Tag Archives: agents

Fate but not destiny

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I was revising a manuscript today and using thesaurus.com, trying to come up with the correct way I wanted to describe this feeling my heroine was having. Then I realized why I couldn’t put my finger on it. The idea I was trying to capture was yuán fèn. The fate of bringing two people together. It’s not love at first sight. It’s not attraction. There’s no word for it in English.

There’s another saying about yuán fèn that translates roughly into: “Fate without destiny”. That’s when two people are brought together, but it’s just not in the cards that they stay together. The English saying of “Not meant to be” just doesn’t capture the bittersweet sadness of “Fate without destiny”.

So to turn my thinking back on its tail, which I like to do —
Lately I’ve been getting better responses to my queries, which is a little spot of happiness. This week has been a roller coaster. Started the week with some awesome requests to be followed up with a couple disappointing rejections. It’s all part of this cycle and I’m thinking that these agents and I, so far we have fate but not destiny. My query and opening pages are getting my toe in the door and that’s a big start. I’m just not closing the deal and I need to work on that.

There are still nibbles out there. I have to get those requests from earlier in the week out and hopefully this time, destiny awaits. Enough spiritual philosophizing – back to work. Destiny wants the lazy description in this paragraph polished up.

My new writing playground

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I have yet another playground on the internet – Miss Snark’s First Victim’s blog. Self described as a blog for aspiring authors, the site’s mistress “Authoress” is currently hosting a Secret Agent contest. Aspiring authors send in 250 word entries to be critiqued by a faithful following of bloggers as well as the Secret Agent of the month, who is actually a literary agent. Get this – the Secret Agent comments on every entry that makes the cutoff. A guaranteed agent critique! This month’s call for submission included romance so I jumped into the fray.

I’m getting some great pointers in my entry and reading the other entries is really helping me get a sense of what works in an opening. There are some very conscientious and thoughtful critiquers following this blog. Many of them are familiar with each other’s works, commenting that “they like the changes” or “it’s come a long way”. I might have to hang around a little more, though the last thing I need is another internet vortex.