Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
This looks like a good one
When I bought The 2007 Guide to Literary Agents on Barnes and Noble’s website the other day, the site suggested I look at Noah Lukeman’s The First Five Pages, A Writer’s Guide to Staying Out of the Rejection Pile. Sounded worthwhile, so I bought it, figuring if it could teach me even one new thing, it would be worth the purchase price.
The author is a literary agent and former editor. His goal is to let you, the writer, know what criteria an editor or agent uses to toss manuscripts into the round file.
While evaluating more than ten thousand manuscripts in the last few years, I was able to set forth definite criteria, an agenda for rejecting manuscripts. This is the core of The First Five Pages: my criteria revealed to you.
Here’s the first part of the table of contents, with my words of explanation in brackets. Part I is called “Preliminary Problems”:
Presentation [manuscript format]
Adjectives and Adverbs
Sound [rhythm]
Comparison [use and misuse of imagery]
Style
Part II is “Dialogue,” Part III, “The Bigger Picture” (show vs. tell, characterization, pacing, etc.) I suspect I’ll have much more to say about The First Five Pages as I work through it, but here’s my early opinion: this book looks like a keeper. I’ll keep you posted.
And since I got slammed at work today and I’m having trouble keeping my eyes open, this is all I have for you tonight. Sorry!
In fact, this day reached such an acme of suckitude, I was tempted to begin a new Thirteen: Thirteen Unglamorous Things about my Profession.
1. “I hope you don’t catch what I got,” she said after coughing in my face.
2. “Cover your mouth when you cough,” the child’s mother said after her old-enough-to-know-better child fired off his fifth snot rocket.
3. “I didn’t mean to do that,” my nosebleeder said, gazing with wonder at the pointillistic spray of blood across my eyeglasses and facemask.
4. “GhhhRRRAAARGgggllll omigod RAARGH RAAAAAAAARGH,” my nosebleeder said as we both discovered what had happened to all that blood she’d been swallowing over the past four hours.
Ugh. I don’t think I could manage thirteen of these without making myself sick.
D.
Thought you might want to check out my posting about Noah Lukeman and his book at http://www.literaryrejectionsondisplay.blogspot.com. I think the dude’s main goal is to market himself and sell books. But I am glad to hear it actually helped. I wish you luck from one writer to another.
So, what happened to the blood?
I’m guessing that this was one of those cases of “What goes down must come up…”
bleargh.
why is she “my” nosebleeder and the other two not your possessions? Is it because she is the only innocent in the bunch? She really didn’t mean to do either of her disgusting responses.
Hmm, I should know better than to cruise your blog as I’m eating breakfast.
Also: I bought “The First Five Pages” a while ago, but I haven’t read too much in it yet. It’s on The Stack.
Writer, Rejected: cool idea for a blog. The link you provided is broken, so here’s your post on Noah Lukeman. My take: if it turns out to be a good book, he can self-promote all he likes.
DN: protected static is right. Did I mismanage my sound effects?
Kate: interesting pickup. I suspect I am a lot more emotionally invested in these folks because their lives (or at least, their well being) really is on the line. People who are seeing me for chronic, non-life-threatening issues who proceed to share their viruses with me — meh, not so much. Yes, they’re still my patients, but I think I’m entitled to some peevage.
That’s my neologism for the day: peevage.
this’ll cheer you up….
http://sestakastan.blogspot.com/2007/06/little-past-due.html
🙂 Good one!
But just think how much fun it would be–you could take bets on how far your readers will get before losing it. 🙂
And it would have to be called ‘The Barf Pool.’
Trust me. It just would.
Given the way my hit counter has been slipping lately (95% of my hits come from people looking for images, so it’s no reflection on you guys), I think I need to do a “Thirteen Nipple Slips” or some such. Or another camel toe post — one of my perennial big hitters.
I doubt anyone will go out of their way for a barf pool.
I vote for the nipple slips post. You haven’t done that one before.
As for Lukeman, I love The First Five pages. I met him at a con a few years ago and asked him to sign my copy.
He’s younger than I thought he’d be and urm, hotter. But I don’t think he and I would make a good pair. He’s hungry and totally in it, in my opinion, for big money. Really big money.
M
Walnut, I know you’ve been doing this for a while, so you have to know that there aren’t any magic bullets as to why we reject work. Sure, there are some gimme’s, but what I will find as being unacceptable could be gold to someone else. The more you try to pattern your work to appease an agent, the nuttier you’ll become. It always comes down to the writing.
And beware the site that offer sure-fire methods – they’re the modern day snake oil sellers.
Good luck to you!
That all pretty much blows. (multi-pun there)