Progress Report -- It's All Good

Looking southwest and down.

It's good to get away from the computer.
I've been contacting literary agents lately as well as working on a synopsis of my manuscript. Many agents want one sent with the query letter so those who do are still to be contacted.
To date I've found 50 -60 agents and emailed a query to 14 of them.  I've had five rejections and one request for the first 50 pages of the manuscript.
In my view I'm doing okay for now.
Still plenty of work ahead of me and there are more agents out there. But for now I'd say it's all good.

Getting away from work is a good way to get some distance from it on many levels. It's even better when away takes me out west to the Rockies for a hike. I haven't been doing much hiking in the past few years due to a nasty bit of business with my heart.
The hike was a good way to test how I'm doing especially since I've cut down on the beta blocker dosage.
We took it slow and I rested frequently, but only for a few seconds at a time. The incline was gentle in most places. We had one steep slope only because we were skirting a herd of Bighorn Sheep napping in the sun on a hillside. We didn't want to disturb them.

It was good to be out in the fresh mountain air again and get some exercise.
The sun was shining, the sheep were napping, the butterflies were flittering about, the prairie anemones (crocus) were opening their fuzzy purple heads, and we had a wonderful hike.
I came back refreshed and ready to tackle the synopsis and fix up the query letter a bit. I realized as we were coming back down that I should mention I maintain a blog.
As noted earlier, it's all good.

Final Round And Busted Back To Rough Draft

I sent out another--and the final--round of proposals and query letters for my third manuscript. If no one bites, then I’ll withdraw it.

Give up? No. That sounds defeatist.

What’s happened is I’ve run out of publishers to contact. After this last half–dozen there’s no house left which accepts unagented manuscripts.

So, get an agent, right? In theory, yes. But I am currently no one and I have a thin platform. Any agent I could get now is the kind of agent I should avoid.

So what I’ll do is take the hint. I’ll withdraw the manuscript from consideration and roll over the material into a newer, better, bigger, stronger and more dynamic book that’s sure to turn me into an overnight success. Or at least a properly published author.

Anyway, they’re off and all I can do is wait.

Meanwhile I gutted book four aka “The Book That Won't Get Writ" the other night.
By the time I’d finished deleting and cutting and pasting I’d pretty much busted it back down to rough draft.

I took out a hard copy. It’s maybe 50 pages single-spaced in Times New Roman. It ain’t much, but it’s a start.

Again.