Email readers, heads up! For the full effect, pause after the excerpt and decide if you would turn the page? Vote and then scroll for the reveal!

Trained by reading hundreds of submissions, editors and agents often make their read/not-read decision on the first page. In a customarily formatted book manuscript with chapters starting about 1/3 of the way down the page (double-spaced, 1-inch margins, 12-point type), there are 16 or 17 lines on the first page.

Here’s the question:

Would you pay good money to read the rest of the chapter? With 50 chapters in a book that costs $15, each chapter would be “worth” 30 cents.

So, before you read the excerpt, take 30 cents from your pocket or purse. When you’re done, decide what to do with those three dimes or the quarter and a nickel. It’s not much, but think of paying 30 cents for the rest of the chapter every time you sample a book’s first page. In a sense, time is money for a literary agent working her way through a raft of submissions, and she is spending that resource whenever she turns a page.

Please judge by storytelling quality, not by genre or content—some reject an opening page immediately because of genre, but that’s not a good-enough reason when the point is to analyze for storytelling strength.

How strong is the prologue opening of this novel—would it, all on its own, hook an agent if it was submitted by an unpublished writer?

I always knew I would die young.

My mother perished in the throes of childbirth. After several losses, she was overjoyed to give my father an heir at last. She labored three days, but by the time she birthed a baby girl, her life’s blood had drenched the sheets of the bed. She was but twenty years old.

My care was henceforth entrusted to my mother’s elder sister, Prudence, a sturdy woman who had not a husband of her own. I remember Prudence quite fondly, but when I was seven years old, she was seized by a prolonged fever, and on the fifth day of the illness, her breathing ceased. She was nine and twenty years old.

By then, I had grown old enough to tend to myself and help with household duties. My father provided cornmeal and flour and a roof over my head and later arranged my union

Sometimes the writing life sucks. It’s hard to get your story right, hard to get an agent, hard to get published, hard to make the 1,001 decisions if you self-publish, hard to get attention, hard to get reviews, hard to get sales, hard to do it all over again but better. Rejection can come from critique groups, editors, agents, publishers large and small, reviewers, or readers. Acts of God or poor publisher timing or lack of support can derail a project with promise.

Most of the time, we writers roll with this because, let’s face it, we choose it over and over again. We know it’s part of the package. And because we’re weird, we even love it.

Sometimes.

Because there are those times when you feel the rejection. You feel it. You can’t just bounce up and get back at the pencil/pen/keyboard with a smile. Your failure (whether perceived or actual) looms over you, weighing you down.

I’m modeling this post after The Big List of Pleasurable Activities used in Cognitive and Dialectical Behavior Therapies, a list of healthy responses to keep on hand when you fall into a funk.

So here is a list of ways to get going again after failure (whether failure is due to your own determination or an exterior rejection of your work). There will be times you don’t need any of them, times you could practice a bunch of them, and there are some that will call to you, tug on you. Your mileage may vary. In any case, each one is a practice, meaning one repetition won’t work—put in the reps!

REACH OUT

Tell someone you’re taking it hard. It doesn’t have to be a fellow writer, but if it is, you’ll get some good commiseration and encouragement. Way back in the early years of the Writer Unboxed Facebook group (10/26/12), I wrote this:

I’m putting this whine here in hopes that someone can commiserate. You know those days when you’re sanguine about repeated rejection – you expect it, you prepare for it, you enter each one in your little spreadsheet that tracks submissions, and then move on? Today is not one of those days.

I got lovely responses that made me feel like I was part of a community who got me. You are also part of a community of writers, of people who understand rejection, who are willing to talk …

It’s the memoir we won’t share outside of our writing group, for fear we’d be found out. The fantasy trilogy started in 2017 that we can’t write past the first book—which has ballooned to 143,000 words. The YA novel rejected by 104 agents. Or, in my case, the crime fiction that received three contract offers, each of which collapsed for its own strange, dodged-a-bullet reasons.

Our abandoned stories. The ones we never finished. Or the ones that seem finished with us. At what point do we give up on them entirely? Or is there something to be salvaged?

While there’s a world of difference between the unfinished manuscripts and the novels that failed to sell, they exist on the same continuum. How we view the potential they still possess might depend on the questions we ask.

What is this literary skeleton still asking me?

I started work on a new story in the fall of 2017, a few months after the publication of my second novel. The first chapters gushed out like water from a thawed pipe. Then came months of barely a drip. One day in the early spring of 2018, an unrelated premise jumped out at me, fully formed. I ran the idea past my agent: she was all in and I was off. I abandoned the earlier work.

Years later I opened the Scrivener file of the 2017 manuscript and reread the scenes. I felt energized and inspired. In the interim, I’d written two contemporary novels with real-world settings and ripped-from-the-headlines-of-my-own-life themes. Suddenly, a timeslip fantasy felt full of possibility and a chance to escape. I was eager to find out what happens in that world, to those characters. My affection for the story—and the spark that started those first words flowing—remained. It felt worth my time and attention. Again.

Am I staying with this project out of love, or out of sunk-cost grief?

This is a big one for me. From the spring of 2018 through early 2023, I wrote a novel that landed within the police procedural/psychological thriller categories. Through the wreckage of a divorce, three job changes, a …

The great news is that as novelists, we actually do get to live moments differently, sometimes six different ways. We get to reconsider, erase previous actions or words, even say or do something completely opposite to what happened before if we want to. It’s called “revising your novel” and given that it’s by definition a “do-over” you’d think I’d find it more fun, or exciting, or something, instead of a job I know has to be done, like washing the dishes or cleaning the litter box.

After a multi-year break from writing fiction, I finished my fourth novel a year or two ago. I sent it to several friends to read, got some feedback, spent six months cutting it from 130K words to 100K words and rewriting and revising so all the cutting made sense, and then I sent it to a new round of readers and got wonderful feedback. And then, dear reader, I did nothing. I didn’t send it to my former agent or query new agents or send it to one of the illustrious editors who’d worked on my previous books. I did nothing.

I told myself it was because the writing of the book was the real victory for me, that completing an entire novel after so many years of not writing was all I needed. Writing the book had been exciting and challenging, joyful even, so much so that I didn’t need to do all the work to get it published. I’d had three books published and had attention and awards and I had nothing to prove.

It was a good story, the story I was telling myself about finding fulfillment in the writing process and not needing anything more. Only it was a lie. Because deep down I knew the book still wasn’t quite done. In spite of the glowing feedback from friends, I knew the real reason I didn’t send it out to agents or editors or publishers …

Greetings, WU fam! Welcome to another installment of my regular series, Up Close, where I interview authors at all stages of the publishing journey and share their wisdom with you. Today I’m delighted to feature writer (and friend and agency sibling) Deena LeVon. Deena’s path to publishing has been somewhat unconventional—Hollywood interest in her first manuscript, agented yet also soon-to-be self-published—and I thought her insight would be particularly helpful to those straddling the self-and traditionally published worlds. In this Q&A, Deena talks about what inspires her, her almost-TV option, and how she went from no platform to an email list of over 7K and a social media following of nearly 12K in just over a year. Let’s dive in.

GW: I’m a fan of origin stories, and though the term is usually used to describe superheroes, I love to use it when talking about writers. So, what’s your writer origin story?

DL: For this, I have one word: Twilight.

To explain, my youngest son was about ten months old, and he wouldn’t sleep through the night. We’d go downstairs in the wee hours and sit on the living room floor. He’d play with his toys while I read the Twilight series, stories I loved. I’ve always been an avid reader, but the idea of telling my own stories sparked while reading those books in the middle of the night with my baby banging on his toys. Little did I know how long this journey would be, how heartbreaking at times, and, even more often, how fun and fulfilling.

GW: You’re an agented author who’s about to self-publish a novel, The Prodigal. Tell us a bit about how you came to self-publishing while agented. 

DL: In 2024, I lucked out and landed an amazing literary agent, Rockelle Henderson, at the Rock Inked Literary Agency. For me, this meant reaching a giant milestone, and I am grateful to be part of the Rock Inked team. My first novel, The Compound, a dystopian romance, went on submission later that year. We’ve received great feedback, an R&R, and notable Hollywood interest, but we’re still waiting for the right deal.

One editor commented on my lack of a social media presence, and that spurred me to write a reader magnet piece, a mafia romance novella called The Sacrifice, to get my newsletter going. It was well received and …

Just two of the topics that have been topics of discussion as of late…

Every genre has its readers, and every author deserves the chance to find them. In this  post, book pros weigh in on how to select useful comp titles and why a little professional courtesy goes a long way in building a stronger literary community.

Advice from a Librarian on Finding Comps

Helping library patrons identify new books is a regular part of Kathleen Reidy’s job at the Winchester Public Library in Massachusettes. She’s also the author of the recently released Y2K women’s fiction novel, Engineering a Love Story, so she really understands the work that goes into smart positioning. Lately, she’s also been working with more writers to find comparable titles for their WIPs. These processes have different goals, but there are similarities. On her Substack, What a Librarian is Reading (and Writing), Reidy offers some tips and tricks she uses in both areas. 

How to Play Nice in the Author Sandbox

Every few years, a genre, book or author will become wildly successful, seemingly overnight. Though as we all know, it wasn’t really overnight. Fifty Shades, Gone Girl, Rebecca Yarros and her dragons, Theo of Golden and now ROMANTASY (all caps required because it seems we live in romantasy times!). And it is hard to sell books. And it is really hard to watch other books, authors, genres go wild when you are earnestly writing, marketing, boosting yourself on social media etc. etc.

Here’s the key—rather than besmirching that new bestselling trend, find the grace to say “A rising tide lifts all boats.” I’ve heard some authors questioning the romantasy genre of late. These books are clearly hitting the hot spot of BookTok and people wanting escapism from reality. These books are ALSO causing readers to go to bookstores, book events, browse Amazon and go to book clubs. All of these activities are good for all authors. More people reading makes more people focus on books.

Just as large corporations need to be good corporate citizens, authors need to support authors.  The sandbox is big enough for all to play. —Andrea Peskind Katz of the Great Thoughts Great Readers Book Salon

Here’s a WU post I wrote a very long time ago and being a good literary citizen.

Please let me know if you have PR or Marketing questions that I …

As I’ve noted in some of my comments to posts over the course of the past year, I’ve turned away from fiction to focus on playwriting.

I actually began my writing career studying acting (I took no English classes as an undergraduate math major, satisfying my humanities requirements with history and anthropology).

And I had always preferred narrative-heavy, concept-driven fiction in my reading—John Hawkes, Jorge Luis Borges, Franz Kafka—so learning about the importance and mechanics of scenes was a revelation.

What’s prompted my return to theater is my concerns about the encroachment of artificial intelligence on fiction. I know there are sound arguments for its use by writers, but I felt a personal aversion to it. I could also see publishers, like employers in other fields, demanding their writers use it to enhance productivity (more books per year!).

I decided on a different path. I wanted to write for physical human beings performing in physical space in front of other physical human beings. And the occasional service dog.

I found an online playwriting class through the HB Studio in New York, which lists the legendary actor Uta Hagen as one of its founders. So far I’ve completed one complete three-act play and am working on a second. Among the lessons I’ve learned—and in some cases, relearned—are the following:

Scenes Are Still About Objective, Obstacle, Action

This is a technique I learned in scene study at the Jean Shelton Acting Studio in Berkeley and I carried it along into my fiction.

At the beginning of every scene I have to ask: what do the characters want? Ideally, they want different, even mutually exclusive things.

What stands in the way of getting what they want? Optimally, it’s the other characters’ pursuit of their goals that prevent each character from achieving theirs.

Finally, what actions do the characters take to overcome the obstacle(s) and continue striving to get what they want? A scene can involve multiple actions on the part of several characters as they adapt as difficulties mount, changing strategies given the failure of one attempt and the need to try another.

This brings up a point that I emphasize in every class I give on dialogue: people are never merely conversing or “shooting the breeze” in a story. They are acting on each other. They are using their words to persuade, to deceive, to mock, to plead, to humiliate, to praise, …

Such disappointment is not unique to me. When their years of effort drag on, many writers ask: What’s the point? If I don’t make it, will all the time, money and effort I invested be for nothing? 

It struck me that this is a moment where knowing your “why” can save you. As authors, we have all sorts of goals—validation, publication, legacy, fame, and fortune among them. According to Sinek, consumers are not as invested in what a product might bring its creator as you might think. In other words, readers want to know what you will do for them.

Sinek’s message made me wonder if we writers can more easily find our “why” by setting aside our identities as “writers” and thinking of ourselves as “leaders” instead. This led to some surprising parallels.

A writer is a leader

I came up with eight striking similarities between writers and leaders. You may come up with more.

Writers command full attention. The reader who enters the pages of your novel is voluntarily surrendering their thought life to this activity. Their attention is yours to lose. Do your work right, and you will direct their every thought. Picture, if you will, folks gathered around a campfire, all eyes on the storyteller—for the moment, their chosen leader.

Writers think deeply. While growing up, were you ever satisfied when your question why was answered with the word because? I thought not. The writer’s desire to dig deep for answers gives us an uncommon understanding for why people differ. Operating beneath this umbrella of inclusion is the hallmark of a great leader.

Writers manage crises. All. The. Live-long. Day. What further proof does a leader need that they’re the one in charge? The buck stops with them.

Writers recognize patterns. This is rarely accomplished …

Listen to authors and the middle is not a happy place to be. It’s described with words like morass, muddle, sagging, swamp. Characters get stuck. There’s a sense of slog, both in the writing and—sad to say—often in the reading. It’s sometimes a labor to come up with things to “happen”, which in turn can produce a feeling of routine. Story stuff gets done, but with lower drama.

Why does that occur? A primary culprit is the fallacy that a story is built out of a string of events. Cook up plot events. Keep stirring the pot. When a lot “happens” there’s a lot of story, yes? Rapid arrival of those happenings increases pace, true?

Not exactly. Events which we can visualize are part of what creates a story in the reader’s imagination, but that’s not all of it. The other major part is emotional cues, meaning not reported character emotions but for the reader points of familiarity: moments for which readers have analogous experience, dollops of recognition—ah-hah, yes, been there—which are how a story can vanish our surroundings and make us feel like we are actually present in a made-up world and that what is happening there is as if it happening to us.

(Those points of “connection”, BTW, are what editors are referring to in their rejection e-mails. I didn’t connect as much as I wanted to.)

In other words, if you look at the middle as what happens next, and next, and after that, and so on, then you are going to fill your pages with something more like a record, chronicle or diary. Not everything that can be set down is dramatic. Routine business is routine. The techniques of micro-tension can spark up anything but when a story is a more than all else a slave to time and visual events, there is bound to be slack.

Hence the drop off in momentum, tension and drama as we hit the middle. To counter-act that, it would seem that cutting out routine things and always jumping to the next big plot happening is the ticket. While not a wholly terrible idea, a race from bombshell to bombshell produces a thin reader experience. For …

A few weeks ago, on a rainy Sunday morning, my dog and I headed out for a quick walk before church. I do love the rain. Especially after a dry, slow-motion summer with smoky air and wildfires just over the mountain passes, after rainlessness has turned front lawns the color of camels (most Seattleites don’t water their lawns in the summertime), the rain helps me breathe. This morning’s rainy, concrete-colored sky suggested a return to rightness. 

I’m often seeking a return to rightness. While I didn’t get a Bipolar II diagnosis until my 40s, I see now I was a very depressed teenager. But because it was the 1980s, because I didn’t have the words to know what was normal, because my life, by all accounts, was pretty fabulous, I didn’t holler for help. I didn’t start waving my arms in the air, shouting, “Hey! Over here! I think there’s something terribly wrong with me!” until I was much older.

Without the language, without the vocabulary, my teenage self didn’t have the words to explain what felt off. Wrong. Dangerous.

Anyway … where was I? Oh yes. The rainy return to rightness.

I was also happy for raindrops because my emotional forecast indicated a 50% chance of morning tearshowers, and from experience, I knew rainwater offered the perfect disguise for tearwater. 

I grabbed three poop bags, called, “Be back soon!” to my husband, and hurried out into the weather. 

I wasn’t sure why tears were in my forecast. I only knew I was feeling a bit low. And weary. And pretty overwhelmed by the start of my school year and book promotion stuff. Plus, I had been worried about my mom’s health and my in-laws’ move into independent living. But come on, my book had just been published! I loved my teaching job and my students. My mom’s recent health scare was no longer so scary. My own adult children were, for the moment, doing great. I loved my husband. My dog was objectively cute. Plus, the day before, I had been thrilled and honored to be a panelist at a book festival on Bainbridge Island. Everything was fantastic!

Except: On yesterday’s panel, I had muffed my responses to the lovely moderator’s thoughtful questions, stumbling especially over the very first question: Can you tell us what your novel’s about? 

The other two authors muffed nothing. Their responses were pure elegance …