Tuesday Check-In

Thanks to my online writing group, I’ve been writing something every day. Even with less than 1K words per day, progress eventually adds up.

Here’s what I’ve been working on lately…

The YA Trilogy: It’s been slow going with this one. I had a pretty huge breakthrough in the last couple of weeks, but am still having a challenging time finding the narrative voice. I know lots of rewrites will be come with the completion of the first draft. But the story won’t let me be, and it is fully developed in outline form. Not sure why it’s proving to be such a challenge. So far I only have 10K words in the first book.

MG Horror Series: As many of you may already know, I’m working on this with my older son who’s in fourth grade. We developed the idea for the first book on the ride home from Durango one night. Then it developed into a complete series. Well, the first book is DONE! Now we’ve moved on to the second. We’re only at 1K words, but we just started it the other day.

HAUNTED (my completed YA contemporary ghost story): It was out on query. But I’ve been rejected a few times. In the past when I queried my novels, I always received form rejections. This time they’ve been a little more personal. Like this one for the first ten pages:

Thank you for querying me with Haunted. Though I did enjoy reading the first bit of your YA novel, unfortunately it does not seem like a good match for me. Because I won't be able to give your book the support and enthusiasm it deserves, I don't feel that I am the best agent to represent you at this time.

And this one for the first five pages:

Thanks for sending me your pages to consider. You’ve got a top-notch writing voice, but in considering the project further I’m afraid the story itself overall just feels too familiar to me. There’ve been a lot of novels dealing with the repercussions of deadly car accidents, and with the recently dead hanging around the living to right past wrongs. I’m sure this gives a slightly different take, but to my view at this time I worry it just wouldn’t be unique enough to break out. I’d be happy to see other work from you in future, though.

(There’s way more to the story than a deadly car crash and the dead hanging around to right past wrongs. But no one could possibly get that from the first five pages).

The Memoir: It’s out on query. My strongest work yet, I think. If this gets rejected across the board, then I’m in the wrong business.

I’m also tiptoeing my way through the follow-up to MY LIFE AS A MISFIT (MY LIFE AS A WANNABE) and very slowly working on a piece for the Keepsake Anthology.

What have you been up to lately?