The Start of...Something

I signed up for Camp NaNo this year (April), but only set my goal as 'edit one novel', which I did. First edit, I mean, because I've a long list of things that need to be done with it now. But I made the list. And I finished the last round on another novel, so I guess I can say I 'achieved' NaNo this spring. It was a month filled with other things, and sometimes that happens.

But it's now May, and I promised myself I would start querying in May. So I have. My goal is to send a query letter out every week day until...well, until the end of the month, at least (which is how many agents I have in my Excel spreadsheet to query to). After that, I have to go looking for more. So that's about 20 or so agents. I'll start looking for more now, though, so I have 20 or so to query in June, and then etc. I could be doing more than one a day, but finding and researching them takes even longer than actually sending out the queries.

[I'll let you know what happens. Maybe I'll be one of those lucky people that doesn't have to send out a 100 before they get an agent. Maybe I won't be lucky at all (lack of luck going around in my life right now).]

I already have Book 2 lined up to query, so I figured I'll give Book 1 a few months, then try Book 2. Often you have to wait up to 8 weeks for a response from an agent anyways, and that's just for them to ask for your manuscript, not read it and report back if they want it. So the agent I queried yesterday might not get back to me with interest until mid-June or later. Or will probably not get back to me at all. Reality check.

I'm gearing up to have a go at the list for the next novel (see first paragraph), though there is A LOT to fix in this novel before I even send it out for beta-reading. And then there is Book 3, which I am blatantly ignoring for the foreseeable future, because it might be borderline crap (the story isn't, the writing is, it was my first novel) and need to just be scrapped and written again. And I can't deal with that right now. I already have another book for NaNo in November already lined up, which needs to be written AND edited that month (it's Middle Grade, it's like 40k). So I think I should just concentrate on editing this one between now and November. And querying the other two.

And if I hear from an agent, all bets are off on that schedule. :D

Further up and further in!