It is with a heavy heart that I write this post, for once again Cat’s Eyes has been rejected. I’m pretty sure this one was a form letter, but it did say that they didn’t think the story was “strong enough” for representation by them. By “them”, I mean Curtis Brown Australia.

That’s two marks against “not strong enough”. Maybe that’s the standard reply these days, which would mean it means nothing. But, maybe it means exactly what it means. I don’t know. I’ll be keeping tabs in the future.

Oh well, I’ll add this rejection to the others and submit it again. I’m not sure where or when, but I do know it will be soon and somewhere. I’ll keep you informed.

I used an email address for the submission of Cat’s Eyes that I rarely receive or send anything from. Moments ago, I realised I hadn’t checked it for several days. Imagine my surprise when I heard the tell-tale “ding” that announces new mail has been received. Immediately recognising the publisher’s email address, I held my breath and prepared myself for a rejection.

So it was an even bigger surprise when I read the email and discovered the publisher liked the synopsis of my story and liked the sample of my writing, and was requesting the full manuscript.

I realise this isn’t an acceptance and the manuscript could still be rejected, but this request has lifted my spirits. I now have a purpose! I now have a reason to sit at the computer and work diligently. I’ve been given hope and that is something I needed.

My plans for the weekend have suddenly changed. I won’t be working on Mirror Image as previously stated, I’ll be ensuring Cat’s Eyes is perfect before I send it off next week.

If there was a mood reader on this blog, it would be saying “happy and excited” right now.

Some weeks ago I mentioned that I want to submit Cat’s Eyes for consideration. The manuscript has been completed for some time, but I haven’t done anything with it since entering it into a competition last year. Anyway, once the decision was made to submit it I set about, and spent over a week, writing a one page query letter. As I wasn’t entirely happy with what I had I did some research to ensure I was including all the right things for such an important letter (which I was). Finally…I pushed the letter aside as I still felt something wasn’t quite right.

Yesterday I mentioned in an email to a friend that I needed to get onto this submission. I questioned my reasons for not sending it out already. No reason really came to mind, except self doubt and that’s not a good reason to hold back a submission. Actually, the thought angered me so last night I opened that query letter and looked at it again. It has all the elements of a good query letter. I know that for sure, however, I still had to do some more research. In the end, I had to concede that I’ve done the best I can with it and now I have to take a chance.

Once this decision was made, I turned my research to publishers instead. Who do I want to submit to? My first choices are the big names – Scholastic, HarperCollins, Random House, Penguin and Allen & Unwin. I visited each website and found their submission guidelines. Two are not taking submissions of any kind at this time. Two would accept full manuscripts for children’s manuscripts, but only queries for adult manuscripts (luckily, my manuscript is for children). One would only accept an email query from unpublished writers, promising a response within two week. This is the one I targeted.

The guidelines were clear, so I adjusted my letter accordingly. They also only wanted the first 250 words of the manuscript, as a sample of my writing. This once again reiterates the need for strong openings, which I’m a believer in, so that shouldn’t be a worry. I read through that one and a half pages … oh, three dozen times, at least. Still not confident enough to send the email, I sent it to myself first as I wanted to see how it would be received. Seeing the email made me feel better. It looked professional and there were no errors, but there was a problem. There was an attachment! I didn’t include an attachment and the guidelines clearly stated that emails with attachments would not be read. I fiddled with settings, which made no difference. Then I copied and pasted the contents of the letter into a fresh page and emailed it to myself again. No attachment. Yay. I emailed it again to be sure. OK, we’re in business and now it’s time to send the real email.

Have you ever noticed how hard it is to press “send” when the email is this important? My cursor hovered over the button for several minutes; I kept wanting to read the entire thing one more time (just to be sure). Finally, I had to force myself to click on the button and trust in myself. The email – the submission – has been sent. I have done the best I can, with the manuscript and the letter. Now I must wait and see if that is enough.

That’s right; the first draft of Mirror Image is finished. It took a long while, actually it’s almost a year to the day since I started this project, but it’s finally done. As mentioned, it is the first draft and a long way from really being finished, but I’m ecstatic that I’ve got this far. The last few scenes are rough…and I mean rough. I’m not happy with them in the slightest, but at least the story is down, which will take the pressure off me. Now I can work on the finer details and I already have a list.

Before I do that, however, I intend to put this manuscript aside for a time – a very short time. I’m going away for a short holiday next week so I’ll give myself until 27 October 2008 and then I’ll start the edit. By then I’ll be revived and ready to go.

My plan is to cut the manuscript into sections. As it is told from five view points, I will make five files and concentrate on each view point one at a time. Then…I will merge the view points back into one story and edit it as a whole. I’ve thought about doing this for a while and I know it will be the best way to handle the edit. I’m looking forward to attacking the story in this way.

In the meantime, I’ll turn my attention back to the query letter I wrote for Cat’s Eyes. There’s something wrong with the letter. I haven’t been able to work out what it is, but as it’s been placed on hold for 10 days or so maybe I’ll be able to spot the problem now. I want to post the first set of queries (no more than five at a time) by the end of the month.

It’s strange when I think back and acknowledge my decision to walk away from writing at the end of last year. It feels like I was a different person then…and I probably was, for many reasons (none of which I’ll go into now). The transformation between then and now is incredible. More importantly, I’m excited by the way my mind is working overtime where writing is concerned.

Having always been a One Manuscript Woman, I’m suddenly having the time of my life with three writing projects at once. I don’t know if this new found method will last for long, it never has in the past, so I’m making the most of it while I can.

Anyway, the three projects are:

1. Mirror Image. You know the one I mean – the one where I keep reporting “I’ve only got 10,000 words to go”. I’m writing about 5,000 words a fortnight since I first said that and I’m still going. I am, however, in the last hours of the story, so I’m making solid progress.

2. Cat’s Eyes. I finished this manuscript a long time ago, but had reservations about its length. Those concerns no longer exist, so I am currently drafting a query letter. Admittedly, I’ve written the letter several times, but so far I’m still not happy with the results. But it’s getting closer and I won’t stop redrafting that letter until I feel it’s perfect!

3. Marlinor. This is an old project revisited. I’ve decided to scrap the entire thing and start again. I love the characters and the story itself, but there are some serious problems that need fixing. I’m currently rebuilding the history and recreating the world…and everything is falling into place extremely well. This project is a trilogy, but I can see a prequel happening too! (I’ve created a new category called “Marlinor Trilogy”; everything mentioned prior to today has been archived in “Marlinor Archives”.)

At the moment, my writing routine consists of me writing for Mirror Image Friday to Sunday, with a bit of query letter writing thrown in now and again. Monday to Thursday sees me doing research when I have time and, again, working on that query letter. What really matters is that this writing routine is working for me. I’m pleased about that.

Honestly, walking away from writing was the best present I’ve given myself. It allowed me to wind down and then, when I was ready, to rebuild my energy levels from the bottom up. It has allowed me to view … everything … from a different angle. And it has given me inspiration and excitement where writing is concerned, which I haven’t felt for a very, very long time.

Cat’s Eyes is the first book in a fantasy series for children aged 8 to 12 years. It has been 100% completed for some time now. However, something niggled at me about its length. At 30,000 words, I felt it was too short and this made me hold back from submitting it.

A few days ago I decided to ask a published author about this. I emailed Pamela Freeman, Australian author for children who has now also published the first two books in an adult trilogy. I briefly explained my concern and asked her advice. She was quick to get back to me and reassure me that the manuscript is the perfect length for the age group and that her own manuscripts varied between 22,000 and 35,000 words. This shouldn’t have surprised me because I did do my research and plan the stories so that they would be the desired length, but I guess with thick books like Harry Potter on the shelves I lost confidence in my own research. This will not happen again.

Anyway, this quick email exchange has taken all my concerns away and I now plan on writing the query letter and synopsis so that I can get it in the post. Since I don’t have an agent I’ve decided to take the “query approach” and send the covering letter, the synopsis and a sample of my writing. I will have no more than five queries out at any one time.

This is an unexpected turn of events that I hadn’t planned on…and it’s exciting. I will use part of my writing time over the weekend to get the “package” ready.

Note: I’ve added a link to Query Shark to the sidebar. There are some good tips to be found on the site.