Monday, January 10, 2011

Decisions, Decisions

I have lots of decisions to make right now. As most of you know (if you've been following) I've written a book. I finished it a few weeks ago and have recently finished editing it. I feel like it's ready to send out, well at least as ready as it's going to be until a professional editor gets a hold of it. I've found a few places to send it to; one being a publisher while the others are agents. I'm ready to set the ship of my writing career a sail. This is where I hit the cross roads.

This book, still untitled, is kind of depressing and to be perfectly honest I don't feel like it's the best writing I've ever done. I'm so anxious to start living instead of just talking about it, but I wonder if this is the right thing to put out as the first big "Hi I'm Rae Marie!" After prowling the teen fiction aisles of Barnes and Noble last week, I don't feel like it fits in with the other teen fiction out there. Yes I want to stand out and be original and my own thing, but it's going to be kinda hard to be famous if no one but my mom buys the book.

I started a new book a few days ago as well. Here's where the big problem fits in. I feel like this new book (already titled and planned out in my head) will fit better with today's market. It's a story I want to tell and know how to tell. Great you say, but it's not written yet. I'll probably take 3 maybe 5 weeks or more to just get the first draft done. I'm going back to my old school ways of handwriting my manuscript which means editing is going to take a bit longer as well since I'll have to type everything. Add in 18 credits worth of homework and work every now and then as well as a small social life...things are going to take a bit longer.

So here's the question. Do I send out my finished project even though I have a gut feeling that it won't do well, which means if I signed a contract I would probably lose it and never be the writer I want to be, or do I wait and send out the story that will fit better?? As I said decisions, decisions. On top of this, I’m changing my major….

**Rae Marie

3 comments:

  1. what are you changing your major too?

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  2. hmmm...I say send it out and get some feedback! I think you should write about what you want and not necassarily try to fit in into any specific market just to try and sell books.

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  3. Michelle: I'm changing to journalism. I realized I don't want to teach anymore. So I'm going with journalism and aiming to be a film/book critic.

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