First Page Critiques | Ft. Maria Heater | Ep. 3 | iWriterly

hello everyone and welcome to our first page critiques on for today's agenda basically we're going to have a quick overview of what is query hack introductions and overview of how the critique will work we'll have of course the critiques of different first pages and then at the very end we're gonna have a Q&A where you can ask myself or Maria any questions that you have so there will be a timestamp in the description if you want to jump right to the Coe Chiefs on the replay but I'm slick here live you know what kind of just go through it as it as I just detail that I guess all right next is what is query hack basically encompasses three different things we have query critiques which are on the eyewriter league website twitter pitch critiques also on the I rarely website and now we have first page critiques and it's the first 250 words of individual manuscripts are live critiqued on I read early videos as you guys know my name is Meg Latour I'm a writer and my debut novel is coming out this fall and obviously I do YouTube and my co-host is Maria could you tell us a little bit about yourself hi everyone so I have a lot of experience as a literary intern but for the past year in a bit I've worked as an assistant as a at Nelson literary agency in Denver Colorado and a lot of what I do is read queries and manuscripts that's probably the bulk of everything so I'm just here to help out Meg with giving a little extra perspective on them on how we read those thank you so much for being here I said good Maria and I were at the corpus here a literary agency for a little bit it's so fun to like reconnect and to do that expect yeah absolutely yeah if you guys are in the chat do say hello let us know where you are watching from and of course I always ask this your drink of choice I am an adults and I'm drinking cream soda but if you guys have you know wine or whatever else let me know alright let's move to the next thing so how the critiques will work basically we'll be doing five to seven first page critiques and again this is up 250 words and they're all selected prior to filming and we might pratik some query letters depending on the instance the there's gonna be this thing with a bell and I'll expand this a little bit but if a bell rings that means we're going to stop reading and more to come on that in a sec and of course we're going to provide feedback so whether or not a bell is rung will provide feedback on what we enjoyed and what areas could be improved ok so what does this Bell mean as the first pages are being read either a bus is the option to ring a bell and if a bell is rung that means we would have stopped reading this manuscript in a submission pile so if you queried a literary agent we will then obviously stop reading and provide feedback for areas of improvement the rules it's a quick overview no published work so only first pages of unpublished manuscripts will be accepted for critiqued for critiques and the longer we go I fix than where I'm like researching to make sure we're not saying you know like self-published books or attrition a published books placeless please just and publish stuff no first drafts please you want like polish the manuscripts you really want to make sure that the it's at the final version it's like first chapters change the most out of all the chapters in books because you kind of don't 100% know where to start and so between your first draft and I don't know 670 drafts later the first page is gonna change a lot so please don't submit that first draft as for the selection process it's random the short of it is a lot of people that leave hundreds of submissions at this point and it's selected at random there's no particular genre or age category for this evenings critique and then if you're submitting please do not submit duplicate submission so if you submit a first page of a single manuscript please do not submit that first page again even if you edit it I'm sorry you get one chance but if you can submit again for a future manuscript if you want that critiqued and the final disclaimer all materials are smooth through google form and then on to this presentation so the formatting is lost it will not be Times New Roman size 12 font double spacing one-inch margins or anything any of that so let's move to the first critique right I can't think of a worse time to forget to silence your phone than lying flat on your back legs in the air with a speculum inside your lady taco but that's just my luck in a nutshell Here I am at the gynecologists with cold sterile air blowing across my bits try my best to ignore my phone ringing for the seventh time in the last two minutes I'm really sorry about the song choice my husband is a baseball player I cover my face as if that's the most embarrassing part of me on display at the moment note to self I will change my ringtone to an appropriate adult ringtone as soon as I'm out of these stirrups put me in coach I'm ready to play don't mind me I'll just stay here silently death by John Fogerty I'm gonna ring your bell since I I mean I'm worried do you want to go first I do me to go first um no you can go first okay um I think it's a bold choice to talk about Lady tacos on page one and I thought some of the sentences were charming oh my goodness where was trying my best to ignore my phone rings the seventh time in the last two minutes like you know kind of like all that was very charming and very funny it just I don't know I didn't it didn't grip me I guess and I just I don't know I can't explain it do you want to jump in and everything yeah I sort of agree it's kind of um I was pretty much ready to stop reading as well and like you you know I feel bad saying this but it's like a little bit intangible why it's very very voice e off of the top and you know I can tell that the writer is going for like humor and like you know just saying something really really bold immediately to kind of like grab the reader's attention but it's you have to be kind of sometimes careful with that choice just because you can go maybe a little bit too bold to the point where you're sort of like maybe just kind of shocking more than you are really like engaging um and it just I feel like what's so hard about the first page is like you just you need to do so much so quickly like you need to like get the reader like invested and like the during the scene and like this one is just kind of I'm not there's so much going on that it's kind of hard for me to like connect like you've got there's like the guy to call there's the gynecological exam that's happening and then there's the ringtone and she's embarrassed and it's just sort of like very very busy at once I feel like I there's nothing clear for me to like latch on to if that makes sense yeah I think what you said what before was really good that if they're going for like trying to startle the reader versus like trying to engage the reader and grip them oh I think they were trying to do that and it it's a good start but I think maybe less kind of trying to startle the reader versus kind of more voice from the character I guess even more at I'm not sure there's there's just something that ya can't quite put my finger on yeah like there I would say like the writer definitely has good instincts like you definitely want to do something that's like you know very grabby right at the beginning um but don't underestimate like the power of like just like good solid voice because that can be just as gripping as like you know an explosion or something and honestly in a book I would rather be gripped by the voice first then I would bio just like something shocking happening on the page before I move into the second critique I'm just gonna say hello to a few people that are here with us live suite croco six-six-six thank you for being here at KB long Jeff Jones Stephen Mary Sarah Jeff Clare oh my goodness oh and Katie said she's from Florida she's drinking coke tonight awesome can you drink if you drink like you're can you drink can you sleep if you drink Coke Zero time it is but oh my goodness it'd be up all night there's some people like aren't impacted by caffeine or whatever hello from Brazil strawberry juice that sounds delicious I think I have to jump in here I see somebody from a UGC represent hey Sarah gee how awesome that's my alma mater so yeah all right let's move to our second first first page yes I can first page critique and this one starts with two different quotes alright I've got a cat here who's just dying to get on the livestream superstar right there anybody come on all right I will hear if you're okay don't mean it go ahead with the quotes yeah go for it all right perfect half human half divine between two worlds I walked the line the second quote is the most beautiful experience we can have is the mysterious it is the fundamental emotion that stands at the cradle of true art and true science chapter one I'm standing on the front porch of my home in East Nashville Tennessee having taken a break from work when my uncle Norman drives up in his ancient boat car and park sit in front of my house electric blue sky hovers above me on this early spring day I raise an eyebrow as I stare at my new visitor this is actually quite the surprise uncle Norman a retired food product salesman is the hermit of the family and hardly ever goes out of his way to visit any of us unless it's a major holiday or it's important or a major holiday I'm hearing this elegant okay and I ring mine to go hungry yeah I'll go first on this one so um straight up I just would have skipped the quotes like I just kind of breezed past that if you start with like a quote or like you know something like a small thing in italics honestly I usually just breeze past it because I'm really just trying to like get some sort of like the the meteor bit like you know the quote or like the little sort of like preamble whatever you put at the beginning you know that's not really like that that's not reflective of your style as a writer and definitely the quote isn't so I'm just kind of when I'm screaming like I'm basically just kind of seem like do you have the the chops you know what I mean to kind of keep reading and the quotes just sort of tell me nothing so I would have definitely skipped those as for the the paragraph itself it has this kind of like removed quality to it it's very like like explaining and set up just the first sentence I'm standing on the front porch of my home in East Nashville Tennessee like it's just like the lenses like pulled so far back and it's like you know I'm not feeling rooted in that person's head like nobody thinks that way like I'm standing on my you know like I'm in Denver Colorado I would never think like I'm standing on my balcony in Denver Colorado you know so it just has this sort of like already I'm kind of feeling a little bit kind of like like I'm not gonna get into this story like I'm not I'm not being like pulled in you know I don't know if this author intentionally wrote it from like an omniscient perspective but it did feel a little bit like a list kind of like a listing of facts rather than voic-- characters and if you guys don't know this voice of characters are in right now most people prefer to read very voic-- stories and I think you know there's a way to kind of show these things versus how there's a lot of telling versus showing you know saying that you're standing on the front porch and you're taking a break from work and this person drives up in the car but they don't normally come up unless it's important or a major holiday you could have just said you know tires screech does uncle Norman drives up in his ancient book car hmm yeah or something like that like it could be like showing these things through like the lens of your senses what does the character see here taste I hope she's not tasting anything with the boat but you know whatever yeah so I think there was more showing that needed to be done in order to make it feel like it was a voice see submission assuming that's what you're going for unless you want it to be like an omniscient yeah like it's you know it's technically first-person because they say they're saying I and I'm and he's back you just love this he's obsessed with attention um so yeah with all the eyes and whatnot it is feeling like it's definitely you know first-person but it's so like pulled back that it does feel more like it's like it's omniscient like we're talking about the sky and we're not but like it's not a scene you know what I mean like things are happening or like and actions are being described like him pulling up but we're not we're not feeling it like we would if we were in the care there's brain and that's what you really want if your first person or third person you want the lens to be kind of like really tight like we're experiencing everything with the character and this is just like pulled out and just sort of like like the writer is like directing the scene you know what I mean rather than like us like experiencing with the character oh great agreed oh hello cutie I should have closed the door how good I feel like res writers a lot of us are cat people let me know in the comments if you guys are cat people or dog people except we had a couple hellos Hello kitties in the comments so thank you guys for welcoming them alright let's move to our third critique perfect error drew in a slightly - parted lips of the swells of alabaster skin rose and fell against the constricting whalebone corsets that covered that was covered by blood red satin silver eyes scanned the candle lit ballroom as faces hidden by masks danced to the lulling sounds of the cello and violin in a dark symphony marble stood gleaming under her swaying feet as she hummed a note from the music she followed the path of the stone walls dancing in and out of the marble pillars that lined the edge of the dance floor bodies came together and parted circling each other and danced of intrigue and silence the woman sorry go ahead oh um this is so kind of a caveat I wouldn't stop stop reading here but I would definitely start skimming to see when we're going to kind of like land on like a character or maybe like some dialogue or just some some action of some kind or anything that isn't just description um you know because I'm feeling kind of similar to the last one but just in a different way like this one is done I would say maybe with like a lot more sort of engaging details but similarly it's very like pulled back like we're just sort of like kind of watching this stuff happening from afar and that's just not not in getting that I would suggest like it's not clear sort of whose head we're in or whose eyes were seeing this through because I do feel like opening with like a lot of description like this like you can make it work if it's sort of like clear that is happening through somebody's eyes because that can really characterize your main your main character by like showing like how they observe and sort of what details they notice you know that can actually work really well but this feels very like omniscient I am going to agree and disagree with this one so I read a lot of adult science fiction and fantasy and my word these writers we love our info dumps so and our descriptions and I know as a writer I also tend to have a lot of info Tubbs is something you know that I have to keep in check so I really enjoy the descriptions I was there in the moment I was like oh with this blood red satin and all these are the things I thought that was a lot of fun but so that's where I will disagree it was it was fun but I think this could be made better per Maria suggestion where we have we need to know who this is so who is the character what are they doing like and then kind of infused some voice so this did feel a little bit um Nishant so it was just kind of like a listing of really cool descriptions and I was so therefore it however I was like who is this why do I care what's their perspective on what these things are is a blood-red satin I don't know alluring to them is that supposed to because like filled red is always a color of sex in books so like if that what it's supposed to be and there's like a man and a woman about to undress I don't know we didn't get that far but like you know infuse the the characters voice in there I personally think that that would make this first page a lot stronger yeah and you know I feel like you you kind of hit the nail on the head a little bit like that the description is strong and so like kind of going back to my earlier like you know note about like I would have started skimming at this point the person can clearly set a scene like that's not the issue here but it's like for me I'm like okay they can write clearly they can write like I just need to make sure that they can like do a character and a plot as well you know what I mean like totally but totally there with the scene setting and like for like a fantasy opening like I'm all about like the balls and the course that's whatnot so definitely I'm yeah definitely points for that for sure I really want to know what the age category and genre is for this one so I'm just gonna quickly look at the query letter mm-hmm fantasy novel so I'm going to assume it's adult fantasy but it is 76 thousand words which is pretty low for adults so yeah young adults that makes me feel like it's more young adult so just a tip guys if you're watching and you have a query letter make sure you put both the age category and the genre and the query because these word counts are going to indicate different things so an adult fantasy tends to be much longer than a young adult fantasy in general and it's also good to know the target readership maybe the agent accepts young adult or kid lit stuff and they don't accept adult stuff so definitely want to include that in your query letter all right let's move to the fourth first age six months of pity was enough to make anyone go berserk but worse than penny was a compassion all that gentle handling made Leif Halton feel like he was fragile like he was broken like he was a failure and Beryl Bay PD's third precinct the last traces of a glorious sunset leaked in through the windows washing everything in a red gold glow Leif limped down the main hallway the ache in his long legs and the burn in his left hip slowed him down but he kept his gaze forward and his jaw locked tight around him the weekend shift changed officers fluttered here and there like moths some of them literally their wings gilded by the dying light beat chops hunched over filing cabinets and uniformed inspectors held court in their various stations the aromas of coffee and magic infused all of it home didn't really describe the place but on most days it was close enough for him today was not one of those days if he could just make it to captain Thompson's office without scrutiny from his colleagues he wouldn't have to explain why he was even here on his day off words weren't forthcoming not during this afternoon's test results a squat squirrel faced officer jog down the hall towards him a forest silk called Holly and a damn good member of his division he had a takeaway hoagie in her paw as substantial a dinner as could be found in the canteen all right we made to the end do you want to go first yeah good job guys um yeah I'll go first I feel like this one just really really did a great job of illustrating like what we've been talking about like about getting like starting in somebody's head and being like really zoomed in and sort of like in the moment with them um I also really like how I didn't realize that it was fantasy at first but they did like a great job at sort of like just organically like dripping in those details and then by the time I got to the end I was like oh oh like I get it now so yeah no props to this one for sure I agree I was very surprised that it was phantom going back to first paint yeah yeah I um I really like that that like you had said like that it was like oh this is just kind of like a contemporary whatever and then you know kind of shifted into the magic and that's because I think I was debating ringing the bell at that point but then akaash it whoa what is this I think my issue with this was the first couple of lines I thought they could have been stronger the first line was six months of pity was enough to make anyone go berserk but worsen pity was a compassion although it leaves me with a question like why is this person being pitied did someone die who is offering them compassion like those were it's good to have the rear asking question so they want to get the answer but I think it just the way that it was phrased felt a little bit I don't have cliches the right word but it felt like it was phrased in a way that I've seen many times before so I wanted there to be a slightly different way that that was phrased or maybe more voice in there and then that sentence repetition afterwards like he was fragile like she was broken like he was a failure I think there was like there was a way that you could have said that with more voice or uniqueness or in a way that little bit more unique to me just some of the line level stuff felt a little cliche for me yeah I see what you mean for me like there's in my opinion there's like two kinds of like really good pros there's the kind that's like so beautifully you like can't help but like stop and notice it and then there's the kind of just like kind of like clean and invisible that just like what's the story shine and for me this kind of was more of that second one so like for me it just kind of like I just sort of breeze past like the kind of like technical bits of the sentences and was just kind of like into what they were saying you know so like I agree that you probably could make it prettier but I personally was just like kind of like the the questions that you mentioned about like well what happened and what you know why do people pity him for me that just kind of like took over and I was like immediately like alright I got it I got to know what happened here and that makes sense and I think this just also goes to show that different people reading the same thing are gonna have different reactions hence the great bring a subtractive so totally alright if you're good we can look to the next one yeah let's do it okay okay critique number five the darkness is back and I'm freaking out kayla is only five and couldn't possibly cast a shadow that big stretches behind her like a long flowing gown it creeps up the wall until it touches the ceiling I know what it means death is close I hate that she doesn't see the darkness swirling about her inching closer tightening its grip no one's ever seen it but me mom thinks I'm making it up just to torment my little sister dad agrees with mom because it's his go-to move and anything more would require effort on his part but I wouldn't make it up I adore Kayla in spite of the attention she sucks away from me in fact we love her so much that I almost convinced myself that it's not real that's all in my head but I know that's not true it can't be I'm going to play outside it's not a question nothing Kayla ever says is a question I envy her baseless confidence her sweet arrogance she can say whatever she wants and get away with it she could probably get away with murder I know I couldn't Kayla turns away flared ends of her bright yellow sundress gliding through the air as she spins it's her favorite dress I should tell her to change into play clothes so she doesn't get it dirty but she won't listen to me now we'll have to find something else to bury her in Oh went to the end I loved it yeah I was I was kind of confused like while we were reading it but I'm glad that we made it all the way to the end because then it came together for me yeah I personally I didn't feel confused in this one but I was just like oh my gosh I have to know what the shadow is so the darkness is back and I'm freaking out and I was like tell me more and I think this style to me was like that simple prose that you were describing Maria where it was like it's like the flowery verses kind of straightforward where it's almost invisible yeah and like it the invisible prose but it also had that really good five senses descriptions voice it was so well balanced I would keep reading yeah no totally they definitely hit like the right balance between like intrigue and like explaining enough that you like aren't like totally confused like I was just sort of you know gallantly she's only five she couldn't possibly cast a shadow well so so what is it and then it gets creepier and creepier and then you get to the end in it it kind of like all comes together so yeah no props to this person any critiques or things that you want to share on this particular page very good um yeah I would say you know it it like just like on rereading it a second time it's like I adore Kayla in spite of the attention she sucks away from me like knowing that she's dead now like that that line just has so much more like resonance you know or like the Reno it explains like why you know Kayla is getting more attention even though I didn't get that on the first read so that's great like this definitely has layers and it also I'm assuming that this is why a um even with being like quite evocative and like creepy you still get that teen why a voice like with dad agrees with mom because it says go to move you don't lose that sort of like distinct why a feel even with like the horror elements so yeah definitely would keep reading yeah I want to know if it's why a so I'm going to come with it Larry I think you look like a logical thriller okay so not horror yeah no interesting like because I felt like there was like magical elements you know mm-hmm but I thought it was great great job to the this writer yay yeah first room awesome let's go to the six critique earth garbage planet but here we are I still don't see why we were sent here of all places I let her reef doesn't answer choosing instead to kick my stomach so I know how annoyed it is the morale the symbionts nestled beneath my diaphragm doesn't need to say anything telepathically or loud we went over this a hundred times before leaving and then a hundred more on the way here I'm just saying reef these people aren't even capable of leaving their solar system why do they have to send us here that's exactly why because then we can't escape this planet is in a restricted sector and even if we were able to get off it using primitive technology available we've died before reaching the nearest star system there's no hitchhiking not near Earth being here truly is exile green sands beside me flickering her tail irritably and unbuttoning her collar as our clothes absorb the sun's heat summer the guard has had to send us here in summer when it was hot when it's hot and sticky and even more miserable than I imagined shut up Leslie if you hadn't opened your damn mouth I'd be working for the guard instead of an exile it's your fault I'm stuck here she's not wrong breehn flicks her tail irritably this whole thing is ridiculous exile I can't believe it an execution would have been quicker I mutter actually if we weren't the one stuck here I would call this an ingenious punishment yep that's it hmm um yeah so we made it to the end writer um yeah I'm always a little bit like I never fully know how to read like non-human protagonists I just I feel like it's really hard to do I think it's interesting that this like alien or at least like not from Earth protagonists still feels very human still feels very teen which is interesting I was kind of there's a lot introduced like in the beginning you've got reef and then you have what is the other one three something and so there's quite a bit of like world building up front but that's kind of okay I would say most people like when they read when you like read like fantasy or science fiction like I feel like a lot of readers expect it like some small level of like catching up that they have to do to sort of like get into the world and whatnot and so I think that that's fine but yeah I would definitely be I would be intrigued to read on but I think I'd be reading with just a little bit of trepidation just because non-human or like non earthling protagonists or are always a little a little tough to do well so far it's it's they're doing fine no that's that's a fair point I think I would have liked to know a little bit more about where they are the setting so like they're talking and that's great and we're getting a lot of background information kind of pushed into dialogue it's not the point of where it's distracting so that's fine but I was like okay so where are they and what is the scene so I think all this stuff is good and it's fine but I you know personally I'm like I'd like to know where they are what are they doing are they running away from someone are they trying to get settled versus just kind of talking reflecting upon their situation just my sense though yeah I had it maybe a little bit of trouble connecting with this one but again like subjectivity like that just could be because you know I'm I'm I don't read a lot of stuff with non-human protagonists but yeah that's kind of the the fun or maybe not so fun depending on them depending on where you are in your like writing journey the the subjectivity part which is just so unfortunately unavoidable yeah okay let's move to our final critique then critique number seven Arthur ran under a canopy of red Pines every breath was a labor every heartbeat a thunderclap muscles burned with hot blood tendons quaked his feet ached after so many miles he wanted all of it and more a breeze wikked sweat off the back his of his neck moment of relief he smiled to feel the breath of the wood it was like being part of something far greater something unimaginable Arthur's delight fractured and a jolt through his nerves he was so busy enjoying the respite in his element he forgot it was not recommended to run while looking up much less with his eyes closed as a result he nearly tripped on his own feet watcher set there boy Joshua said heels back sorry thanks dad Arthur corrected his footing by lifting his heels higher behind him as they strode over pine needles like this better Arthur beamed he watched his father run beside had nothing but in navy track shorts he wore the same but donned a t-shirt as well to hide his scrawny frame even though Arthur was half a head taller his father was still the one to keep the pace of their workouts art or reason the muscles that packed his body product of his the humor sorry I was darling yeah um yeah I don't think that this started off too bad so I can tell that this person can write like they can definitely like write like pretty coherent sentences and whatnot but just that super like that very very like action II like physical writing in the beginning about like the tendons in the blood rushing or cuz you can you go back one way look at ya got like the muscles burning with the hot blood and the tendons quaking and the heartbeat it's all like so you know how I was talking earlier about I'm gonna sound like such a hypocrite but like I was talking about like you want to be like really zoomed in like you don't want to be this zoomed and like you don't want to be like biologically like watching cells divide like zoomed and you know what I mean like you kind of want to be like in their headspace not you know no I don't really the sweat and you know the blood aren't really hooking me the way that this person's thoughts might so like I get that they're running but sort of why they're running or like with what purpose would be a lot more interesting to me than just the physicality of them running that's so interesting because that those paragraphs were my favorite I didn't really like the rest oh really I must be very opposite like these are the things that we enjoy but I like those details I liked that what was the sentence muscles burned with hot blood tendons quaked every heartbeat a thunderclap like to me I was like there in the moment I was running with him but then as soon as we got to the fact that he was just working out and then we were describing his physicality by comparing him to his dad and he's got a t-shirt and then I was like I don't really care about this like what go back to like the fine details why are we running you know but then it was just kind of like an exercise routine so I was wondering like is this the best place to start the book is there anything we can leave in some of this background information do I need to know that he's scrawny and wearing a t-shirt and his dad is shirtless or whatever it was you know so there's stuff like that that was like yeah and I kind of feel like you like maybe inadvertently stumbled on sort of like what like explaining like the mistake that I feel like a lot of writers do you make which is they feel like they need to start with action and so they'll like interpret that is like physical action but unless it unless it has some sort of meaning then it's just gonna feel like a false start so like you were really like taken in by like you know the physicality of the running and that's great but then you just ended up disappointed because then it just sort of was unimportant it was just the sort of like ordinary moment you know as opposed to like okay like he's in a race that you know is very important for him to win or he's running from something and so yeah I just I feel like you can never really go wrong was kind of like just rooting yourself and like the characters mind I'm like what situation they're in in that moment whereas if this just kind of feels like the writer started with action because they felt like that's what they're supposed to do they started with like the most action ething possible which is someone running I agree I think it's a vet fine line of where you start the book where you want to be engaging you wanted to hook the reader but and you're like you want to be close enough to the inciting incident that it's interesting but not too far like we're not too close so it's like all confusing but again not to power that's too slow so it's like that weird fine balance but I do think that start in the place where everything changes for your character like where you know right before that happens usually there's always exceptions to the rules and people who write fantastic books can always manage to do things in a slightly different way but you know think about when things change for your character or right before then that might be a good place to start your story mm-hmm agreed all right well that was our last first page so we are going to move to today's Q & A and I did just see a question that I'm going to answer really quick this was from John Wells but it's how to submit the first page for a critique for next time there's two different ways the first is there's a link in the description below so if you just scroll down I have the instructions I have like how it works and then I have like the link to submit you can also go to I readily com look for the query hack tab on the website and there's like a drop-down menu and you can click Submit first page so it's a Google Form please follow the instructions please read the instructions this is not for you this is for everybody who wants to submit the second way is if you join me on patreon patrons get first chance basically two for their first pages to be submitted we do have hundreds of submissions at this point so if you want to you know first chance to get it submitted check us on patreon that link is also in the description below but of course if you guys have any questions about querying or a writing or whatever please do drop them in the chat Maria and I will enter them at this time as she answered before she reads tons of submissions from Nelson literary agency so she is legit guys go after all the things she's got so much good knowledge to share thank you you're a doll okay okay here is good question how can I write with multiple POVs in the same scene a third person hmm my my gut instincts for this is you don't you really want to go each scene should be contained in my opinion or each scene is best when contained within a single POV if you have multiple POVs in the same thing we call that head hopping basically because you're hopping from one person's brain to another and it can be really jarring to read as a reader now that isn't to say that this hasn't been done many many times before like if you read like epic fantasy or like historical fiction from like you know 20 years ago it was actually pretty popular to do this but these days it's um it's kind of I don't wanna say frowned upon but it's just kind of out of fashion people really want to feel like rooted sort of like in one character at a time you know you really want that like deep characterization so like by all means like do different you know chapters or even like if you break up your scenes and you have just kind of like an obvious page break or something in between that can signal to the reader that you're changing POVs but I don't recommend doing it within the same scene I am gonna ditto basically all of that I personally I think if you're gonna have multiple POVs what's trending right now and also just what I prefer is a reader and I've always preferred this is start each chapter with a different POV or maybe have chapter breaks if you need to because you know towards the end of the book you're quickly swapping between POVs if it's more of my POV but personally I like I think of like George Armour and Game of Thrones it's chapter by chapter how it's broken up but no one that has a multi POVs and I swap mid-scene is I think celebre for I was glancing back to see I'm still looking at my book so it's the mortal engines Phillip Reeve does this but it'll start like in a scene you'll be like one characters perspective she comes into the scene and then she sees this other character and then the scene kind of finishes and then we followed this character that this first character meant off to doing the blood date whatever they're gonna do so it felt like a natural progression where it was like not jumping from like random heads in different locations to me that's very jarring I think jumping from POVs mid-scene is very jarring and I'm like I was just with that person and they were so interesting let's go back you know so you can do it you can do it well check out mortal engines if you want to look at it but I would agree with Maria that it is like a people don't do it as much anymore it's not like in favor yeah just scrolling through some really good questions coming up there I'm impressed you guys you're thinking in depth okay let's do this one prose grammar versus story plot which wins and the end story plot always agreed you can fix grammar you can't teach someone who doesn't know how to weave a good plot totally yeah 100% this person asks specifically for you is is paw prints done I've been reading it for years and miss it and will Chris and be close to unsolicited queries forever oh man that's funny okay hi Sarah um yeah so um pomerance is not dead but we don't update it as frequently as we have in the past but if you aren't subscribed to the the newsletter I would definitely get on that because that is we send that out with a lot more frequency and there's all that like astley good stuff like ask an agent so um if you miss pepper ants but you're not signed up for the newsletter I would definitely definitely sign up for that but I'll get you some of that content and she will not be closed forever I don't think um but she is you know I mean every agent says this but obviously incredibly busy but yeah she's um she's hoping to open at some point hopefully early this year I'm gonna ditto what you better got the newsletter I've been subscribed to this newsletter for I love the Nelson literate agency newsletter like what I just remember the December one like that you guys send up metrics of like you have any queries you received how many partial requests that you asked in full requests and then offers and sales and it's no interesting and it's basically like three blogs in a single newsletter is what it is yeah no it really is and there's like dealing there's everything from like deal announcements to like you said query stats to um you know just kind of like up incoming releases so yeah I mean I obviously I'm biased but it's definitely I would say one of the better literary newsletters out there highly agree alright what would be a good type of pacing for an adult fantasy like a paranormal fantasy um it so paranormal fantasy um I would maybe guess that they mean like urban fantasy or like contemporary fantasy the the phrase paranormal fantasy is throwing me just a tiny little bit um but usually at least for the contemporary fantasy I would say that they're generally paced more like a mystery or a thriller like with adult epic fantasy you know it's expected to move a little bit slower but yeah for something contemporary you definitely want like a quicker pace something that's more on par with like mystery this next question is do you stop at the first 250 words that they don't hook you I don't know if you're referring to queries or today's like critique but today's critique is just first pages so yes we stopped by for 250 words but it's obviously very different if you're in this clary box and I will let you address that yeah I know it definitely is um no I would say like the first 250 words or like the first couple of pages like I'm basically just looking to make sure that like you're a capable writer you're starting and what's what seems like the right place and that it's you know just like put together like professionally and and you know is worth and is something that the agent would be interested in um you know that sounds like a low bar but you'd be surprised how many things don't don't meet it just usually because it's like someone's quarrying something that like you know the agent doesn't represent but it's I would say it's rare for like the query to be great and then just get to the pages and have the pages not be up to par um I would say usually by the end of reading the query like I know if it's something that the agent is gonna be interested in usually the pages are just there at least for me and like what I do just solely confirm like okay yeah like this person they can put together a story this is definitely worth like a second a second viewing out of curiosity you read the query first in the pages second is that how it like the order of wish you read things yes yes it is um I would say and even sometimes if the query is like not that great but there's like enough of like a nugget sort of like in the concept there that I can kind of see like okay um you know let's look let's check the writing out and let's um you know even if maybe because because some concepts are tough to explain so it might be like ah they made it just kind of struggled sort of with their pitch but like it seems that there's something here we're looking at the pages yeah I just remember it like I would look at the queries first just like word count if I saw like a four hundred thousand word adult fantasy I was gonna call it pass and I didn't have to read the pages because I knew there was a structural thing issue but that was just you know how I read stuff yeah and I mean if there's like a massive red flag in the quarry like you know and there's a hundred other queries to read then you're not going to really you know waste waste time but yeah I would say yeah the quarries just is like that sort of like pre-screen everything seems together in the quarry usually yeah then I'll read the pages awesome I was curious because I feel like everyone like reads everyone reads differently and totally always super curious okay so this question is I hear you two often talk about POV would you advise against having a narrator separate from the characters I'm assuming that's either an omniscient narrator or it's like I'm thinking of this is a spoiler I don't think so if you guys have read never night I feel like it's pretty obvious with like the footnotes and stuff that the narrator is not the actual characters so I think it can be done well personally I think omniscient is out of favor but in books like never night it's an extremely voicing I talk about it all the time on this channel but that has a different narrator than the main characters and they do swap POV so I think it can be done well it's probably more difficult to do it well with an area that's separate from the characters versus just having a voice a character that you're telling the story from their perspective yeah no I totally agree I feel like if if it can pay off later and then like that narrator you know turns out to like be a real person but just like sort of not who you thought it was like the - I have a couple in my head one is um is a literary historical fiction um by Isabel Allende she did her own retelling of Zorro and in Zorro like you know there is icy like Meg likewise but yeah but there is a narrator and the narrator is very much a character and like you do figure out who it is kind of like around like the midway point and you know it's very obviously not not sort of himself even though he's the main character and so it can be done well I'm the other more recent example I'm thinking of is the ruin of Kings by Jen Lyons that has like like two narrators that are separate I think and that but you you do kind of learn you do know who they are and they aren't the main character but they kind of give you like different perspectives on that main character and so she does pull it off so I would say like if you are doing it with like intention and you have like a concept in mind and like it's gonna pay off go for it but having but I will say like if I'm reading something with like a really voicing narrator who feels like a character but then you get to the end and like it isn't explained who that person was talking all the time then I feel a little bit like cheated agreed agreed there needs to be like a fun reveal who the heck this narrator is right so I guess it's the whole reader expectation if you make promises in the beginning totally all those promises later on Brandon Sanderson his latest classes are up in his YouTube channel and he talks a lot about this so guys go check it out if you haven't already so good I wish I could take his class alright next question is what are the most common pitfalls of writers who almost make the cut so I'm thinking like I don't know if you agree like the Marshalls full requests and you're like am I gonna offer okay I'm not gonna offer what do you think yeah um gosh that is such like a hard question and it's a really good one but there's there's a lot of there's just so many reasons like but I would say think in my experience it usually just comes down to like the amount of work that like needs to be done on the manuscript versus like sort of like the pros you know what I mean like and by the pros I mean like the positives not like pros PRL so yeah it was like oh well you know this concept is great and the writing is great but like there's pretty much no plot from like you know the midway point until like almost to the very end you know so I would say yeah it's just like basically if you know the when the agent sort of feels like what they love about it is outweighed by sort of like all of the the negatives that would need to be fixed unfortunately yeah just from my time at the agency I would agree with everything that you know you just said the only thing I would add is if at any point the writers unprofessional and the emails or like unresponsive to me that's an immediate red flag they're a bad communicator or not professional person so just make sure you're you know good person and professional and your Elson timely you know you don't have to go back within the hour but you know within a day or two yeah totally and like you know just for like if they mean pitfalls for like you almost get your quarry requested but not really usually at that point it would probably just come down to like like straight up concept like you just don't love the concept quite enough to retest it or it just sounds like something that would have maybe been like awesome five years ago but that like the agent is just not looking for right now yeah like if it's oversaturated like I feel like you know say it's pretty saturated at this points pirates we hear about that you're like seeing that a lot yeah totally or like what or just if it doesn't feel like you know maybe well-written and all but like like something like like angels and demons like a lot of people love that but a lot that's just not the cup it like that's not a lot of people's cup of tea they're just like not interested in that kind of Mythology is so like your character your characters could say I'm really cool and like your opening pages could be good but like ultimately if the agent is like do I really want to work on something that's like angels and demons no yep oh great just because we're we're getting close to the time I think we got like eight minutes left we have a lot of wonderful questions let's move right along for adults fantasy or other genres if you want to touch on it West more common preferred first person or third person I'm just going to say from a writer's perspective third person is the most popular for adult science fiction and fantasy usually because it's easier for swapping to POVs and my various chapters you can know Meg said this Maria said this you know like it's as just do here to do it's totally person is more jarring Diana Gabaldon did that with first-person I feel like she started the story thinking it'd be one POV and then she moved to multiple POVs and I don't know if that fell off to me in the Outlander series yeah no I totally agree I think you nailed it it just makes for smoother transitions alright oh you know just for funsies I don't know it must be hard to coordinate normally right I would say yes everyone's usually different time's up that's pretty funny I'm from New Jersey so it's the east coast of the United States yeah and I'm in Colorado so we're two hours behind the East Coast so it's not too bad all right I'm currently trying to a coordinator live stream with someone that lives in England and another person lives in the West Coast the timing of like getting all the humans on at the same time is it's very difficult sometimes let's see oh well just jump down I'm so sorry if I missed some of these questions guys oh let's just talk about this one because I feelings for traditional publishing and do you think paying for your manuscript to be professionally edited before querying is generally necessary I will let you go first no I would say it's absolutely not necessary at all especially because like agents want to see like what you can do on your own and so even if you do decide to like pay for like a professional editor that's that's fine I personally wouldn't recommend it in your query I feel like it's just kind of like like if I find like an error or whatever like that then like my brain immediately is just like well how did this get passed to people you know what I mean like I found that guy maybe read with like a tiny bit more scrutiny um but ya know I would say if you want to do it totally go for it I wouldn't use it as a selling point when you're querying agreed I have a ton of videos on working with freelance editors because I used to be one and then I have a bunch of videos and the pros and cons of self-publishing the pros and kinds of traditional publishing and one of the pros of traditional publishing is you don't have any upfront costs to publish a book so I don't know I just feel like if wouldn't like I'm self publishing a book this fall so if I'm doing that I'm paying these editors I'm trying to make it a very high quality book and that's because they won't be working with editors and publishing houses but the hope I guess the pro of you know working doing traditional publishing is that you're going to work with editors later on so save your dollars and my opinion you can if you want and you have a my tune you just want to get like so developmental feedback from an editor but just work with me there's some beta reader save your money you don't have to do this yeah totally again just my opinions vary about the baby is feeling your good opinion okay I'm gonna quickly address this when these two hundred 50,000 word novel you always always always want to in the metadata of like your query you want to include your each category so it's young adult adults middle grade whatever genre so for this it's science fiction and your word count those are three things you must include in your query letter so yes you'd want to include this however I'm so sorry to say this because this is going to be tough to hear but two hundred fifty thousand words is too long for a debut novel you want to aim for like the hundred thousand to one hundred and twenty s like the top end of that range most agents as they see this word count is going to be in Auto pass I'd be edit we're gonna assume it's too high yeah totally um and I'm just gonna add like a sneaky like tip um like the conventional wisdom is like a hundred and twenty thousand words is like a solid like a many agents will cut it off there if your concept is super super solid you can get away with like a higher word count and like still get a request and then maybe the agent would think like oh maybe I can edit this down or whatever but two hundred and fifty thousand words is like so far beyond that ballpark yeah you're looking at an auto rejection I'm so sorry adult science fiction or fantasy if it's a good concept like what you were describing what's the highest word count you would consider I've okay I haven't seen but I've heard of things as high as like a hundred and seventy that's um that has to be like your concept is just bangin like solid gold um and like your first pages are amazing you know to to you know get there um but yeah I would say like safely honestly and it's a pencil um but I would say like an agent who works a lot with like hard science fiction and like epic fantasy like a hundred and forty thousand words they're probably not going to be scared by but don't you don't don't push it you know you know that you've got a little bit of wiggle room but don't ya don't don't push too hard yeah I would say like like I'm an overeater so aim a for like a hundred thousand words you'll probably land a one hundred twenty thousand words if your is oh I am so you don't just aim lower than you think you're gonna happen yeah that's way safer for sure okay that's an interesting question I've seen the term high-concept here and there what is it yeah this is a great question um high-concept is really just basically like a pitch that you could boil down to like a very very like quick like sentence or even just like comps then then everybody wouldn't know what you're talking about so like I'm kind of struggling so I come up with like a perfect example of that right now but basically like high-concept would just be like something that you could spit out in one sentence and everyone would get it we are getting close to time here do you want to take a few more questions we want to finish up you just tell me you know whatever you're able to do timewise ya know I'm able I can take a couple more questions okay if you see any let me know sure it's giving a scroll here I see some of your commenters are already answering each other's questions yeah eighty thousand words for why a especially one was like speculative elements is totally safe whoever the what is your name VIN seus yeah you're definitely in range here's an interesting question what are additive the house is asking for most often these days and this is going to probably depend on age category genre but we've heard anything that you'd want to share or able to share um just generally right now I would say middle grade is um I would say children's editors are very very hungry for middle grade these days it's a great time to be middle grade middle grade of all kinds contemporary fantasy but yeah outside of that you know it really really varies like you said by genre and category I think like young adult you know had its boom for a while so the rumor has it middle grade is up next yeah definitely we have like the Y fantasy boom and then we're kind of having like the Y a contemporary it's like rom-com boom but yeah it looks like like middle grade is now the kind of where it's at yep yeah I can probably do maybe one more question and then my kitties up on the table he's just dying to be fed so this one is um let me see did you don't you feel pity on the writer when you reject a novel yeah always I still remember like the first query that I ever sent a rejection for um and like I definitely don't like I don't remember them all obviously because there's just too many but yeah like I just oh my god I just remember like having like send that rejection email the first time and like I just felt so like guilty um but honestly at the end of the day like you know and I've had you know I'm gonna be doing this for a couple of years now I really do believe that sometimes like rejection is just like the best thing for you some writers at a certain point like and I told this anti-joke before at like conferences that I've been to but like just imagine like the first draft of the first thing that you ever wrote and like imagine if somebody like offered you representation on that like your first draft of you the first thing you ever wrote was probably not that great so if somebody had like signed you on that you would probably stop just growing as a writer like writers get better because they're you know they level up they write something they submit it doesn't go anywhere they look at it again like oh okay maybe I kind of see you know why this isn't working they read something a little bit better you know rinse and repeat and so if you just kind of like get in like with the first thing that you had a through like why would you keep growing as a writer you know like you might just be kind of and then let's say that you get an agent agent submit that submits that work editors don't pick it up well then and then your agent drops you then you like you just don't have the perspective I'm like oh like you think that like well I got in you know this is the level that I got in with the first time so like why wouldn't that work the second time so just you know you need to be like constantly leveling up as a writer and if everyone's just telling you yes all the time you're not going to do that a great spoiler I do have a video coming out on this subject very soon so keep an eye out for that but I 1000% agree is that it it forces you to become a better writer you learned how to edit different things character arcs plot structure pacing whatever it is you figure those things out if you work with critique partners and beta readers and then maybe you write faster or whatever the skill or thing is that you want to improve on so rejection stink but there are good things that can be learned from them specifically how you can improve your writing yeah totally well thank you guys so much for your questions and for joining us today if you want to connect with Maria her twitter handle is here on the screen and I also have links in the description below yeah so thank you guys so much again and thank you to Maria for joining us and sharing your insight and knowledge and your time appreciate it yeah thank you so much for inviting me this was awesome and I really enjoyed being here to answer your questions alright guys well thank you so much and we will see you next time

Channel: iWriterly

Views: 12,166

Rating: 4.9627042 out of 5

Keywords: writing advice, writing tips, best writing advice, first page critique, literary agent, literary agency, literary agent critiques first page, literary agent critiques, traditional publishing, book publishing, how to start a book, how to start your book, book opening, story opening examples, story opening, writing tips for beginners, writing tips for young writers, writing advice from authors, literary agent advice, literary agent interview

Id: 03rOgEkc4mw

Length: 64min 20sec (3860 seconds)

Published: Wed Feb 05 2020