Have been polishing up two talks this morning (creating Power Point slides for them—thank you for the kick in the pants, Martha Bee), and so have also been musing about the national SCBWI conference in Los Angeles. It was about six weeks ago that it wrapped. I didn't get to attend this year, and I really missed it. It is grand in every way—thousands of people, speakers who inspire and entertain, children's books celebrities hobnobbing at the lobby bar, and a huge costume party/dance on Saturday. Being surrounded by like-minded people is inspiring, narcotizing, energizing. There's nothing else like it.I love attending and speaking at conferences. No, not just because I am a complete ham; and no, not just because of an obsessive need for endless attention, thank you very much. Rather, it is because I get to talk to people about what I love—books and writing and books and writing—and I get to find exciting new writers. (It does happen, that whole writers-being-"discovered"-at-conferences thing. For example, I signed up Ysabeau Wilce after reading her stuff at an SCBWI retreat in Prescott, Arizona, and I had the fabulous Deb Lund as a one-on-one critique at the Whidbey Island Writer's Conference years ago.)But occasionally these conferences can be utterly draining, too. Why? Because the attending agent or editor or writer must always be "on," and that can be a wee tiny bit overwhelmingly taxing. I've seen people literally block access to the bathroom in order to give someone a pitch; have seen crowds mob speakers after a talk, pressing manuscripts into their already-full hands; have heard stories of manuscripts slid under hotel doors, between bathroom cubicles, and other such things that might be amusing if they didn't happen to be true.And you know what? I understand the impulse of those eager writers. There is a sense, as a new writer, that you had better make a strong impression, because this one fleeting contact with an agent or editor is the author's one and only chance to be discovered.But I'm here to tell you that it's not. Honestly, agents and editors like meeting new talent—really, we do!—but we'll be more receptive to your manuscript when we're at our desk, in the work headspace. No one wants to carry manuscripts around at a conference. We're just as receptive to getting submissions after the conference. In fact, we're probably more receptive. Certainly come up and say hello. If you heard us speak, say something nice that shows you were listening. ("I can live for two months on a good compliment," Mark Twain said, and his ego was larger than most anyone in publishing.)And then? Let us get to the bathroom.There must be other conference etiquette tips I don't know that people should bear in mind. What are they? What sorts of interactions at conferences have proven especially fruitful for you? And why?
Have been polishing up two talks this morning (creating Power Point slides for them—thank you for the kick in the pants, Martha Bee), and so have also been musing about the national SCBWI conference in Los Angeles. It was about six weeks ago that it wrapped. I didn't get to attend this year, and I really missed it. It is grand in every way—thousands of people, speakers who inspire and entertain, children's books celebrities hobnobbing at the lobby bar, and a huge costume party/dance on Saturday. Being surrounded by like-minded people is inspiring, narcotizing, energizing. There's nothing else like it.I love attending and speaking at conferences. No, not just because I am a complete ham; and no, not just because of an obsessive need for endless attention, thank you very much. Rather, it is because I get to talk to people about what I love—books and writing and books and writing—and I get to find exciting new writers. (It does happen, that whole writers-being-"discovered"-at-conferences thing. For example, I signed up Ysabeau Wilce after reading her stuff at an SCBWI retreat in Prescott, Arizona, and I had the fabulous Deb Lund as a one-on-one critique at the Whidbey Island Writer's Conference years ago.)But occasionally these conferences can be utterly draining, too. Why? Because the attending agent or editor or writer must always be "on," and that can be a wee tiny bit overwhelmingly taxing. I've seen people literally block access to the bathroom in order to give someone a pitch; have seen crowds mob speakers after a talk, pressing manuscripts into their already-full hands; have heard stories of manuscripts slid under hotel doors, between bathroom cubicles, and other such things that might be amusing if they didn't happen to be true.And you know what? I understand the impulse of those eager writers. There is a sense, as a new writer, that you had better make a strong impression, because this one fleeting contact with an agent or editor is the author's one and only chance to be discovered.But I'm here to tell you that it's not. Honestly, agents and editors like meeting new talent—really, we do!—but we'll be more receptive to your manuscript when we're at our desk, in the work headspace. No one wants to carry manuscripts around at a conference. We're just as receptive to getting submissions after the conference. In fact, we're probably more receptive. Certainly come up and say hello. If you heard us speak, say something nice that shows you were listening. ("I can live for two months on a good compliment," Mark Twain said, and his ego was larger than most anyone in publishing.)And then? Let us get to the bathroom.There must be other conference etiquette tips I don't know that people should bear in mind. What are they? What sorts of interactions at conferences have proven especially fruitful for you? And why?
Following Michael's thought-provoking post on writing reviews on Goodreads, I figured I'd take my turn dipping a spoon into the controversy crock-pot. You see, there are works that are commonly thought to fall into the children's book canon, classics that stay with readers for years. These are the books people look forward to giving to children again and again, so they, too, can experience these wonderful stories that are loved so dearly. But every once in a while you'll finds one of these books that you, well, just don't like that much.But you keep quiet. You don't rock the boat. You hope no one notices the slight hitch in your voice when you say, "Oh, it was ... lovely!" and quickly change the subject to the terrific cookies Loraine baked.We spend so much time purring about those books we hold dear. I think it's time to talk a little about children's classics that we just don't like. Did you find yourself hoping Wilbur got the ax? Wishing Willie Wonka kept his stupid factory closed? Wondering why those stuck-up kids wandered into the Metropolitan Museum of Art?Here's your chance to get it off your chest. In the comments, post a title and a quick explanation (think, 75 words or less) for why a classic book just didn't work for you. If you feel more comfortable, post anonymously.I'll start things off with The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin: I had a memory of enjoying this as a kid and recently picked it up to reread. This time? Complete snoozefest. Too many characters, too many points of view, not compelling enough (could be because I remembered the ending, but regardless) to keep me interested. I think I may have (gulp) actually liked the movie as a kid, and not the book. I put it aside after 40 pages.To add to the fun, feel free to also post a rebuttal to someone else's pick, limited to under 50 words, if possible.We can argue. We can debate. And we can have some fun. Let er' rip!
Following Michael's thought-provoking post on writing reviews on Goodreads, I figured I'd take my turn dipping a spoon into the controversy crock-pot. You see, there are works that are commonly thought to fall into the children's book canon, classics that stay with readers for years. These are the books people look forward to giving to children again and again, so they, too, can experience these wonderful stories that are loved so dearly. But every once in a while you'll finds one of these books that you, well, just don't like that much.But you keep quiet. You don't rock the boat. You hope no one notices the slight hitch in your voice when you say, "Oh, it was ... lovely!" and quickly change the subject to the terrific cookies Loraine baked.We spend so much time purring about those books we hold dear. I think it's time to talk a little about children's classics that we just don't like. Did you find yourself hoping Wilbur got the ax? Wishing Willie Wonka kept his stupid factory closed? Wondering why those stuck-up kids wandered into the Metropolitan Museum of Art?Here's your chance to get it off your chest. In the comments, post a title and a quick explanation (think, 75 words or less) for why a classic book just didn't work for you. If you feel more comfortable, post anonymously.I'll start things off with The Westing Game by Ellen Raskin: I had a memory of enjoying this as a kid and recently picked it up to reread. This time? Complete snoozefest. Too many characters, too many points of view, not compelling enough (could be because I remembered the ending, but regardless) to keep me interested. I think I may have (gulp) actually liked the movie as a kid, and not the book. I put it aside after 40 pages.To add to the fun, feel free to also post a rebuttal to someone else's pick, limited to under 50 words, if possible.We can argue. We can debate. And we can have some fun. Let er' rip!
Like so many of you, I rushed out and bought the Library of America edition of Raymond Carver's Collected Stories right on the day it was published. (Okay, that was a joke. I am a writing nerd is what I'm saying. I went to the Strand on the day of release to buy a copy. Like a teenage girl awaiting the new Stephenie Meyer.)Yes, I already own Cathedral and Fires and Where I'm Calling From and the poetry collections (which are fine and powerful though not formally challenging but hey, that's okay, too). I know Carver, and I love his work for the most part—not always, but for the most part—and this new edition fascinated me.Why? Well, because it includes the original unedited manuscript, the source material for what became What We Talk About Love When We Talk About Love. Carver's editor, Gordon Lish, cut and reshaped that collection of stories until it was practically unrecognizable. Some stories he cut by as much as 78%. Others he retitled, threw away endings, and wrote his own concluding sentences. When Carver saw the edits, he wrote to Lish begging him to stop publication, but Lish prevailed and the collection was published in 1981. The end result is the slimmest of Carver's books, overwhelmingly spare and bleak—even more so than Carver's first collection, Will You Please Be Quiet, Please?Thing is, Carver's work at the time was moving away from that spareness. He was moving into a more expansive mode, and his later stories are alive with ... oh, I don't know, a generosity of spirit, say, that is almost entirely absent from What We Talk About When We Talk About Love. This has been written about extensively elsewhere, including a superior piece in TheNew Yorker that you can read here (along with the correspondence between Lish and Carver here.) I'm not interested in rehashing the controversy; more I just want to talk about the actual editing. Because there are examples both of superb editing and of an editor pushing his own agenda over the author's aims.First, the superb editing. There is a story that Carver called "Mine," which Lish edited only two or three percent. And which Lish retitled "Popular Mechanics." It's a very short tale of domestic horror, about a couple who are separating. Each of them wants the baby. A tug-of-war ensues with sad results. Here's the opening paragraph of Carver's original:
During the day the sun had come out and the snow had melted into dirty water. Streaks of water ran down from the little, shoulder-high window that faced the backyard. Cars slushed by on the street outside. It was getting dark, outside and inside.
And Lish's tweaked version of that paragraph:
Early that day the weather turned and the snow was melting into dirty water. Streaks of it ran down from the little shoulder-high window that faced the backyard. Cars slushed by on the street outside, where it was getting dark. But it was getting dark on the inside too.
I like what Lish has done there. He's made the melting of the snow active and created a causal connection to the streaks of water running down the window. That's subtle, but it helps unify the paragraph. And he's excised one of the repeated instances of "water" that clunked the rhythm of the sentence. Then he's shifted the bit about how it was "getting dark" outside to the description of the cars, which is nice. That grants that final "getting dark on the inside" sentence more ominous weight. These are subtle edits, but they work very well to accentuate what Carver is doing.The other edits are similar, things like paragraphing and shifting of clauses that redistribute the weight of the sentences to maximum effect. The story ends with the husband and wife pulling back and forth on the baby's arms and legs, and the final sentence is, in Carver's version,
In this manner they decided the issue.
Lish makes a tiny edit, resulting in
In this manner, the issue was decided.
Now, some may not feel the edit does much, but to my ear, it saves the most damning word for last. In Carver's version, the full import of the sentence is felt by the time we've read that "decided," so "the issue" is kind of anticlimactic. Lish repositions things so that all the weight of the sentence comes down at the end, as it should.It's a masterful bit of editing, and Carver clearly approved of everything Lish had done (with the exception of the overly cynical, cute title change), because he included the edited version in his new and selected stories.It's a different case entirely with one of Carver's most famous stories, "A Small, Good Thing," which Lish cut by 78% and retitled "The Bath," completely scuttling the original ending. The Lish version is powerful, but it is powerful in a wholly different way than Carver's version.If you know the story, it's about a couple whose son is hit by a car a few days before his birthday. A party had been planned, and a fancy cake ordered, but that is obviously forgotten while the two wait by the boy's hospital bedside, hoping for him to recover. (He doesn't.) Meanwhile, the baker, angry about the cake he's made that was never picked up, keeps calling the parents and asking if they have "forgotten about Scotty" and then hanging up. (He's an immigrant and a bit estranged from the language.)In the Lish version, the couple do not know who is calling, and the story ends with the bereaved mother answering the phone and hearing the baker ask again about Scotty. It's bleak and depressing as hell. The Carver version, however, continues and arrives at a different place, one that is large-hearted and forgiving and about grief and finding solace in unexpected places. In the Carver version, the couple realize it is the baker prank calling, and they arrive at the bakery late at night to confront him. And the baker comes to understand what he's done, is horrified, and tries to make amends the only way he knows how—he offers the couple food and asks their forgiveness.
"You probably need to eat something," the baker said. "I hope you'll eat some of my hot rolls. You have to eat and keep going. Eating is a small, good thing in a time like this," he said.
That has the power of plainly expressed truth behind it, and it is cathartic. The emotional burden of the story, so long held back, comes down upon the reader and it is a crushing weight. Through the baker's interaction, we finally feel some small portion of what the parents are suffering. The story ends with a breaking of bread (could there be any better symbol of forgiveness and shared sorrow?):
They listened to him. They ate what they could. They swallowed the dark bread. It was like daylight under the fluorescent trays of light. They talked on into the early morning, the high pale cast of light in the windows, and they did not think of leaving.
The Carver version was later published and won the O. Henry award, the love of thousands, and so on. It is that version that he included in his new and collected stories for posterity's sake, and it is one of the centerpieces of the truly great collection Cathedral. Which only goes to show you that Carver know what he was about.I suppose my final question here is: Did Lish do wrong? Well, I guess I'd say yes. Mind you, I respect Lish enormously—he's a genius and guided many great writers to publication (among them the amazing Amy Hempel)—but the end result of his editing here is to make the stories more his than Carver's. There is the kind of editing that sharpens the writer's vision, accents the points the author is making. That's what an editor should do. And then there is the kind of editing that forces a story or novel to fit into the procrustean bed of the editor's very personal notion of what the book should be. And that's just plain wrong.
The kind folks over at WordHustler have nominated us for a Kreativ Blogger Award. We're flattered, and quite pleased to have gathered such a loyal following in such a short period of time. Thanks for reading, everyone!
A few days ago, we asked everyone (or rather, those of you who are reliable readers of this blog, which is more or less everyone so far as we're concerned) if there were any questions not covered in our FAQs section on our site that you were just dying—dying—to have answered. We wanted to hear all those secret questions that leave you lying awake at night, staring at the play of passing cars' headlights on the ceiling and thinking, How will I ever find out the answer to my question about marbles?!?! and Is it really so bad to wear white after Labor Day? and Why "different from" instead of "different than," huh? and other such dire burning issues that we all worry over but are too shy to ask about.Well, now you've done it! You asked, and we are in the process of answering. We'll post our answers here over the next few weeks, and—if we deem one of the questions as possessing that lapidary quality that means many, many, many, many people will ask it—we will add it to our FAQs page during our next site revision. Oh, glory! Oh, to dream!So, without further ado:Q: What should I do if you send back a rejection to my query, yet Upstart Crow is the agency I want to work with?
Oh, you flatterer, you!
Seriously, though, if we decline to review your manuscript, and you believe that manuscript is great, then chances are we are not the right match for you and your work. This isn't so much a matter of declaring anything as being wrong with your work as it is a matter of our declaring that, for whatever reason, we are not the agents who will be most passionate about your work. And for whatever reason, your query and twenty pages haven't clicked with us. So best to find that fierce champion elsewhere. Or to try us with a different project.
Q: If we’ve not heard back on a query or submission, how long after the stated time frame should we wait to contact you? And, in the case of a query, would you prefer an e-mail or re-query?
A few apologies here: Due to the labor-intensive nature of setting up a new literary agency, a few of us (read: Michael) have been dragging our feet in responding to queries. We are on them now, however, and both regretfully turning down submissions and requesting full manuscripts from others. Our stated time frame is our goal, and we will get there, but this first month has been a matter of getting up to speed. It will get better.
Regardless, feel free to requery, and expect to hear from us within a few weeks.
Q: Does a query rejection from one agent translate into a rejection from all agents at Upstart Crow? Some agencies say “yes” and some say “no.” What’s your policy?
Alas, yes: A "No, thanks" from one of us is a "No, thanks" from the agency as a whole. Really, you should submit to only one of us. While each of our preferences differ, our sense of quality and what we long for in a manuscript are pretty similar. If we see something that is great and not to our taste but perfect for another one of us, we will pass it along.
Q: What things should I do with my manuscript to make sure it’s really ready to submit?
Run it through a workshop of fellow writers you trust several times. Revise revise revise revise. Make your final drafts shorter than the previous drafts by at least 10% and preferably 20%. (This was the advice given to a young Stephen King by a magazine editor: "Revision = draft minus ten percent" or something like that. This is sound advice and should be heeded.) All good writing is endless vision and revision.* Have someone else proofread it. Let it cool in a drawer for a month before submitting, and then re-read it again cold, see if it holds up from a distance. Once you've done everything you can think of to fix the manuscript, then it is ready to submit.
Q: Does Upstart Crow Literary require exclusives?
Nope! But if you have sent it elsewhere, the wise and kind thing is to let everyone involved know. We won't judge you for it or anything, but we will appreciate knowing that others are also looking at it. And especially let us know if someone else has contacted you with an offer.
Q: How do you become an agent? What would you tell someone who wants to go into the business?
The apprenticeship, as you've no doubt heard, is the stuff of legends and tales told round campfires: Agents are taken from their familes as wee bairns (and called that, "wee bairns" rather than the simple "babies" because a degree of literary pretention is instilled at an early age). Placed in bookshelf lined cages together, they're raised by a succession of faceless stewards who insist the children express themselves via wooden alphabet blocks. Those who insist on spelling standard monosyllabic words ("cat," "mat," "drool," "fool," etc.) are ruthlessly culled. By the time they reach their adolescence, they are deemed ready for the arena, and placed into the so-called "grammarama games." Words used as weapons? Books used as cudgels? Paper cuts across carotid arteries? Yup, that and worse: The few who come out the other end—bloodstained, the entrails of lesser agents dangling from their teeth, dull-eyed with a thousand-yard stare—those are the few who are turned over via indentured servitude to the literary agencies of the world.
And then the real horrors begin.
(Sorry. It is late as I write this and I am getting punchy. Seriously, different people come by it via different means. Usually the work stems from a love of books that overrides more commonplace influences such as parental career advice, university majors, and the desire of significant others for boodles of money.)
Q: How many manuscripts do you read each week?
It varies. I can say that I've received, on average, 100 queries each week we've been in existence. Is this standard? Beats me. But it feels like a fair number. Sadly, queries come last in the day, after we've taken care of the other business for the authors who are actually already signed up and among our clients.
Q: Do agents really have a black list of troublesome clients that they circulate? If so, will asking about it get my name on the list?
No, there's no time to squander on the writers who are less-than ideal. If someone has had a number of agents, why, we may talk to their previous agents, see what the problems were. But mostly, if someone is on a black list, it is the black list of not writing well and ignoring responses from people that may point them to necessary revisions.
Q: Last but not least, sorry if I missed this news, but have you made your first sale as the Upstart Crows?
I can only say here that yes, we have made several sales. We will send announcements in the next few weeks to the usual places where one ballyhoos such things, but suffice to say that on our very first day we had someone take a manuscript through to acquisition. Which was a nice way to begin things, let me tell you. And since then have sold a property at auction and more and more so on and so forth.
Q: Why is it that 99% of literary agents appear to be female? Is there some sex-linked genetic component to this?
Wow, I wish I had an answer to this, but here at Upstart Crow, we are 66.6% male. Unless Chris is hiding something from me.
A footnote to the asterisk in an answer above:
Because even we sometimes get tired of listening to ourselves natter on about this and that, we thought it was high time to involve you via our second netcast. For this one, fellow agent Chris Richman and I considered openings of a few favorite novels and why they work despite—or perhaps because of—thumbing their noses at commonly held ideas about what makes for "good writing."Let us know what you think![podcast format="video"]http://upstartcrowliterary.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/09/UpstartCrowLit002.m4a[/podcast]
If you've been to our website, you probably know that we have a list of Frequently Asked Questions. However, after taking a long, sobering look in the mirror, we've admitted that maybe we're not perfect, and perhaps there are questions every writer wants to know about an agency but hasn't had a chance to ask.To remedy this, we're offering writers a once-in-a-lifetime chance to be anonymously immortalized on our site. We're looking to add about five new questions to the FAQ that perhaps we overlooked, things you think all writers should know about an agency before sending in their work, or questions specifically about our how we work as an agency.An example may be:
So there you have it! Please post your suggestion for a question as a comment (remember, these will fit in with what's already on the FAQ; this isn't the time to ask a question about a specific submission or anything). If you'd like, pick questions above you that you particularly think are useful. We'll lock the comments around tomorrow at this time, pick our five favorites, and add the questions and our answers to the site.
One of my college professors once imparted this bit of wisdom to our workshop:“Look closely at what you’ve just written. Now go through and circle everything in it that you love, every gorgeous description, every turn of phrase—and delete it.”There are days when I think this is the best advice I’ve ever gotten (usually when my writing is not going well). And there are days when I think it’s the worst (usually when I’m particularly in love with myself).I urge you to give it a try and see what happens. It's a fun experiment, and if you're suffering from a case of wordiness, it can be very grounding and helpful. But if the professor’s approach is a little too harsh for you this Tuesday morning, then I’ll leave you with the very wise words of a former Editor-in-Chief of mine:“Every word should carry its own weight.”When you get right down to it, both statements are really about checking your ego at the door when you write. It’s about bringing a sense of honesty to your writing, about doing what’s best for the story.Write well!