Tag: literary agents

I Again Worry About What Happens When Literary Agents Do ‘Due Diligence’ On Me

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

You just can’t escape yourself, you know. Or, as my mom would say, “You take yourself wherever you go.”

So, in that regard, I’m kind of saddled with being a freaky weirdo in a very demonstrable manner on the Internet. I bring this up because once I start to query this scifi dramedy novel I’m working on — probably in late spring 2026 — any literary agent worth their snuff is going to search for me online.

This leads me to blanch. I just can’t help who I am and I can’t help what I may have written online over the years. I call this the “kook tax.” It’s the tax that only kooks like me have to pay.

Anyway. I just can’t help who I am. For better or worse, I’m unique and that’s probably going to turn off some of the liberal white women who probably make up the majority of literary agents.

Though, in my defense, most, maybe nearly all, of my political views fall within the spectrum that liberal white women would find agreeable. And, yet, I also know virtually no one takes me very seriously these days for various reasons and so, lulz, kook tax.

I think I’m brooding about all of this because of general insecurity about what it’s going to be like to query. Just from my occasional interaction with literary consultants, it seems as though some literary people — even pop literary people — take themselves a tad too seriously.

But a lot of that probably comes from…they’re just normal? They take the querying process really seriously and, what’s more, the entire querying infrastructure is designed to prevent people like me from succeeding in teh first place…so…lulz?

Querying This Novel Will Be A Whole Different Creative Era For Me

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’m going into querying totally, and completely, oblivious as to what to do. Whenever I start to query, all I will have is a finished novel and that’s it. I have a general idea of some of the elements of querying, but, in general, I have no idea what to expect.

Well, actually, I do know what to expect — it’s probably going to suck.

There are a lot of reasons to believe this. I’m too old. I’m demonstrably a kook as my writing on this Website can attest. The list goes on. Also, the closest novel I know to “comp” my novel to is about 20 years old now.

As an aside, I have noticed that the most recent novels put out by the Stieg Larsson estate seem specifically designed to be as marketable as possible…even though I’ve not managed to get through any of them.

Anyway, that was the whole point of starting this process all those years ago — I wanted to see how far I could get before I had to give up and or piviot to a different novel. I’m not getting any younger, so I should be working on a backup novel right now…but what I’m probably going to do is start work on a second novel once I start to query this mystery-thriller.

I write because I have to, not because I want to, so there.

Psyching Myself Up For Literary Agent Due Diligence On Me

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I’m determined to start querying this novel either this fall or next spring. I’m tried of writing and rewriting things and I’m prepared once this version is done to call it The Final Version.

As such, I know that the first thing any literary agent who is actually interested in this novel will do is search my name on the Internet.

I just can’t help who I am — I’m something of a kook and that’s just who I’ve always been. So I have to work under the assumption that I could write the great American mystery and, lulz, literary agents will think I’m too big a kook to take seriously and that will be that.

But that’s not going to stop me from trying. I’m going to query this novel anyway and see what happens. It will be fun, in its own way, to watch people who are clearly literary agents that I’ve contact poke around this Website at some point in the future.

It will be “fun” in the sense that I will at least be able to see in real time why it is I can’t sell the novel in the first place.

It’s Comical How Little People Take Me Seriously When It Comes To These Novels I’m Working On

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

I have the worst luck when it comes to getting help from people to improve this first novel I’m working on. Some of it comes from the fact that the heroine is a part time stripper and some of it is that well, lulz, people just think I’m a kook.

Naomi Scott as my heroine, Union Pang?

And, you know, maybe I am.

I suppose the dream of every artist is to be judged on the merits of their work, huh.

It’s going to be really interesting to see if I can get any literary agents to take me seriously at all. You know what will happen, of course — they will do due diligence on me, find this Website and laugh and laugh and laugh at what a huge fucking kook I am.

I call this the “kook tax.”

I just can’t help that I’m…different. I’ve always been different, but it’s really disheartening that “serious” “normal” people can’t lower themselves to at least read my novel to help me improve it.

Fortunately, I have AI now. That is really helping me get a little further in the process of improving the novel because the AI doesn’t judge me, even if it locks up whenever I ask it about particularly “spicy” scenes.

I just want this novel to be interesting enough that people finish it and want more. I have two more novels set in the same town and universe. If I manage to miraculously sell these novels, the fifth novel will be set in Asia, I think.

I’ll be 70 years old by the time that one comes out, though. Ugh.

I hate being old. I wanna have fun. I sell my novel, it be a huge success and then run around New York City drinking too much, banging hot 24-year-olds and staying up all night partying.

But, alas, that’s just not in the cards I don’t think. Even though I could probably do those things still, the whole context would be different to the point that it would give me pause for thought. People would look down their nose at me and think I was a creepy weirdo.

Sigh, sigh, sigh.

Some Thoughts As I Potentially Zoom Towards Querying In The Fall

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

Looking over the content I’m fusing together, it definitely seems as least within the realm of possibility that it won’t be a year from now when I query my first novel, but, rather this fall.

Four things come to mind as I contemplate this.

  1. The Novel May Be Too Long
    Because I work in terms of scenes, not word count — at least for a lot longer than you might think — I honestly don’t know how long this novel will be. While I’m aiming for about 100,000 words, there is a real chance I may blow past that and be closer to 160,000. That would really put a crimp in my dreams of ever successfully querying, but, lulz, this is a passion project and I just want to experience what it’s like to query.
  2. I’m Kind of Bonkers
    Any literary agent doing due diligence on me is probably think I’m nuts. I may just be too “colorful” for my own good. I just have accept that particular example of the “kook tax” and try to roll with the punches. But it sucks that that and my age may really in a cold, clinical nuts-and-bolts kind of way may prevent me from ever getting published traditionally.
  3. The Novel May Be Too Spicy
    There is a fair amount of sex in this novel, the point that that, unto itself, my turn literary agents off. And the fact that my heroine is something of a part-time sex worker might also cause some problems.
  4. I’m A Middle-Aged White Dude Writing From A Brown Female POV At Times
    There are a number of problems baked into the very structure of this novel from the get-go that may make it a no-go. I often write from a female POV in this novel. There are more than one POV within a chapter. And the chapters are probably a little too long at some points. All of those issues — while true to paying homage to Stieg Larsson — may really make it difficult to sell the novel.

An Aggressive Creative Drift

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It seems as though I’m going to continue to drift like always towards my goal of being a published author, but maybe in a little bit more aggressive manner. It seems as though I’m going to bounce around the six thriller novels I have planned so I can maybe have some sense of what’s been established in the universe as the novels progress.

Or something. Something like that.

And this doesn’t even begin to address how I have a scifi novel I’m also working on. Actually, it’s a few scifi novels.

I suppose, in a way, I’m trying to make the best of my tendency to not be very focused. But I’ll be happy as long as I am heading in the right direction of getting something, anything actually finished to the point that I can pitch it to a literary agent.

Of course, the issue of me just being too fucking weird could be a problem on that front. It’s enough to make me think about creating an whole identity out of whole cloth, like, I don’t know, a trans undocumented immigrant or something.

But, sadly?, I just don’t have the energy to do such a thing. Just accepted me — or not — for who I am. I just can’t continue to mope so aggressively as I have for months now.

Pondering The Querying Process

Contemplating The Looming Querying Process

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

While I still have the entire second half of the latest iteration of the third draft to make a pass through, it is beginning to sink in that I’ve just about entered the post-production part of my journey towards publication.

The fact that many, many, many people languish in the querying process for years and years gives me pause for thought. I’m not getting any younger and it could be that either I drop dead before I get published or I’m so old that it’s just kind of poignant and sad. I keep searching my mind for ways I could potentially make the novel better. But at this point, the issue is simply rewriting scenes that maybe haven’t been updated in ages.

At the forefront of my mind is how “spicy” the novel is. This element of the novel comes about in large part because of one plot point — my heroine is a partime sex worker (stripper) during course of the novel. She owns a strip club and on someting of a lark, decides to go back to stripping for the holidays.

I hope that I have written a novel that is as popular and an accessible as Stieg Larsson’s The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.

This really helps the novel be better — at least in my opinion — because it makes it edgy, and interesting in an unexpected way. I’ve never seen stripping depicted in the way I do in popular fiction.

But.

There is a problem of the “woke cancel culture mob” that hates heterosexual sex (apparently) and hates CIS white men doing anything — especially writing from a female POV. (I’m being rather droll in even mentioning this.) There are no easy solutions to this particular problem — I have realized what my vision is for this novel is and that’s what I’m going with.

It doesn’t help — I say this with a wink — that many literary agents are white liberal women. I have nothing against white liberal women, I just think the phrase is amusing and I can’t help myself and bring it up a lot as something of a running gag. (Of course, my use of the term isn’t going to help me any when literary agents start to do due diligence on me.)

What I need is an honest third party evaluation of the novel to get some sense of how the sex worker angle of the novel will play with an audience. I have no friends and no one likes me, so my ability to get that kind of input is limited or nonexistent — at least for free.

All my regular readers know me personally. I need someone who reads a lot who is willing to be firm — but fair — about what I’ve come up with. I suppose what I’m saying is I need a manuscript editor of some sort. But those don’t come cheap.

But I even I have to admit that I’ve pretty much reached the goal I started towards several years ago — writing a novel that doesn’t embarrass me. What happens next is anyone’s guess.

These Novel Writing Projects Are Existential

by Shelt Garner
@sheltgarner

It is becoming more and more clear to me that I could be nearly 60 years old before I become a published author — if that even ever happens. What’s more, it’s also clear that there is a pretty good chance that if the Petite Singularity doesn’t make all my hard work moot, that some sort of severe political crisis starting in late 2024, early 2025 might just do the trick.

My dream is that my “passion project” main novel is as accessible and popular as Stieg Larsson’s The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo.

And, yet, here I am determined to keep going with two different novels that I’m working on.

The key thing is that I manage my expectations. I’ve decided on an existential basis that I’m willing to use what little time I have left on this planet to at least TRY to become a published author, problems and obstacles be damned. I have a huge chip on my shoulder about my writing ability and I want to the validation of getting the approval of literary gatekeepers.

Having said all that, I am really working on my backup scifi novel. The main novel, the “passion project” has problems because its heroine is a part time stripper at club that she owns. I am WELL AWARE of how problematic this may be to younger people — especially women — but I really like how unique and unexpected this part of my heroine’s personality is and so, lulz, fuck it.

Meanwhile, the backup scifi novel is built from the ground up to be as marketable as possible. That’s the goal, at least.

In an ideal world, one of the two novels will sell and I could use the popularity of one novel to get the other novel published. But I have my doubts about if such a cross-pollination of success is possible, given that the two novels are of such different genres.

Anyway. I am pleased with what I’ve come up with and the goal is to wrap up a final third draft of the “passion project” novel no later that around July 22.

Video: Idle Rambling About The State Of The Third Draft Of My First Novel