Checking in Briefly
Just heard that three articles I wrote are appearing in June’s issue of Chocolate Zoom. It’s their spa issue, so there are articles about treats for the body as well as for the taste buds.
Hope you enjoy.
Conference News
The BEA Writer’s Digest Conference was totally worth it. There is one panel I went to that I sort of wish I’d chosen differently and gone to a seminar on plotting, but on the whole, it was a good experience. I might get into it more in depth later, but for now, I’m pretty tired (and I still have that cold and gimp).
Part of the conference included the Pitch Slam Session that I was sure I wasn’t going to participate in. Let’s face it, what writer ever feels they’re ready? Really? Go back to anything you’ve written in the past and before you know it you’re tweaking it yet again.
Anyway, at lunch, someone asked if I was going to pitch and I said no, but I was going to watch and learn so I’d be ready next time.
I had texted a friend earlier who said if I didn’t pitch my book he would hunt me down… I knew he was joking but he was right. I had the opportunity now. I needed to take that opportunity and risk now. Who knows when I would have a next time? What’s the worse that could happen? They aren’t interested. So I go to the next agent. Or the next. Or if there aren’t any agents at the con who are interested, I try doing it the old-fashioned way.
I decide to think about it and leave the option open, but I figured I still wouldn’t go through with it.
Anyway, I scribbled notes in panels and seminars and made conversation with writers and agents and found my fellow scifi/fantasy geeks (is there such a thing as geekdar?) and by 3 pm, when the Pitch Slam started, I found myself in line after all, in front of my “dream agent” running through a 3 sentence blurb in my head, over and over and over again, thinking in between pitches, “Dammit! If I’d known I was going to do this, I woulda taken that class on pitching!”
There are at least 30 agents at this conference who represent literature in a number of areas. They have all written bios for the program to let you know what they are interested in and what stories they are looking for. The advice is to choose one dream agent to pitch to with a number of backups. The session goes for 2 hours and each person has 3 minutes. In the past, depending on the length of line of the agents you choose to pitch to, some people have pitched to 7 agents.
My dream agent couldn’t make it, but she sent her assistant. I thought about running out then, but decided to keep a stiff upper lip, stay the course, and all that rot…
As the line in front of me got shorter, I kept repeating my pitch, but it kept changing. Should I approach it this way or that way? I had only decided to do this around 2:45pm. At about 3:12 it was my turn. I pitched. It came out lame (I thought), courtesy of my “deer in the headlights” brain freeze, but I brazened it out and went on through it to the end. The assistant and I talked over a couple of points and while I think I can guess why he liked it, I’m still not sure. He liked something about it though, because I was given contact information and told to send him the first 2 chapters.
I couldn’t believe it. I just wanted to get up and leave right there. My 3 minutes weren’t even up. When it the timer yelled out “30 seconds” I hurriedly added my idea for the sequel, just in case. He may not remember that bit. I need to remember to add it to the query or synopsis.
I know it doesn’t mean I’ve sold anything, but still. It’s so cool. I’m so glad I tried it, whether or not I would have gotten a request.
Yes, I considered going to some other agents as well, but the other agents I was interested in were from the same agency he was in, so I decided that was enough for now.
I left the room in a daze and wandered around aimlessly in the hallways until I found an empty restroom with no one in it, went into a stall and promptly cried like a baby. Happy, scared, excited. My baby was going to finally be viewed by someone outside of immediate family and friends.
Then I went outside and called my friends and did a victory dance!
What this means, however, is that I will be incommunicado for a while as I work on the query letter, synopsis and polishing those chapters. You’ll probably hear from me no sooner than say mid Week. By then, if my brain is not all rotted from writing hibernation mode, then I’ll set up that Writer’s Market contest.
So, that’s the news for now!
And The Winner Is…
Renee Stanchfield! Renee, you have won an autographed copy of All About Vee! Contact me or I’ll contact you and I will send you said book!
Tune in later when I’ll be having a contest for a free copy of the 2008 Writer’s Market. That’s right! All 5 pounds or 2 pounds (it’s heavy) of it.
Last Call!
Midnight tonight is the deadline for entries into the All About Vee free book contest.
Tomorrow I will be going to the BookExpo America/Writer’s Digest Writer’s Conference so I will probably not announce a winner until tomorrow evening.
Tune in soon. I might be having another contest in the near future to give away a free copy of the 2008 Writer’s Market.
Wish me luck tomorrow. I have a sprained ankle, a cat bite that is taking it’s own sweet time to heal (on the same leg), and a cold. Plus, I’m not sure what I’m doing. There are some good “break-out sessions” (WD’s annoying term for seminar or panel) I want to attend, but half the afternoon is a Pitch Slam Session (pitching ideas to agents and editors). I have nothing to pitch, but I figure watching, learning, taking notes for when I do is a good thing.
Maybe I’ll meet some new people. That’s always nice. Well, sometimes it’s nice. Provided you don’t feel like a sick, gimp who wishes she’d stayed in bed. But you get the idea. It could be a good adventure.
The Mystery of the Memorial Day Missive…
My dearest Beatrice,
It was a day like any other, at least when it began, except for the gouge upon my leg. I’m speaking, or course, of the place where my beloved feline companion bit me as I went about my daily chores. Perhaps not unusual in the natural way of things, but I should have taken note of it nonetheless. Mayhap it would have prevented me from continuing merrily on my way into the perilous road I was taking — or at least prepared me for what lay ahead…Only later, when strapped upon the old quack’s operating table, slugging down whiskey to dull the pain of the rusty saw would I think back on this day and wonder if I could have changed the course of events.
I was to meet my companions for a rare night out, times being what they are. I had cleaned out my wound, bandaged it, made up with the cat, and then skipped out the door for some much needed jollity and gin. Who could ask for more?
On the way out, I checked my mailbox. I live in a small apartment, nothing fancy, built during a time when buildings were meant to endure. The ceilings are high, the stairways long, and mailboxes very small. Within my small mailbox were the average pieces of mail – garden-variety coupons, flyers, bills, statements, and other whatnot. Plus, one magazine.
It is not strange to receive a magazine that one has ordered, nor yet is it strange to receive a magazine one has not ordered if one’s friends have ordered a subscription as a gift. However, it is strange to receive a magazine one has not ordered, with no note as to how or why it landed in one’s mailbox. I have read my share of “fairy tales”; nothing is for free.
I will not repeat the title of the periodical here, suffice it to say that at once I experienced a horripilation so severe I near fainted. Hurriedly I stuffed everything into my handbag, making haste for the establishment wherein I was sure one of my friends would assuage my fears.
Of course, nothing was done that night. Our conversation taking a turn upon a new dandy about town, I forgot to mention my strange mail to my friends. Or, could it be that in an effort to shove all misgivings aside, I chose to forget my strange mail? Looking back, maybe I did laugh a little louder and drink a little more than was normally my wont. Suffice it to say the mail landed on the bureau the moment I returned home, in a pile with the rest.
It wasn’t until a few days later, as I went through the mail that I noticed the strange magazine again. The plastic covering upon it was strangely deformed, pockmarked as if by too many hot fingers with suction cup tips grasping fervently at the cover. My teeth ached with it’s hideousness, despite, or maybe because of the picture behind the clear plastic covering. Shuddering, I shoved the periodical from me once again, refusing to acknowledge it. Choosing, instead, the less onerous task of reading my bills and checking through my statements.
The next day, whilst luncheoning with some friends I meant to bring up my troubles regarding the strange missive. Something stayed my mouth — perhaps trepidation that my fears would by scoffed at. What could be so frightening by a mere magazine? The nameless horrors behind the magazine were what filled me with a nebulous dread. Ancient beyond untold years, this periodical has been haunting humankind and now it had chosen to haunt me.
Tonight, after weeks of faltering over this paper time bomb, I did it. Trembling as I struggled to open the deformed plastic covering, I took note of the label, addressed to me, as if I had filled out the form myself. Yet, I did not recall doing any such thing. Nor had money been withdrawn from my accounts to pay for even a single issue of this alarming journal. Gingerly I went through the periodical, noting the stories and authors names. Some I knew. Some I didn’t know. Some were among my mortal enemies…did that explain the strange acrid taste in my mouth, the feverish burning in my brain?
But no, there were favorites in the magazine as well. No, it was not the writers who accounted for this strange hesitancy I had at even opening this journal. Maybe it was the editors whose names were hauntingly reminiscent of vile children I had known growing up who had done nothing but cause others misery. Mayhap the area of the country it was spawned from, an area mother to much wickedness and viciousness. Or… I looked at the name of the publisher. Though the name bespoke evil, no evil could be traced back to the publisher. No. It was something else entirely…
Fear. Fear of who — or what — might choose to send this to me. Fear of what messages they might have hidden within the texts on the pages. Horror at what I might find if I looked too closely at the pictures or read too neatly between the lines of poetry.
There is one story that tempts me, told by one whom I love to read; one who has the very ear of the angels. As I write this letter I wonder, who knows how long I will be able to hold off before I open the evil periodical and am drawn inexorably into its nets.
The leg is gone now, irretrievably lost to a gangrenous infection and replaced by a wooden stump, much carved and decorated by a talented woodworker who has offered his hand in marriage. But I daren’t accept. I do not want anyone to go down with me. The magazine awaits me. I can not get myself to throw it away. Every day I carry it to the trash and every day find it, once again, on the bureau.
If you do not hear from me, then you, at least, will know what has happened. I have opened the magazine, been drawn into its depths and overcome by mine enemies. Think not of me, if this happens. It will be too late for me by then as I will either be in the midst of torture by evil minions or in my Holy Father’s arms. Think only of yourselves. Run, flee. Do not let them find you or Thomas or the others.
Ever your
Helen….
Contest Deadline Extended!
Hey there!
I’m extending the contest deadline for the free autographed copy of All About Vee by a week to the Tuesday after Memorial Day weekend (May 27, 2008)! You can see the original post here.
All About Vee Review and Contest for Free Autographed Copy!
Last night, on the final episode of America’s Top Model, Whitney Thompson won the final slot. They loved her. She was beautiful, she had energy and verve and that feminine mystique that women all want to have. Repeatedly, throughout the show, she was called the “Plus-size” model. She was a size 10. SIZE 10! That’s NORMAL. But because she wasn’t a stick thin manikin, she was considered plus sized and “full figured.” Believe it or not, but there was a time in history when Whitney would have been considered too thin to be beautiful.
That’s ridiculous. The Powers That Be – those connoisseurs of style that every woman looks to for approval – is essentially telling most women in the WORLD that they are fat, when in fact they are a normal HEALTHY size. Isn’t it time we taught people not to live according to the molds in places like New York and Hollywood, and instead taught them just to be themselves, be healthy, and follow their dreams?
I’m pointing all this out as an introduction to my review of the book, All About Vee, by C. Leigh Purtill:
Veronica May, otherwise known as Vee (of the four Vees) has always wanted to act. She loves the stage: taking on new roles, learning lines, the energy from the audience, the feedback from the fellow actors. Vee loves acting, and she knows she is destined for great things. When it looks like Chester, Arizona no longer appreciates her, she decides to take a page from her mother’s book, follow her friend Vivian, and move to Los Angeles, California to become a star!
Getting acting gigs is tough. You need a job that will pay the rent and the bills, oh, and will also pay for those head shots, acting classes, movement classes, audition classes, and seminars, but that will ALSO let you take time off at a moment’s notice to go line up for an audition. And if you get the part, you still may need that job later when your part is done. (Hence the actors as waiters joke.) If you add on to that other issues that have to do more with the industry’s desire for cookie cutter blockbuster actors, actresses, and movies, then you have a recipe for a highly neurotic society.
Veronica has it all planned out though. She has money from savings. She knows what parts she should lead with when she goes to auditions. She knows she is a good actress. She knows she has good eyes and hair. But this is Hollywood, and it’s not knowing Shakespeare and Chekov that will get you the part, so much as whether you’ll look good in front of the camera. Veronica is not a petite young woman. She is, in fact, closer to a size 18 than she is to a size zero. While Vee has always had a healthy self-esteem, it gets a serious beating as she struggles to adapt to the “business” and the Los Angeles landscape. How she figures out how to do that is the adventure.
I moved to Los Angeles when I was 29 years old, 11 years older than Veronica is when she moves to Hollywood, yet the story felt true – bringing back all sorts of memories. As much as I enjoyed reading All About Vee, I cried more than once reading it. I am not an actress, but I am a plus-sized woman living in a skinny town. This is being marketed as a young adult book, but the concepts are pretty universal, and a true reflection of how it is here, I think. I highly recommend it.
The Contest – Free Copy Autographed Copy of All About Vee
While I was reading All About Vee I got to thinking, remembering. I had friends who were actresses; beautiful, talented, funny, intelligent, witty women, who were also unique in looks.
One friend was a curvy size 12, a nice normal size. Marilyn Monroe was a size 12. My friend had wonderful blue eyes, black hair, high cheekbones, fair skin. She was told repeatedly how talented she was and then to lose weight. Maybe consider becoming blonde. She was on her feet 6 days a week working in a coffee shop or waiting tables and spending the rest of the time walking her dogs or going to acting and auditioning classes. When she sat still she slept. And she was careful to get all her vegetables and cut down on her fats. She was healthy. She gave it her all here – I think close to 10 years before moving back home. This city beat her down.
Another friend of mine was tall – 5 foot 11 inches or so. She never wore heels. She was striking. Clear grey eyes in a face of structured cheek bones, dark curly hair, pale olive skin, well-toned and athletic, health conscious (thin!). She also was constantly on the move. If she wasn’t waiting tables, she was walking her dog, going to auditions, or following up on any number of ways to get acting gigs. I remember her working with a theater group. She rarely sat still. She also was told she was too big and to consider going blonde. She also gave it her all. After about 10 years, she decided it was time to move back home, as well.
I want this contest to help women like them as well as promote this book. So, here are the rules for the contest for a free autographed copy of All About Vee by C. Leigh Purtill:
Think about all the large male actors you see on your television every night or in the movies you watch. Count them. Quite a few, heh? Now, think about all the larger female actors you see on your telly or in the movies. Not so many. In fact, maybe 1 woman for every 10 men (did you know Jennifer Love Hewitt has been considered too big?!).
Okay, now choose one of those women who happen to be considered plus-size that you also admire. Why do you admire her? What do you like about her? What positive attributes do you want to emulate?
Now, leave a comment on this blog with her name, a link to her website or webpage or imdb profile, and the reasons why you admire her by midnight (Pacific Time) May 20, 2008. Then I’ll assign a number to each entry and choose a winner using a random number generator. Remember, just leaving a comment on the blog won’t do it. It needs to be the name of a plus-size actress, with a link to her, and reasons why you like her.
I think Vee would very pleased if you did this…
Crossposted on Blogger, Live Journal and MySpace.
Writers and Therapy…
I’ve been doing a little research on writers and their emotional, psychological, and physical health lately. This afternoon whilst I was eating lunch, a program came on the radio (I usually listen to KCRW during the day) that was, I believe, particularly apt: Hollywood on the Couch. Claude Brodesser-Akner interviews Dennis Palumbo, a former screenwriter himself, who discusses some of the common emotional setbacks that creatives (such as writers, directors, and actors) face. As he points out, therapy is the same everywhere, except here. You might not have time to listen to the entire broadcast, but they do discuss writers first before going on to directors and actors.
One remark that made me laugh and spit up my water: Writers are ego-maniacs with extremely low self-esteem.
All About Vee!
The Fabulous C. Leigh Purtill and me!
Yesterday, I had the pleasure of stopping by Chevalier’s Books in Larchmont Village to visit C. Leigh Purtill during her book signing for her new Young Adult novel, just out, titled All About Vee. My friends Chandra and Christina also dropped by, along with several other Leigh Purtill fans, to help support Leigh whilst she signed and sold copies of her books. (Leigh’s first novel was Love, Meg.)
I picked up a copy for myself and am halfway through and thoroughly enjoying this story of a young plus-size actress who moves to Hollywood to see what she can do. I ALSO happened to pick up a second copy and have it signed by the divine Ms. Purtill. I am currently trying to figure out what kind of contest I can dream up for it. If you have any ideas, let me know. In any case, I may soon have my first contest for the book, All About Vee. Yay!
Dear Blogetary…
A lot has happened since I wrote you last.
What I’ve Been Doing:
We had a speaker come to our writer’s group last Saturday and that was very nice. Only thing I regret is that he didn’t seem to reach the under 40 crowd, but oh well. I tried.
Was asked to be Vice President of our little writer’s group as well that same day. That was nice! Been a little discouraged lately and almost considered dropping out of the group until then.
Searching for writing, proofing, and copy editing gigs, as per usual….trying to stay out of trouble.
OH! And I just got me a bright, shiny new external hard drive so my workhorse of a computer doesn’t need to labor so hard under so much memory keeping.
What I’ve Been Reading:
I’ve finished reading Rogue by Rachel Vincent (second in her Werecats series) and was on the edge of my seat much of the time.
Stayed in all day Sunday reading The Empire of Ivory by Naomi Novik and quite enjoyed that. It is Book 4 in her Temeraire Series. Book 5 is due out in hard cover in July.
Currently am reading Solstice Wood by Patricia McKillip. I forgot how much I enjoy her.
I’m still working on an anthology edited by Marvin Kaye called The Fair Folk, with stories in it by Tanith Lee, Patricia McKillip, Jane Yolen and Midori Snyder, Megan Lindholm, Kim Newman, and Craig Shaw Gardner. I quite like it and recommend it.
What I Am Writing:
Some poems, some short stories, an essay/article or three. Revising a few that need it.
Since the mountain top experience with Julie Andrews I’ve gotten like 8 “No Thank Yous,” which was a little bit why I was discouraged. But I did also get 1 “Yes Thank You,” which totally made my day. It’s a Christmas story so I’ll let you know when and where it will be in December if you’re interested.
Well, that’s my news. Hope you have a great day and I’ll write again soon!
Fond regards,
Rachel
P.S.
I had a really good dinner and the BEST CAKE IN THE WORLD EVER! And I learned how to play Crazy Rummy after said dinner and CAKE! (Ice Cream cuts the sweetness.)
