question answered and other things

no doubt you all have been chewing your fingernails with worry, wondering what decision i made about taking the data entry job. i turned it down with chris's full support (he was even more certain about the 'no' decision than i was). then i spent the next two weeks working my ass off on report revisions for my current job. not complaing. lots of money to sock away for lean times. which might begin now since the revisions are complete, and no other projects have been directed my way.

there are two 'other things' that i'm going to post about in this blog. (why do i feel like i am writing a third grade level paper? in this paper, i will talk about items one, two, and three.) the first is the difficulty of getting back into The Book after an almost two week work-induced haitus. the distance gained by such a break is a double-edged sword. good side: i get perspective and see the outline of the book rather than getting mired in the chapter details. bad side: i get perspective and see holes. which in and of itself is actually a good thing, but when the holes seem to be the size of a small eastern european country and make you think that maybe your writing and your story are crap crap crappy, it ain't so good. luckily, i seem to have found a happy medium and have a feasible plan about plastering the holes that will require a decent amount of editing but won't take a herculean re-write effort.

the second thing is that i spent a goodly amount of time this week pouring over the 2005 guide to the publishing market, looking up agents and publishers. it was a learning experience, that's for sure. some folks are snobs and won't take submissions from new writers. bitches. who needs them anyway? (a reasonable voice in my head is right now saying, "we do" but i am resolutely ignoring it.) others take new writers but they don't publish very many copies, and since writers (especially new writers) are paid mostly by royalties... well, let's have a little math lesson, shall we? 10% of 10 bucks (most first novels come out in paperback) equals $1. $1 times 1000 copies printed (which is what most small publishers put out) is $1000. that would be a payment of 1000 bucks for how many months of work? i dooooon't think so. it appears as though getting an agent is the way to go. an agent is kind of like a lawyer. they will take shitloads of your money but they will end up netting you more than you would have gotten if you had self-represented. most agents only want three chapters and a cover letter, which means that i could start looking for them now, but they also want you to be able to give them a manuscript the very second they ask for it, so i'll have to wait to start the search. which gives me plenty of time to prepare for the numerous rejection letters i am undoubtedly going to recieve. (i'm not being negative -- it's just a part of trying to get published.) so anyway. look at me, actually trying to learn the business i am choosing to work in.

so yeah. that's it.