14 Comments
  1. Deep Lurker
    6:33 am on October 16, 2024

    The old WIP that’s been in revision for what seems like forever has finally been kicked out the door. I’ve restarted a new WIP that’s been in the deep freeze.

  2. E. Beck
    8:38 am on October 16, 2024

    A college assignment has turned me into a published author (technically)! It’s an 11-page picture book about farms on Book Creator. 🙃 But hey! It’s still something I wrote that’s out there where people can find it, so it still counts!

    Meanwhile, I just got back into writing on a couple of side projects, and even though it’s not the main WIP, it feels so good to be writing again!

  3. Mary Kuhner
    12:40 pm on October 16, 2024

    I got a lot of feedback on my query letter, but am having trouble doing anything with it. I don’t *think* the structure of the initial conflict is bad, but it resists being made into a sound-bite for the query letter.

    I’m also editing two scientific papers, which is eating up all my editing energy. In one of them, the other two co-authors are having cat-fights in the comment fields, but I think it will get out the door soon. The other one, though…the lead author handed me a manuscript and said “Work your magic” but was unable, on repeated questioning, to answer “what is this paper about?” Guess what: I don’t know either. Looks like a heap of disconnected facts to me, and I can’t edit that into coherence.

    • Kevin Wade Johnson
      2:13 pm on October 16, 2024

      On the “what is this paper about” question, I still remember going back to the writer of one disjointed mess and saying, “So what’s the point of this? Why did you write it?”

      His answer? “Boss told me to.”

      Editing is not for the faint of heart…

      • Mary Kuhner
        4:33 pm on October 16, 2024

        He doesn’t get to say that, ’cause he IS the boss! But as near as I can tell, he’s doing the thing that non-writers sometimes do, which is he wants to have written a wonderful paper on this topic, but doesn’t want to actually write one.

        A group member suggested running ChatGPT over it, which makes me blanch. A lot. The result will likely be more coherent; it will also likely contain falsehoods which I will then have to hunt out. I pointed out that the journal requires formal disclosure of ChatGPT use, which hopefully has killed this suggestion.

        In the mean time, you’ve read this thing, what is “the opening conflict” to go in a query letter? I tried “the zoo exhibits aren’t showing natural behavior” and “a child is missing and the zoo exhibit wants to help find it.” Not finding either of those straightforward. Part of my problem was that if my protagonist realized how serious of a decision accepting that help would be, she probably wouldn’t have done it. If I lay out the stakes, the reader knows more than the protagonist, and her decision just looks bad.

        • Kevin Wade Johnson
          8:48 am on October 17, 2024

          “[Protagonist] is phenomenal with animals, much better than with humans, which works both for and against her in her zookeeper profession.

          “That includes the extraterrestrial animals at her zoo, which turns out to be critical when an accident occurs.

          “The crisis deepens when the space force gets involved. And [protagonist] learns a lot more about humanity, and aliens as well.”

          Now, that’s more of a blurb than anything else, which our hostess has said isn’t what you want to put in a query letter. But I think it does get to the heart of the story conflict, I hope in an intriguing way.

          P.S. Good luck with the boss. I never had one do anything like that – the problem ones for me were the ones who thought writing was easy, something anyone could do. (They were half right. Anyone can do it – badly.)

        • nct2
          3:05 pm on October 17, 2024

          Keep in mind that the query letter won’t be read by the reader, but by an agent.

          Going entirely off of your and Kevin’s comments, I think her lack of realization is actually part of the conflict. Maybe replace Kevin’s third paragraph with something like this.

          “Because [protagonist] is unfamiliar with intergalactic politics (or whatever), she accepts help from the space force, not realizing that x, y, and z will result.”
          Then tell how things get worse and how she resolves the problems.

  4. Mary Catelli
    11:59 am on October 18, 2024

    Trying to write about the stress of life.

    But — I did get a review of The Princess Seeks Her Fortune that recommends it for fans of Patricia C. Wrede’s Enchanted Forest Chronicles, amusingly enough.