Best wishes from everyone please....

I finally finished my third novel on Thursday. First draft of a 49,000 word novel in just 20 days, I can hardly believe it.

Yeah, this is the one I started a heated discussion about what a teen girl would wear today that would knock a teen boy flat on his backside. It's my first (well, first deliberate) YA novel.

Just waiting to hear back from my agent, who got the first 50 pages earlier in the week and is looking them over. I really need for her to agree to take it on, and for the editor who said she liked my earlier stuff but couldn't use it to bite.

Need a lot of thoughts, prayers, and positive energy on this one; I really need to sell this one.

:hi:I remember the thread.

49,000 words in 20 days sounds inspired. I'm sure that is a good sign.

... along with a :hug:

May you be toasting your new success before the month is over. :toast:

CONGRATULATIONS.....

...I became an avid life-long reader...and I caught the reading bug
because of really great YA stories (books)...

I have a grandchild who will be reading your story when it hits the shelves...
:)

Tikki

and a few ideas from elsewhere, here it is. (And I do address that it's a little informal for Homecoming in the text, but I had to use this description.)

and prayers going your way!

just got an E-Mail from the agent. She turned it down. Looks like a month of my life wasted after all.

I want to see this one once it's published!

because it looks like it's not going to get published.

Agent rejected it, and it took me three years to find her.

Sorry to hear of this.

I think quite a few of us have manuscripts in a drawer. Publishing is an incredibly competitive business. Everybody and their grandmother wants to be a writer, but agents and publishers are only looking for a sure thing.

It's a discouraging industry. I can never get started on anything because I know the chance of selling it are so slim. Here's hoping you have more determination than I do.

I'm done writing books that no one is ever going to read. The three I've finished are destined for the drawer, and there they will stay. I've given up.

Sometimes it's just not to be. Publishing is an insanely competitive world. I've had to gradually let go of my own fantasies of getting published one day as well. Chances are, it's just not going to happen.

That being said, there are always the stories of people who get rejected by 30 or more publishers and end up finding success. It happened to Robert Pirsig, James Redfield, and many others. But, speaking only for myself, I'm realistic enough to know they are much better writers than I am.

I remember a story I heard about the singer Seal when he finally made it big. Do you know one of the first things he did? Re-released all the stuff that rejected before he hit it big.

That may not be true, but it's inspiring nonetheless.

Also, may I suggest a strategy to you?

Go the Aaron Sorkin route: have it performed as a play first at your local little theater. Or, better yet, (since I know you do video) videotape one chapter/scene and release it to the film festival circuit and call the book an "adaptation."

All the best. :grouphug: