The way to get an agent

Not that I know anything at all about this subject, mind you.
Just watched (for the umpteenth time) Julie & Julia, and it is like picking a scab: Gee, since it's so easy to get an agent /slash/ book contract, why doesn't everybody start a clever blog? The first time I saw the movie, my mother's elbow made a permanent impression on my rib cage when all the offers started coming in from people interested in Julie's blog - "See, that's all you have to do."
But honestly, most film treatments of the writer's life are like this. They're fairy tales, dressed up in modern clothing. As I've said before, the writing is easier than the selling. And the writing takes years (if you have to have a day job)...and the selling takes longer, unless you are incredibly lucky.
I say lucky because I don't think talent has much to do with it. I think that the publishing industry is just as susceptible to fads (mob behavior) as the general public. Maybe more so, even. For a period of several years, the only literary fiction being published was that written by people with a definite ethnic perspective. And then we went through a phase where everything (even fiction) was a memoir. Or wait, was it the memoirs that were fiction? Hard to keep track - but harder still to try and sell a mainstream novel. And don't get me started on vampires and zombies.
It's hard, folks. And I guess that's the way it is...but while the publishing industry goes through some seismic changes, let's not forget that companies such as iuniverse help the starving artist get her work out in the marketplace. Now if only an agent would take a look at it...

Reader feedback

I spent a couple of [lonely] hours sitting at Borders last weekend, waiting for people who wanted to purchase a signed copy of my book. One lady asked about it and purchased a copy. Today, I received a note from her via my website in which she wrote, in part: "I loved it. It kept me interested thru the entire reading. Great story writing."
That was worth the wait, I'd say.

Some background

Here is part of In Flight that was edited out. A little character development, part of my desire to understand what made Marta tick.

“Tell me something about your family,” Vasilli said.
In response, Marta leaned back in her seat and scowled at him.
“Okay, never mind. Tell me about your life in New York,” he prompted. “I told you about how I came to live in America. Tell me your story.”
“Okay, you want the sorry tale of my introduction to New York? When I first arrived, I stayed in a rooming house near 42nd Street. It was horrific – noise, bugs, rats, shootings outside - and this guy at the reception desk told me he knew a place for rent, that he’d help me get a decent place. But he wouldn’t take me there without something in return. That was the first time I had to make that trade. It got easier. Does that shock you?”
Although he squirmed in his chair, Vasilli shook his head. “Is that what you are trying to do? To make me uncomfortable?” he coughed. “Go on. Tell me your story. The real story. I want to hear that.”
Marta gazed at him for a moment, considering his request, before she spoke again. Her voice became low and choppy, as if she was reading a story about someone else’s life. In a way, she was – Marta felt herself disengage from the memories she revealed until they felt like a movie she’d watched once, long ago, or a play on an off-Broadway stage. She could see the scene in her mind as she described it to Vasilli: The room she rented from a couple of sisters living in an enormous ground floor apartment on Morningside Drive, which was probably one of the most dangerous parks in the city at that time. The two elderly sisters.
Marta lived with them for three years, in a small back bedroom that looked out on an air shaft. The apartment had five bedrooms, three bathrooms, two sitting rooms, a formal dining room and a library that was darkly paneled and filled with leather-bound classics it would take a lifetime to read. Marta spent hours in that room, reading, studying, while other borders came and went without making an impression on the reclusive law student.
The sisters had two rules – no visitors of the opposite sex, and no smoking. A list was posted in the kitchen of all the little things that “reasonable people” were supposed to respect. Like washing out the tub, cleaning your own dishes, wiping down the countertop. Never leaving an empty toilet paper roll, or putting unwrapped “female things” in the trash. The only thing the sisters asked was for the roomers to join them for tea every Sunday afternoon in the front parlor. Mostly Marta was the only one who would sit with them. They served those little English Pym biscuits and they’d use the real tea set, with china cups and silver tongs for the sugar cubes.
Marta paid almost nothing to rent that room, which was ideal since she had nothing to spare. She ate salad picked up from a corner deli, cramming half of it in her mouth before going to the scales at the checkout counter. Once a week, she might have a burger, just to get some protein. In the beginning, Marta worked at the library, shelving books and answering questions, working on her English by listening to tapes and eavesdropping. When she got her degree and first job, Marta stayed on with the sisters for a while as she saved up some money to get a nice place. They were starting to fail, starting to depend on her too much, so she realized it was time to move on. They eventually had to have nurses living in, taking care.
“The last time I heard from them,” Marta paused. “I’m not sure. I think I did see an obit just a little while ago. They both lived to be in their 90s. I wish…No, not that I’d kept in touch. I couldn’t help them, and they encouraged me to go out on my own.” She sighed. “I just wish I knew what happened to all those books.”

Here's my heart

Walking into a bookstore and asking the manager to a. sell your book, and b. allow you to speak and/or sign books there is like walking in the door, reaching a hand into your chest cavity, ripping out your heart and handing it to someone. Please, take it. Really, I don't need it any longer. My heart is here in these pages.
Doing marketing yourself after self-publishing is even better. You have to do it yourself, and therefore, no one wants to talk to you. As if the beating bloody heart you just offered is diseased somehow. So no, thanks anyway. We'll wait until you're famous and have a marketing department pushing your book on us. Which we will then complain about too. Because we never get any say about what we sell. Duh.
So, it's hard.
What's gratifying is the emails, facebook posts, and yes, even phone calls from people telling you they finished the book and loved it. One friend took it on vacation to the British Virgin Islands and left it there in the lending bookcase at the pier. How cool is that?
And it really is wonderful to walk into a public library in, say, Farmington, and to be welcomed by a very nice librarian named, say, Hal Bright, who offers you a cozy corner to set up and a bottle of water and even joins in the talk when another dozen or so brave the monsoon rains and come to learn about your book. THAT's what keeps this writer's heart beating.

Attracting readers

That's what we do when we market our books - try to get the story out to readers. It's why we write, yes? To share the stories of the characters that live in our minds and hearts? So if our objective is to make money, then I can't relate to that. Obviously, one would welcome the call from Oprah and a place on the New York Times bestseller list. But if that's why you write, then I wonder how involved your heart can be.
There's a place for genre writing: take the recipe or formula of the romance novel or mystery, and apply it to a set of characters and a time/place that provides a "hook" of some kind. And then, crank 'em out.
For me, the focus is about writing the kind of book I like to read, and then finding a way to share my excitement about it with others. Without sounding like the biggest egomaniac ever, it's hard to strike the right balance when you want to encourage people to read your book, share their enthusiasm (but not the actual book) with others, and help spread the word. The best thing is the word of mouth from readers who post comments or reviews that attract others to pick up the book.
Why read this, even? Is the constant struggle of a self-published author of interest to anyone? I hope it is. Writing a blog feels alot like being in therapy, without the feedback from the shrink in the chair. It IS all about me, and how I feel. And how much I need you to like my book (and therefore, me). Yikes! Time to stop now!!!

On the beach

Seems that In Flight has taken off at the beach, which is really fitting. So many people are reporting that they have read the book on vacation, although there are a few that haven't been able to wait that long. If you're heading to a relaxing place, take it with you (even to re-read). It's a good beach read, if I do say so myself.
A really pivotal scene takes place on the beach....and quite a bit of the book was written there, including the last 100 pages....so the vibes are right for a satisfying read. I started the book way back in the early 1990s, and wrote on and off during our annual trips to Turkey. Much of what I wrote in those days is in longhand in sturdy black notebooks. The vagaries of electrical power made working on a laptop a bit of a risk there, and the practice of writing by hand seemed to work better for me.
Later, when I was roaring through the last version, I took a week and went to Naples, FL, to the retirement home of my friends Beverly and Jack Bain. During that week alone at the beach, I wrote the ending, read 4 other books, walked, swam, and relaxed. It was the best time! I wish I could do it again as I reach the same point in my new book.
So, readers, let the novel transport you to another country, whether you're sitting on a beach in Cape Cod, Maine, Rhode Island, or somewhere more exotic, say a cruise around the Greek Islands. Enjoy!

The Lesson

Here's an excerpt from In Flight that shows the relationship between Marta and her mother.
Marta’s mother had lined them up every morning for the daily inspection, checking for clean hands, freshly tied headscarves, and minty breath. Sometimes one had a crumb or a dollop of toothpaste briskly removed with the corner of her apron, dabbed in spit. A lock of hair would be tucked in, a scarf retied with head-squeezing precision while a stream of praise and admonitions came from Mother’s nervous lips. Marta had no idea if they were still alive, her parents, and what had happened to the sisters who once followed her like matryoshka dolls, each garbed in a similar colorful combination of skirts and scarves and scrubbed faces. They grew up together, her mother like an older sister at times, and remembering this, Marta felt bereft for the first time in years.
She closed her eyes, and a scene played out like a movie behind them, as vivid as yesterday, the smells and tastes causing her mouth to water a bit.
Day after day, they had followed the same routine. It was a hard life, and they kept inside a very small circle, with no television or radio to bring outside influences into their quiet home. As Marta got older, she started to fight it, to fight her parents and the oppression of their narrow lives. Sitting in the park now, in the twenty-first century, the afternoon sun warming her face, Marta shivered as she recalled the first time she challenged her mother.
Every afternoon, they returned home from school to Mother’s eager greeting. She would greedily empty Marta’s books onto the table. By the time Marta had shrugged off her coat and poured a warming cup of tea, Mother would be examining the papers dumped from the book bag. She was short and thin with angular bones in her face and dark chestnut hair covered by a flowered scarf tucked behind the ears and knotted loosely under her chin. Mother always wore a floral-print housedress that clashed badly with the scarf, but she rarely noticed her appearance. Marta often shuddered at the thought that she would grow up to look the same way, and it bothered her, not because her mother was unattractive, but because Marta was fearful of living the same life. All the girls were smothered in some way by the force of their mother’s personality, her neediness. She yearned for education and had taught herself along with her eldest child to read, write, and perform mathematics, all of it without the knowledge of her husband, and all the time pushing Marta to excel.
Watching her mother that night, Marta had reached up and pulled off the bland paisley scarf that covered her own hair and for good measure loosened the braid twisted at the back of her head.
As expected, the reaction was shock and disapproval.
“Why did you do that?” Mother demanded. “We’re going to have to fix it before your father gets home, you know.”
She snapped her finger at Marta’s hairline in a stinging rebuke. Shaking her head, she pushed the math book toward Marta and opened her notebook. Marta hitched her feet in the rungs of the chair and took a long sip of tea.
“I don’t have any math homework today. We had a test,” Marta announced.
“Well, let’s review the test and go over the material for tomorrow,” Mother pushed.
Marta thrust her lower lip out stubbornly. “I don’t need to review. I got a one hundred.”
The four sisters looked up from their books at the change they heard in Marta’s voice. Mother started fussing about ungrateful children and back talk, and Marta held the glass of tea and fixed a stare at her through the steam. As usual, Mother’s speech ended up with the importance of education and the sacrifices she made for her girls.
“Why is it so important that I go to school?” Marta asked, for probably the hundredth time. “Father thinks that it is a waste of time.” Red-faced, her mother ignored the question and started turning the pages in the math book.
“Let’s go to work,” she said. Marta sighed. It must have been the thousandth time she’d heard that announcement sitting at this table, and she rose to refill her cup of tea. Turning back to the table, Marta picked up a history book and sat down.
“You go ahead and study the math,” she said. “If you have any questions, you can ask me. I need to memorize this history chapter.” Marta avoided her mother’s face but felt her sister’s sharp kick under the table. Mother sat quietly looking at the math book for a long time, and the girls read in silence until little Nilgun—always curled in the window keeping watch on the street—yelled that their father was coming.
The books were swept aside as Marta hurriedly tied her hair back and pulled on the headscarf. She was laying out the silverware when Sevgi poked her hard in the ribs. Marta grabbed her arm, and Sevgi hissed, “Why are you being so nasty to Mother? Would it kill you to teach her that math?”
“You teach it to her,” Marta said as she released her arm.
“She doesn’t want to study with me, stupid, just you. She’s not interested in learning the same stuff over again. She only wants to study with you.” Sevgi turned back to the table as Father opened the door and greeted the family with a grunt. He went to the sink to wash up, and the evening ritual began. Marta sat quietly during dinner, absorbed and confused by the sudden surge of power that she felt over her mother.
Father rose from the table and left for his evening of bridge at the café down the street. The table was cleared and the dishes washed as usual. Mother pulled the history book from the pantry and sat down to quiz Marta on the dates. Her eyes sparkled each time Marta missed an answer, and Marta in turn challenged her mother to answer them without the book. Sevgi took the text, and the two began to match wits against each other.
The teapot hissed and jiggled in the background. Faces flushed from the competition, mother and daughter drank from the hot glasses until the little girls fell asleep and were carried to bed. Marta returned to the kitchen and, without speaking, opened the math book and began to work the problems with her mother.
Their relationship changed that day, Marta knew. Someday, Marta could leave and have her own life. While she still lived at home, she vowed to do what she could to help her mother improve herself. Maybe she, too, could find a way to have a better life. Education was the key for both of them, and Marta never again asked why she needed it, never again gave her father the power to veto her options.