By Lacey Gunter
I have been on vacation for the past seven days and it has been lovely. I have been doing tons of reading, a fair amount of relaxation and bucket loads of family bonding. But, sadly, it all ends today and I have to step back into the reality of everyday life.
As I think about the week ahead of me, my stomach does a 360 flip. In one week from today I will be doing my very first live pitch with an editor. I only found out about the opportunity the day before I left on my vacation and I am totally not prepared. I have no idea which book to pitch or how exactly to do it. A few days after that I will be participating in my first twitter pitch session. Ahhh, I need help! I need inspiration!
I have done a little bit of reading up on how best to do both, but I am feeling completely overwhelmed. I know I need to dig up everything I can about the editor's likes and dislikes, but I haven't been able to find much concrete information on her in my genre so far.
Once I finally decide on the best manuscript, I need to come up with a great pitch and learn it well enough to be able to discuss it with ease, which should involve a fair amount of practice on other people.
So, assuming I am able to pull that all off in one week, what else do you all recommend? I know some of you have done this before, so what is your best piece of advice? What do you wish you had known or prepared for beforehand? What do you wish you hadn't done? Any and all feedback will be much appreciated. I promise to add my two cents to the discussion afterward for anyone else who is trying to prepare.
So please, HELP ME!
I have been on vacation for the past seven days and it has been lovely. I have been doing tons of reading, a fair amount of relaxation and bucket loads of family bonding. But, sadly, it all ends today and I have to step back into the reality of everyday life.
As I think about the week ahead of me, my stomach does a 360 flip. In one week from today I will be doing my very first live pitch with an editor. I only found out about the opportunity the day before I left on my vacation and I am totally not prepared. I have no idea which book to pitch or how exactly to do it. A few days after that I will be participating in my first twitter pitch session. Ahhh, I need help! I need inspiration!
I have done a little bit of reading up on how best to do both, but I am feeling completely overwhelmed. I know I need to dig up everything I can about the editor's likes and dislikes, but I haven't been able to find much concrete information on her in my genre so far.
Once I finally decide on the best manuscript, I need to come up with a great pitch and learn it well enough to be able to discuss it with ease, which should involve a fair amount of practice on other people.
So, assuming I am able to pull that all off in one week, what else do you all recommend? I know some of you have done this before, so what is your best piece of advice? What do you wish you had known or prepared for beforehand? What do you wish you hadn't done? Any and all feedback will be much appreciated. I promise to add my two cents to the discussion afterward for anyone else who is trying to prepare.
So please, HELP ME!
Well, I pitched to an agent, not an editor, but I don't know if that makes any difference. I think I went into it thinking she would be some kind of scary beast, but she wasn't- she was a very sweet person, in fact. I wrote up my pitch ahead of time and practiced it a bunch but I still had it in front of me when I pitched (it wasn't memorized, but I knew it well enough I could make good eye contact while I read)- I'm glad I did it that way, b/c I think if I tried to memorize it I would have psyched myself up for a major crash and burn.
ReplyDeleteOne thing that threw me off is that the agent asked me how the story ends. I mean, I knew how it ended but I was trying to get her to ask for more by way of a manuscript request, not a, "So how does it end?" So be prepared if they want a synopsis that includes the ending.
I did get a request for a partial, which I sent, but it still needed some work. The agent did give me some great feedback, though.
My advice: know your stuff and just RELAX! And just think of it as a good opportunity, not the Final Judgment of Your Book. Personal taste has SO much to do with it.
Good luck!
If I could help I would but alas I can't all I can do is let you know I was here
ReplyDeleteLacey that is so exciting...you are going to be fantastic! Keep us posted. I want to hear what happens :)
ReplyDeleteExcited for you! I've never pitched to an editor, so I have no wisdom to share, but I will pray that you have peace of mind about the whole thing. I think when we are are at peace, we are at our best.
ReplyDelete