The Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Yesterday I blogged about the highs and lows of the NEC conference on Friday night. Today I’m going to discuss the good, bad and ugly aka, my agent appointment.

I was super excited about the appointment because the agent received the query and first 10 pages prior to the meeting. This way she had time to decide if she wanted more. The appointments last 8 minutes, after the brief introductions here’s how mine went:

Good:

I love your writing

Your dialogue zips along nicely

The flow from one pov to the next is fantastic

I LOVE your heroine’s unique name.

Bad:

BUT, the concept of a woman vigilante has been done before and I don’t feel I can sell this.

What else do you have?

I explained another book that is complete, but needs revision.

Her interest piques.

I’m thinking score one for me.

I say, “Maybe I could send you a partial?”

“Sure, you can go through the normal submission process online,” she says.

Ugly:

“Do you have any questions for me?”

I hate this question because I’ve read a lot about what not to ask. I bumbled through some question and realized the more we talked we weren’t a match. She was super professional and nice, but of course as a writer I want someone who is passionate about my work like me.

She asked if I had any more questions and I said no. I stood, thanked her for her time and left.

Time spent with agent? 4 mins.

As a first timer, it was an awesome experience and I learned a lot about what to do and not do. I’m thinking of self-publishing these contemporaries anyway, but it’s always nice to see what an agent thinks. Overall I had a lot of positives coming out of the meeting. She only made 3 minor comments on my 10 pages, so I was happy.

Tomorrow I’ll talk about the guest speaker and give away a book. :o)