All About the Writing

Writer's Digest Agent Pitch Slam

I had been wanting to go to this as soon as I saw the description somewhere.

The great thing about it was it was in NYC, just a few hours away from where I live.

The bad thing about it was that it was in NYC.

Don't get me wrong. I absolutely adore NYC, or "The City", as it's affectionately known in my neck of the woods. The first time I'd heard someone say "The City", I thought, "Oh, c'mon!" Because I'm also a fan of Boston, another big city, and I'd lived in the shadow of Seattle, another lovely big city. It didn't take me long to fall into the same speech pattern, however. Somehow it just fits.

Okay, back from the mental detour.  .  .my first trip to The City was a mere three years ago, and I promptly fell in love with it. I certainly wasn't expecting that, since I'd grown up on the West Coast, and we pretty much viewed NYC as a monstrously frightening place, just waiting to pounce on the unwary (you can thank TV and movies for that). So my first visit was flying there by myself, to meet a friend. It was a little scary, but not too scary. Subsequent visits were WITH friends, or meeting up with friends who were already there.

But in order to attend the Agent Pitch Slam, it meant I would have to go into The City, by myself, AND find my way to the Javits Center, BY MYSELF. (I'm not counting the millions of people who walk and drive in the city all day long.  I don't know them, so it means I'm there all by myself.) I studied Mapquest and Mappoint to the point that I could probably pass a taxi driver's test.

Fortunately my fear of missing out on something great managed to override my fear of The City. It was nervewracking though. I had to get up at 0-way-too-early, and then drive to catch the jitney (fancy schmancy name for the bus going from the boonies of Long Island to The City). To make things even more surreal, it was foggy, like a movie crew was setting the scene for me, so I'd be on the lookout for axe murders all day long, and during the short drive to catch the jitney, there were deer strolling down the middle of the street.

Weird.

Once I made it to The City, I had to find a cab to get me to the Javits Center. I'm not aggressive by nature, which the taxis could sense, because they were zooming past me and my tentatively upraised hand. Did I mention it had begun pouring rain? One of the cab drivers took mercy on me, or was struck with curiosity, and I plopped down in the backseat with relief. Instead of speeding to my destination, though, I was inching my way to the Javits Center, because every car in The City was at a standstill for some unknown reason. (I'm pretty sure it wasn't my fault.)

And then there it was: the Javits Center. Relief. It's a freakingly huge monstrosity of an edifice. It sits on about fourteen thousand city blocks, and has easily 2.5 million entryways. I stumbled through one, and then walked and walked and walked until I saw a human being, who told me to continue the direction I was headed, and if I hit the Pacific Ocean, to turn around because I had gone too far.

After what seemed like days, I nearly wept when I saw an oasis: the round green sign stating "Nectar of the Gods" (aka Starbucks). Please please please don't be a mirage, I thought. I had not had time for coffee that morning, and would have easily taken out a payday loan for a thimble full of the stuff. Once that level of Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs was sated, I set out for the Agent Pitch Slam.

There was an awesome class given by Donald Maass. I'm a huge fan of his "Writing the Breakout Novel Workbook", so I wanted to see how he could possibly build on that with his just-released "The Fire in Fiction". He inspired me once more, and I managed to buy the new book (and at half price! Score!)

Another great class was the one on "Breaking into Fiction". I'd heard great things about these ladies, and they inspired me as well. I also got their book (at half price! Double score!)

I was starting to get a little nervous about the afternoon Agent Pitch Slam, partly because the book I was pitching is tricky to condense. Each encounter with the agent was limited to three minutes, so it had to be concise and hit the sweet spot at the same time.

Yikes.

It turned out to be a great experience. I chatted with a couple of agents who currently had the manuscript, because I wanted to have a more personal, less "e-mailish" kind of connection with them. I also got to have a great chat with an agent who had suggested some wonderful revisions last fall, and even though she did not ultimately offer representation, I wanted to let her know how much she had helped me improve my writing.

I hadn't planned on meeting with any of the editors, since the prevailing wisdom (okay, it is something I've read several times online) says agents don't like you submitting directly to editors. However, while waiting in line for one of the agents, I chatted with another one of the attendees, and she had pitched to the editors, and suggested I do the same. I'm glad I did, because both of them were very enthusiastic about my book, and it was fun chatting with them about books in general.

At the end of the day, I left the Javits Center exhausted, but also exhilarated by the numerous manuscript requests. A taxi waited outside the building, as if it had arrived just for me. I asked the driver if he could take me to my jitney stop, and when he quoted a rather high price, I actually NEGOTIATED with him. (I know – even I was stunned at my character growth from a few hours earlier that day.) 

I rode the jitney home, proud of myself for overcoming several fears, and inspired to keep writing.

Yo Ho, Yo Ho, A Writer's Life for Me

One of my favorite things about the writer's life is research, especially experiencing something that relates to the manuscript I'm working on.

Right now I am writing a manuscript set in the Hamptons. It is quite different than what most people expect when they hear "novel set in the Hamptons".  Since I am not ready to divulge too much about it just yet, all I can say is it includes pirates, and shipwrecks, and paranormal beings, and most definitely romance.  There are a couple of other twists in there that are incredibly fun as well, but they're a secret!

Right now I have the luxury to really research the settings for this book (something which has been a little trickier while writing Regency historicals).  The hero of this book lives in a house atop a promontory, and he is a sailor, drawn to the ocean while repelled by it (thanks to the villain).  There is plenty that could be learned via a Google search, but since I'm so near the source of the actual information, I could not resist the opportunity to "see what I could see".

So on a beautiful sunny day last week, with my research needs plotted out ahead of time, I ventured out to the Montauk Lighthouse.  The view is stunning, even at ground level, which is where I had planned to stay.  On the beach to the right of the lighthouse, I could envision the ship crashing on the shore, only now I had the sound of the surf and the sunlight bouncing off the waves to add authenticity to the scene I had previously only imagined.  I could see the ocean spread out before me, and I knew this was exactly what the hero saw upon waking each morning.

That should have been enough research for one day.

I am still not sure how I got talked into going up to the top of the lighthouse.  If the tour guide had reminded me that there were 137 steps, or that they wound around in a tight circle, OR that there was only a thin rope to hold onto the entire way. . .all of that valuable information might have elicited a different choice.  But I decided to be brave and adventurous, widening the ole comfort zone in the name of writerly research.

Someone should have also mentioned how tricky it is to navigate the angled metal steps while wearing platform flip flops (which are adorable, by the way, so no regrets there).  It's even more fun coming back DOWN the stairs, because now you know just how treacherous the whole trip is, and it takes twice as long than going up did.

Having a vivid imagination is both a blessing and a curse.  I am grateful for it when I'm writing, and the scenes are spilling out of me faster than my 120 wpm fingers can handle.  But when I'm creeping inside a constricted brick building, built in 1795. . .

"What's that noise?  There's nobody here but me.  Ohmygod, it must be a ghost.  I wonder if the ghosts are watching me huff and puff, and they're laughing their asses off.   Something touched my hair!  Eeek!  Wait, ghosts can't touch my hair.  Whew.  Well what was it then?"

One of the many things I learned doing my research that day was what it REALLY felt like to have my heart pound.  I've described that sensation many times when my heroes and heroines are experiencing something momentous, but now I understand how it FEELS.  Hopefully I won't need another near-ghost experience in order to describe it in the future.  (I also learned later there IS a ghost there, and her name is Abigail, which means she probably WAS touching my hair, because I have a fabulous hairdresser, and how could she resist?)

I also realized that climbing inside the lighthouse was similar to what it would be like inside a castle turret.  I tried to imagine running up the stairs (I know, hilarious) with a sword in one hand, and the need to hurry and be nimble all at the same time.  It's research I plan to make use of in a future book.

Probably the most valuable thing I learned was something my characters all experience at some point: you have to do the thing you think is utterly impossible.

I made it to the top of the lighthouse, which seems even more miraculous since I thought the heart pounding was going to escalate into cardiac arrest at about Step #86.  And the last ten stairs required tippy-toe steps while bent over so there would be no skull-cracking research moments.  I finally entered my destination: a small circular area, which held about 5 or 6 people maximum, so it could not be called "roomy" by anyone who understood the definition.

I was ready to toast my achievement, and gird my loins (mentally), so I could prepare to creep back down to ground level.  But the tour guide, and a pair of tourists who had a gift for meddling, absolutely INSISTED I step through this small opening so I could look outside.

I said I was fine just peeking through the opening, and I leaned to the side to catch a glimpse of sand and surf. 

"Oh, no, you just HAVE to go outside.  It's AMAZING."

I tried to resist, one more time, but I was still trying to catch my breath, so the meddlers interpreted my lack of speech as agreement with their plan.  I don't know why it was so important to them that I have this particular experience, but their will to succeed was strong.

I glanced at the opening once more.  There's only room for one person, and it's enclosed by a wrought iron railing, about waist high.  Just as I knew I'd regret not coming up to the top of the lighthouse, I convinced myself I would hate not going out onto that minuscule platform.  As impossible as it seemed, I had to do it.  Had to.

So I took a step forward, on incredibly wobbly legs.  I was awestruck.  I knew it was going to take the jaws of life to get me back inside.  It was so liberating with the wind whipping around me, staring down at the beach and the waves, envying the seagulls floating past me.

In the next instant, that old blessing/curse thing kicked back in.

"Will this railing really hold?  I wonder when they checked it last?  What if the guy who installed it was in a hurry?  Maybe he drank one too many mojitos that day before mixing the mortar.  Wow, I could use a mojito about now.  Hell, I'm having TWO of them when I get back down on the ground.  Did pirates drink mojitos?  Seriously, I can't believe how incredible it is up here.  I can see Justin and Philippe battling on the sand down there. . ."

Research uncovers a ton of useful information, a lot of it entirely unexpected.  It increases your knowledge, of course, and evokes curiosity so you want to learn about dozens more topics.  But, even more importantly, it can also expand your knowledge of yourself, which in turn leads to increased awareness of your characters, as well as their emotions and experiences. 

So never pass up the opportunity to do research.  It's one of the most delightful parts of a writer's life.  That, and mojitos.