Author Spotlight: Travis Erwin

I met Travis many moons ago when we were both contestants in the Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award Contest I've talked about a million times on this blog.

He's a native Texan, a meat eater, who loves his beer. He's 6' 5", nearly 300 pounds, oh, yeah, and he writes women's fiction.

Yes, I said women's fiction.

Did you spit out your coffee at the thought? I know, right?

In his own words on the profile on his blog, this is why he must write "girly stuff" *giggles*:

"I have to write the stories that fill my head. I’m obligated to be the voice for the characters that speak to me, because they’re not going to shut up either way, and at least on paper I can act like they exist for a reason. Otherwise, I’m just a guy with multiple personalities."

He's an interesting cat for sure and I'm writing about him because his book, Twisted Roads, is now available for purchase on Amazon. 

Today he's having a Twisted Party on Facebook and giving away some prizes. Go check it out.

He also has a guest post on author, Amy Sue Nathan's blog today that reveals more about the twisted road of his publication journey. You can read it here and you should. It's pretty interesting.

And he's a really good Scrabble player too. He's kicked my ass a bunch of times on Facebook, but I've got him back a few too.

If you want to know more about Travis, you can read his blog, Bacon, Beer, & Books.

You can also find him on Twitter @TravisErwin.

The Query Process.

I'm deathly scared. I've sent another query out today. I'm sick to my stomach. I know the feeling will pass shortly, but I always feel this way after I hit the submit button.

For those of you who've not yet made it to the query process, let me give you a rundown. A query is nothing more than a one page letter. It should state book title, genre, and word count.

Then you need to summarize your book in a way that gives them a feel for your writing and makes it pop off the page.

Any credentials, list them. Of course first time writer don't normally have any, so there's that.

Lastly, you need to personalize the letter. Tell the agent why you chose to write to them. This tells them that you know who they are, what they represent, who they've sold.

That's it. You're done. Most of them don't want to even see a page of your work. They judge you on that one page letter, so you better make it good.

This is why I'm sick to my stomach. I think finding an agent is the hardest part of the business. Writing, awesome, revision, not as fun, but a necessary evil. Getting published? I only have one experience with that and it was less than two weeks. But it took me a long time to find an agent. Over a year for the superhero book, which is now being transformed into something else. Probably about six months with Never Eighteen.

Be prepared. Thicken your skin. You will get rejected. Don't take it personally, agents get thousands of queries a year, have piles of manuscripts on their desks to read, plus have to represent the clients they already have.

If you're getting ready or are already in the process, good luck. If you could send some good vibes my way too, I'd sure appreciate it.

The Agent Search Has Begun

It's begun. I've queried two now, one through meeting at conference, one through referral. Yesterday I did my research on agentquery.com and came up with a list of fifteen more to query in the upcoming weeks. I'm thinking five a week.

I have a few top ten lists I'm going to go through. Top ten most queried, most accepting, most unresponsive, most rejecting, and research, of course, the most accepting and see if there are any that are a good fit for me, and try and avoid the other ones (they don't all rep YA btw). Of course one of my dream agents is on one of the other lists, so, you know, I can't avoid them all.

I've also gone back to the Blue Boards. It's been a long time, so I'm listed as a newbie again. :( I was a frequent poster before. The Blue Boards were pretty much my bible when I started the journey to publication. I'm in Verla Kay's debt for the invaluable resource.

I'm also curious, if I query an agent I know reps friends, do I mention that? Even if they didn't really refer me there? And if I mention them, do I mention that they didn't refer me there?  Maybe I should ask my friends, but getting some unbiased opinions would be good too.

Anyone else out there on the quest for an agent?

Okay, wish me luck.