mysteries and motorcycles

Tuesday, January 29, 2008

On a mission

On Thursday Jan. 31 I'll be shoving off for the Windy City and the "Love is Murder," mystery writer's conference. It's about a 6-1/2 hour drive from my house and the weather is always a concern at this time of year. I'm going with some specific objectives in mind.
I have appointments scheduled with two publishers and two literary agencies who will be taking pitches at the conference. The first challenge is that I will have somewhere around five minutes with each representative to convince them that my manuscript is worthy of their consideration. While I'm there I'll be participating in three discussion panels and displaying a large poster in the book vendor section to show the agents/editors that I'm serious about my writing and eager to promote my work.
If any of the agents or editors invite me to submit my story, I'll mail it to them and then bite my nails for up to six months waiting for the verdict.
Conferences are unquestionably the best places to break the ice with agents, after all they're there to find new talent. Established literary agents are the key to major publishing houses, as a matter of fact agents are the only avenue to New York.
My current publisher is a small company in California and while they're quite aggressive and seem to do most things right, they're up against the machine that runs the industry. The major booksellers like Borders and B&N are pretty much locked in to the major New York publishers.
Wish me luck.

Posted by The Unreal McCoy :: 10:59 AM :: 0 Comments:

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