Well, I have to run to work so perhaps I can "chat" more later. In the meantime, since it's my day to post, here are a few images of the slush/contest pile at Random House. Want to know why it takes so long to hear back? This is why! I do commend them for their organization. This does make me wonder, though, why I got discovered from the slush in the first place. I had no connections... I didn't know what I was doing... yet someone pulled my half-baked MS out of the pile and bothered to respond. I will be forever grateful to my editor, then at RH now at Viking, for giving me that chance. If she didn't, I may be working for minimum wage and doing something awful like working at a register right now! Oh... wait... I do DO that. Feel free to find me at Union Sq B&N and watch me grumble as I make change hour after hour after hour. Ho-hum, so booooring and mindless. Still, I wouldn't be where I am today, with my 5th book coming out in Oct. and 4 more under contact if I weren’t given that chance! I would be twice the loser I am today!
The wonderful designer who works on my books told me I need to stop fussing with photos and this blog and get back to work! So I shall….
meghan
3 comments:
well that is quite a slush pile... and a humbling visual reminder of our profession!
An editor (not Alvina!) at Kindling Words gave us numbers: she once had her assistant compute how many manuscripts they received in a week, then count how many they had published. THey had received hundreds of thousands (literally) and in 20 years, she had published 12 of them. Twelve.
So, Meghan, we really are lucky!!! I also was discovered on the slush pile, by Alvina. Can you photograph that one for us as it looks now?
Libby, are you asking me to photograph my own slush pile? It's not nearly as daunting as the one at RH! We no longer accept true "slush," so it's just my reading pile. I'll try to get a photo of that, but in the meantime, here's a picture of my inbox from February.
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