s Gearing Up to Get an Agent’s Agent Pitch Contest. So DIVINE’s query is posted on her blog. Hopefully there will be some follow up from the contest. Agents are browsing the entries all week this week, and then the public are allowed to comment on the entries on Saturday.

So please, don’t comment on my entry. Deana will just have to go through and delete it, and I’d hate to do that to her. So if you’d like to support, you can comment here, or on my Facebook page until Saturday.

I’ll keep you posted on the contest as the week goes on!

My entry:

DIVINE
YA Sci-Fi
76,000

Query:

If you’d told seventeen-year-old pickpocket Caddy a week ago she’d scale a sixty-story prison with a rogue orphan, she’d laugh in your face and walk off with you wallet.

But that’s before a sandstorm destroys half the city and the vigilante boy, Twist, drags her to safety in the secret ruins beneath the glass metropolis. Before the Service—the civil police—starts pulling people from the streets in search of a diamond thief. Before the tensions between citizens and Service rise to suffocating heights, and riots flood the city.

All the while, Caddy must fight to keep herself from getting too close to Twist. If there’s anything she’s learned on the streets, it’s to avoid attachment. But when her brother is arrested on false charges, Caddy becomes desperate to save what little family she has left. There’s only one person who can help break him out of prison: Twist. But when trusting the boy means risking her petty-thief status, her family, and her life, she must decide if she’s ready to face the Service head on.

First 150 Words:

Heat presses against me. The orange haze makes the air impossibly dry as I scan the swarm of bodies packed tight in the streets. The dust is high today. Another sandstorm is coming.

Squinting, I try to focus. My fingers itch as silver flashes on my left, my right. I reach and slip a thin chain dangling from a man’s pocket into my bag as I stick to the shade of the massive buildings. In Cidy, there are no skyscrapers. All of the glass buildings penetrate the indigo sea above. To the untrained eye, we’d seem prosperous, peaceful. But based on the masses here, that’s far from the truth.

My head pounds from the cries of barterers, and I run a hand through my hair scanning for redcoats. Today thousands of people will be on the streets to trade what they have for what they need. Meaning Service will be on high alert for thieves.

Reminiscing:

I realized that, well, in less than a month SILENCE will officially be two years old.

Looking back is a good thing. I do it a lot actually. There are days where I need something to laugh at. Cry at. Grin about because I know just how much I’ve grown. I love looking back at the words I wrote but hate it at the same time. It’s like looking back on all of your embarrassing school photos that you’ve begged your mom to stuff in a drawer, or better yet: burn.

I love it because there is so much growth from my first manuscripts to what I’m able to work with now. I don’t have to focus on the same things that I had to pay extreme attention to back when I started writing in 2008. I think it was around this time of year too, because I’d just finished reading the first Twilight book.

And I’ll admit it. Twilight is originally the reason I started writing. As an eighth grader. As a thirteen-year-old, I thought, if this can get published, then I can get published. I know there have been about a million conversations about Twilight and the writing and the plot, so I’m not going to open old wounds for Ms. Stephenie Meyer. But, yeah, in short, as I thirteen-year-old I know I could write something better.

That’s when I started the first draft of my first manuscript. That book will most likely never see the light of day again–at least with the same/similar plot line. But it’s weird to think that I’ve been writing for four years, finished a total of six manuscripts–two of which are rewrites, and… yeah. I mean, I know it’s not true, but I feel old. I’ve been at this for a while now.

And that thought is weird. Because I’m still not sure what the hell I’m doing half the time.

I’m still new. But not-so-new that others can tell that I don’t have a clue what I’m doing anymore. At first, that much was obvious. I got so many critiques and learned so many valuable grammar lessons from the writers on Inkpop that I can’t begin to thank them enough (Sharon M. Johnston, Carrie McRae, Gwen, Kristia, Autumn, Kat, and everyone else–thanks. :D).

But now…. Now I just feel like I’m stuck somewhere in between. I don’t have a published book. I don’t make millions of dollars, or even thousands of dollars, a year. I don’t go to book signings. I don’t have that thrill of others understanding, respecting, what I do–especially at college. But at the same time, I’m not making beginner mistakes. It’s strange. I’m not sure if I enjoy it, like floating in Limbo. But it’s where I’m at.

And I’m not sure really where I’ll go from here. Sure, I’m querying my newest manuscripts. Sure, I’m still trying to get published somehow. But even then it feels like a longshot. There are points where I sit and wonder whether or not it’s worth it. Whether or not I should keep pursuing the industry when the material in the industry can be full of plot holes and so many inconsistencies that I put the book down by the third chapter. Or there are books where you read the back and already know the end. It seems we’re down to only two types of plots: the kind full of holes where the reader is left feeling lost and confused, or the kind that are predictable. So predictable that it gets to the point where I look at a book about mermaids, or werewolves and go, “I’ve read this before,” go down the line and see the same plot four more times in a row.

Honestly, it makes me want to quit. Because if this is the only things we’re publishing in the young adult market at the moment, I’m not sure I want to be a part of it.

Don’t get me wrong, there are good books out there, excellent books. But they’re few and far between.

In short, I realize that I’ve grown. So much. I’ve developed as a writer and I couldn’t be more grateful for all the people I have met along the way. But at the same time, I’m not sure if I grew in the right way for the business. The growth is perfect for me, but for publishers… not so much based on what’s available.

GUTGAA: Updates

So, I’ve entered this blogfest contest thing, and then I stopped blogging because school got in the way of keeping all of you guys up to date on what’s happening.

To catch up:

• I participated in the Pitch Polish on GUTGAA, and got some great feedback on DIVINE’s query.
• I made it into the opening round of the Agent Pitch contest. Got some nice comments there too.
• Monday, DIVINE’s final entry for the Agent Pitch goes up on Deana’s blog.
• Thursday night I leave for the writer’s conference I’m going to later this week.

So, in short, good things are happening, and I’m excited.

GUTGAA: Meet and Greet Response:

My answers for the meet and greet this week! Yay blog hopping!

Hi guys. So, I’m Hannah. I’m a freshman in college who writes YA Paranormal and Dystopian stories while working on an English and Art double major at the moment. I’ve shown horses competitively since I was nine, and tend to be a bit of a loner. But yeah, still adjusting to life on campus as well as trying to figure out what I’m doing in the writing world with four finished books and a new manuscript to shop around.

Where do you write?
My favorite place to write is in bed. Really. It’s comfy, and familiar. I also like my desk when I’m working on really tricky situations, or fleshing out character or more of the business-like side of writing. But when it comes to free writing or actually fleshing out a chapter, I prop up my pillows, sit back, and go.

Quick. Go to your writing space, sit down and look to your left. What is the first thing you see?My desk lamp and a picture of my horse. (Space is kind of limited while living in a dorm.)

Favorite time to write?
All day. It really depends. If I’m working on paranormal works, then it has to be at night for the most part. Adventures or action scenes I need daylight. But I’m usually an evening writer.

Drink of choice while writing?Water. Or Starbuck’s bitter hot chocolate with extra whipped cream and chocolate sauce on top. 

When writing , do you listen to music or do you need complete silence?
Music. Almost always there’s music playing. However, when I edit I usually don’t listen to music. And if I do, it’s one song on repeat for the entire time I’m editing a project, which could be anywhere from a few days to months of the same song.

What was your inspiration for your latest manuscript and where did you find it?
It was abnormally warm, and I pondered the details of being a pickpocket. 

What’s your most valuable writing tip?
Write. All the time. It doesn’t matter if it’s good or if it makes sense. Just write. As much as possible. All the time. FOREVER.

Seriously though. You only get better if you practice. I write at least five times a week with school. Over the summer, I wrote every day. And then some. I’ll sit for hours and just bang out words. I don’t even care if it fits perfectly with the plot line. I just go where the story takes me, loosely so.

GUTGAA

I know, the post title looks like I fell asleep drooling over half of my keyboard with my head smashed against Caps Lock. But I promise, that’s not what happened. Honest. Really.

The post title’s an acronym. It stands for: Gearing Up to Get an Agent. It’s a near-two month long blog hop/agent pitch contest hosted by the wonderful Deana Barnhart. I suggest that anyone gearing up to query looks into this. It’s my first time, but hey, it looks like a lot of fun!

Some things that happen:

• A meet and greet session.
• Random drawings with random prizes.
• Agent pitch contest(s).

There’s more about it on her blog. It’s going to be fantastic, and I’m so excited to partake in this!

So if you see posts starting with GUTGAA, you now know that it’s because I’m doing this contest and blogging about it and that I haven’t passed out on my keyboard.