We interrupt this regular day to bring you some HUGE NEWS!

Our very own JAMIE HARRINGTON HAS AN AGENT!

Yep, you read that correctly!

Jamie joined us not long after we started here, and has been an intricate part to our site. (She and her husband created it for us.) So we couldn’t be more thrilled to announce that:

Victoria Horn from Liza Dawson Associates

has signed on to be her agent!

Congratulations to Jamie and Victoria, I am sure they will make a great team!

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Sarah is writer looking for an agent. She is currently working on novel # 4, editing novels 2 and 3, and querying novel # 1. For more insight to her work, visit: http://legendoftheprotectors.wordpress.com/ or http://legendoftheprotectors.blogspot.com/

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I’m not sure whether this happens to other writers or authors, but it happens to me. After weeks of writing regularly, I seem to go into a period of not writing so much, when life or something else takes the center-stage.

At such times, though I’m not really adding to any long or short work, perhaps hurriedly scribbling down a few things before I go back to whatever has priority at that moment, I’m still writing in my head.

By “writing in my head” I mean I’m kind of sub-consciously working out a plot point in my head, or letting a turn of phrase buzz around my brain and inspire a scene, or letting my eye absorb details that would one day come handy. I empty my head of thoughts, and while a part of me is working at something (usually physical, like laundry, or going out on an errand), the other part is in a trance, dream-writing.

I have come to believe that a writer is a writer even when he or she is not writing at that moment. I have learned to make all my writing downtime into a preparatory for my regular writing, when all the dream-writing lights off sparks on my real page. Which is why I was very happy when I read Natalie Goldberg in Writing Down the Bones, because she describes exactly what I do:

“….right before you are planning to write, a good preparation is to become an animal. Move slowly, stalking your prey, which is whatever you plan to write about, no matter what else you might be doing at the moment–taking out the garbage, walking to the library, watering the garden. Get all your senses intent. Turn off your logical mind–empty, no thoughts. Let your words come from your belly. Bring your brain down to your stomach and digest your thoughts. let them give nourishment to your body. Have a round belly, like Buddha, breathing all the way inside. Don’t hold in your stomach. Be patient and measured. Let the writing percolate below the level of thought forms, in the subconscious and through your veins.”

Do you dream-write as a preparatory to your actual writing?

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In my editing of Legend of the Protectors, my friend, Tes Hilaire, asked me to work on my visceral reactions. Okay, if I knew what they were, it would make it easier to work on them. So I did my research and came to the conclusion, this was a very important part of writing. So, hence this blog post.

What is a Visceral Reaction?

Ebbi Thomas at Effective Mind Control dot com had the answer. These “reactions are triggered by emotions within milliseconds, ahead of your conscious awareness. Adrenalin increases to prepare your body for a fight or flight response. Your heart beats increase to improve blood supply. Blood pressure rises and breathing changes. Acidity increases in the stomach. Your excretory system prepares to clear toxin. Your endocrine system produces the adrenal hormone cortisol.

A visceral reaction occurs quickly, before you become aware of it. Paul Ekman, the famous emotions scientist, reported ‘We become aware a quarter, or half second after the emotion begins. I do not choose to have an emotion, to become afraid, or to become angry. I am suddenly angry. I can usually figure out later what someone did that caused the emotion.’ The nervous system processes all the available information and drives you to anger, or despair, within just half a second. Each visceral response occurs before you know it. Nature also provided laughter to counter this response.”

Well, our characters can’t always laugh off these reactions to keep from getting a stomach ulcer, but that’s okay. We need to be aware of these reactions and add them in our writing.

That said, I’m working on this and hope to improve my writing with Visceral Reactions.

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Sarah is writer looking for an agent. She is currently working on novel # 4, editing novels 2 and 3, and querying novel # 1. For more insight to her work, visit: http://legendoftheprotectors.wordpress.com/ or http://legendoftheprotectors.blogspot.com/

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You can still send us your hooks and or pitches and we will put them up on Sundays.

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Sarah is writer looking for an agent. She is currently working on novel # 4, editing novels 2 and 3, and querying novel # 1. For more insight to her work, visit: http://legendoftheprotectors.wordpress.com/ or http://legendoftheprotectors.blogspot.com/

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You’re in the bookstore or library and you have a screaming kid wanting to leave. You have about 15 seconds to read the blurb on the back of the book. What hooks you into picking it up and buy it or checking it out?

Can you hook your readers? An agent?

We want the hooks for your book. This is not a contest, it is to see if you have what it takes, in 3 paragraphs or less, to hook us. Email them to us and we will give you a post. You can get comments on the perfection of your ability to hook a reader or how to improve it.

I’ll put up some of mine as well.

Let’s see if we can’t come up with those first lines of the query. A great hook.

And if you need help with your hook, check out Querytracker’s blog. Elana Johnson has great helps with your query. Here’s the link to the hook.

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Sarah is writer looking for an agent. She is currently working on novel # 4, editing novels 2 and 3, and querying novel # 1. For more insight to her work, visit: http://legendoftheprotectors.wordpress.com/ or http://legendoftheprotectors.blogspot.com/

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The best way to get objective, honest feedback no doubt comes from a professional editor. But let me tell ya, I checked into that. Editors are expensive!

Sometimes we are blessed to find a great critique group or friend to help us edit. If we are REALLY lucky we get someone who will tell us how it is, without having to pay for it! But let’s be honest, not all of us are lucky enough to find someone in the industry that gives the right kind of feedback.

Although friends and family are GREAT to boost your ego and tell you how wonderful your book is and how every little edit has made the book a sure fire seller, they aren’t the best people to take advice from.

So what’s a writer to do? How can we tell if our book is really ready or worthy to get published?

Here are some good indicators that your book may need some help…

1. You’ve found a few beta readers who are also writers. They were super excited to read your novel, but two chapters in…they stop reading and suddenly you aren’t hearing from them. It’s possible your book may need some help. If they aren’t begging for more, chances are, you’re not hooking them enough.

2. You’ve broken down and sent out tons of query letters. You’ve been reassured that your query is flawless, but you are still getting form rejections. It’s a good indication that your book may need some help. If your first chapters are not able to get you any type of feedback, chances are, you’re not hooking them enough.

3. Your friends and family aren’t too excited to keep up with your changes, updates and edits. In short, they are bored. Friends and family are usually our BEST critics, if we can’t hook them our book DEFINITELY needs help!

If you have experienced any of these my best advice is to work on the beginning of your story. Make it full of hooks and impossible to set down. Just like Julie Andrews said, “Lets start at the very beginning, a very good place to start!” (Oh how I love The Sound of Music!)

Have you ran into any other signs that make you sit back and think, “Maybe my book needs a little more help?”

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Marybeth is an aspiring novelist currently working on her second novel. For more information visit her website www.marybethsmith.com. She also has a blog Desperately Searching for my Inner Mary Poppins where you can keep up on her moments as mother, wife and writer..

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