I’ve been away from my blog for what seems ages. But I do have good reason. I’ve been in Texas, working.
Honest, I have. And here are the pictures to prove it.
First, you find an awesome group of friends. Above, I’m with the adorable, Jenny Hansen, best room-mate ever, Piper Bayard, my gorgeous twin, Ingrid Schaffenburg, and the Godmother of us all, Kristen Lamb. This picture was taken after a long and stressful dinner with NYT Bestseller, James Rollins, and a ton of other people. (I think Nigel Blackwell is taking the picture and bitching at the amount of time we took to say goodbye to each other).
Then, we invaded Lamb Ranch to do a little character R and R. Originally, my antagonist was a mild mannered gal whose only crime was to return her library books back two days late. Kristen ripped her apart and turned her into the Terminator’s ‘Sarah Connor’. Can you spot the difference?
Piper and I became so obsessed by our characters, we shot up the place.
We thought I’d missed the tin can….then on closer inspection found I’d hit it with every shot. 🙂
Afterwards, we went riding on the ATV’s at night across snake infested land…. just ’cause we’re hard as nails.
Unfortunately, it was all too much for Spawn. He may need a few more years training…..
So, back to business. How to hook an agent the ‘SOO’ Publishing way.
N.B. For those who haven’t been following my Facebook page, and I will shoot you later, ‘SOO’ stands for ‘Squeeze One Out’ – a term I used while stormchasing when wanting a wee or tinkle as the Americans like to put it. Unfortunately, to the Americans it means ‘No.2’ and I was saying it every time we stopped for gas – which averaged ten times a day five days of the week. No wonder they looked at me a little weird. ‘SOO’ Publishing will publish any novel…… as long as it’s c**p.
Right, the tried and tested way on how to snag that all important literary agent.
1. Gate-crash a writing conference party. The DFW Writers Convention is excellent!
2. Along with a friend (I recommend Jillian Dodd), find a likely male candidate. The more vulnerable he looks, the better. For the purpose of this blog and because I don’t relish a law suit, our agents name will be kept a secret 🙂
3. Start a conversation to break the ice. We began with the very boring, “so, what genre do your represent?”
4. Then make it more personal. We used questions like, “what are the names of your mum and dad?” and “what is your inside leg measurement?”
5. You’re almost best friends at this point so go for broke. Ask about his Abs and whether you can take a picture. If their face begins to redden, offer to do this in a secluded corner of the room.
6. Then, lure him back to a hotel room and ply him with drink.
You will have an agent for your novel by the end of the night – Guaranteed! If not, don’t untie him just yet. Take further pictures, if you know what I mean. It will help your cause immensely and he will cave in to your demands by morning.
If you’d prefer to take a more serious route, (you boring lot), then check out these posts:
Ingrid Schaffenburg’s Top Five Lessons from DFWCon,
Jess Witkins Celebrating her Writing Slump,
David Walker’s take on the DFW Convention
Julie Glover’s Ten Things to do at a Writing Conference
Tiffany A White’s What Writers Really Do at Conferences (apart from the above)
Jenny Hansen’s DFW Con and the Flu…Oh My!
And, Julie Glover’s Vlog – you can see us in the background, plotting.
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Donna Collins' Blog 