AUDIENCE PARTICIPATION TIME!

As I mentioned before I am knee deep in some serious rewrite/revisions on book one. I am Freddy Kruegering the heck out of this thing. Only in a positive way and not a gory, brutal, shield-your-eyes kind of way. In it's original form THE CONDUIT was 110,000 words, now it is down to 89,000 and I'm only half way through it. As I am going through this time I am taking the agent's advise and removing anything that doesn't help move the story along. I have come to realize that I have a tendency to go off on tangents. (Those of you who know me know this is not a news bulletin.) While I might think these little side stories are funny, they slow the book down. So they gots to go!

That brings me to the audience participation part. Upon completing this round of editing I will have my tried and true helpers read THE CONDUIT for the 100th time and offer up their opinions. While I appreciate their opinions IMMENSELY I would also like to get a fresh perspective from someone that has never read it before. Therefore I am looking for one or two people to volunteer to give it a read through. Said volunteers need to be fans of Young Adult sci-fi genre, must have time to read the book within the next couple weeks, must be willing to offer feedback on the finished product and must solemnly swear that they will still buy a copy of the book when it's published. Interested parties for this job that pays nothing but my gratitude, please let me know!! Thanks gang!!

PS-Yep, couldn't figure out how to post a picture of the art work. It is AMAZING!!! I am hoping my dear, sweet hubby will show me how to show it to you all soon!

IT'S MY BOOK I CAN HACK IT TO PIECES IF I WANT TO

Ya know those three chapters I shared with you all on here? Only one of them, the prologue, is actually still in my book. The agent that requested sample chapters pointed out that it was taking way too long to get to the action and I completely agree. Therefore I am going through the entire thing with a fine tooth comb and taking out anything that isn't crucial to moving the story line along. Aren't you guys lucky that you were privy to the deleted scenes? An elite group, my blog!

The literary agent requested I resubmit after further editing, which shows she is still interested. To be honest 97,000 words for a young adult novel is a bit hefty anyway. My delete key and I will take care of that!

Tomorrow I am picking up my artwork, so stay tuned for a sneak preview of that!! Cannot wait to see what the brilliant Mrs. Strange has concocted! I will posted it here...just as soon as I figure out how to do that. Copying and pasting proved challenging so I can imagine what should be a simple task will result in a migraine.

Until tomorrow friends!

KIND WORDS

This morning I received some wonderful feedback from an agent. A REAL agent!! (Yes, I already googled her.) She had very positive things to say as well as pointing out some areas I could work on. There was no offer of representation, but she did request to see a few more chapters. Her interest is definitely a good sign.

In no way am I egoistical enough to think my book is perfection, far from it actually. I invite and welcome feedback that will help me to get it to the polished finished product I know it could be. I basically explained that to the agent in my email to her. My hope is that she will see enough potential in my plot, characters and style of writing to take a chance on me. (Anyone else just start singing the ABBA song? If not, I bet you are now!)

I'm not going to get my hopes up, the literary world is far too subjective for me to do so this early on. I will admit though that it would be a really, really nice change of pace to be able to post some actual good news and signs of progress here. We shall see...