Reminder: today's the contest deadline!

Hi all,

Just a quick Monday stop-in to remind you that today's the last day to enter our mini-contest. Win a query bio critique, here on the blog, by posting a response to last week's writing prompt.

As with the previous contest, I'll leave the comment section for the prompt open until first thing tomorrow morning; assume that if you're able to leave a comment there, it's not too late to enter.

The original post (where you should post your contest entry) is here, and if you have any amazing stories from your weekend, I hope you'll share them in the comments for this post.

Happy Fall (in the northern hemisphere)! I'm off to have more coffee.

Please send me LGBTQ manuscripts.

Thanks for all the thoughtful comments on the headache post, guys; I'm going to try a bunch of that stuff and will report back on what's working. E., the no-caffeine thing is a good idea but I don't see it happening-- but we'll see.

I wanted to put this post up ASAP, rather than waiting any longer; there's an awful story going around the internet about literary agents telling authors to take gay/lesbian/bi/trans characters out of their novels. The link I have is here.

I don't have a lot of time today to get creative with this, but I wanted to go on the record as saying (and here I'm going to blatantly copy and paste from the link!)

I would love to see books whose characters are diverse in all or any respects, including but not limited to gender, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity, religion, disability, and national origin.

The words may not be mine, but the sentiments are.

I can't speak to the veracity of the story (EDIT: see link below), but I'm happy to say I don't personally know anyone in the business who would counsel such a change. The publishing industry is always struggling with diversity; it's an industry that tends to be overwhemingly white/European-American, college educated, East Coast (specifically NYC), and with a slight female majority. But that means that there are many, many points of view that are less familiar to the industry as a whole, and those points of view tend to be underrepresented.

It's up to all of us, whatever our part in the process, to work to overcome that. I hope you'll help me bring more diversity to the books that are published.

EDIT, a bit later: The industry is still swirling about the post I linked above; in the interest of fairness and not stirring the pot, here's a link to another blog post giving the other side of the story: http://theswivet.blogspot.com/2011/09/guest-blogger-joanna-stampfel-volpe.html

I still absolutely, really believe that the publishing industry needs more diversity, but I also don't want to get dragged into finger-pointing or anything of the sort, on this or any other issue. As a colleague of mine just Tweeted, one of the best things we can ALL do is to vote with our wallets. Here's a list that Malinda Lo put together of recent LGBTQ YA novels. http://www.malindalo.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/09/LGBTQ-YA-2009-11.pdf

On finding time for your goals.

It's the first day of school here, and even though it's still pretty warm outside, it's overcast and a little rainy; it FEELS like a school day. I'm channeling my first-day excitement into a new copy of my to-do list, which is less daunting than I'd feared, and plotting out my next steps and my priorities for the next few days.

I talked a little in my last post about my desire to create more structure for my days, especially to carve out more time for reading manuscripts during "the work day." It's a real job hazard of working in publishing that the work-reading can take over all of your leisure time. An editor whom I follow on Twitter posted today that among her plans for her "day off" today was to finish editing a manuscript. Most (acquisition/line) editors do most of their editing at night and on the weekends, so this is not at all unusual, but I was struck by it all over again: editors use their time off to do the work that most people think of as their primary task.

Editors, at least at the bigger houses, spend an incredible amount of time in meetings, and when you add in emails and phonecalls and lunch dates with agents, there really isn't much time left in the day to read or to edit. But I, as an agent, have a lot more, um, agency to set my own work-day agenda. I attend far fewer meetings, and at least most of the time I can schedule my phonecalls for a time of day that's convenient for me and my workflow.

Thinking back on my two hours of reading goal, I'm reminded of a close family member of mine, who upon her retirement a few years back, took up exercise in a big way. She is diligent about it, seven days a week, unless she's got a terrible cold or is traveling, and I think both the exercise itself and the routine make her really happy. We talked about it recently, and she told me, "I have to make it a priority, or it doesn't happen. I start inventing excuses."

This, it strikes me, is true of a lot of things in our lives. I love watching TV, and can easily while away the entire evening that way. But when I spend a lot of time watching TV, I have (deliberately or not) made my TV time my priority. (Remember NBC's slogan, "Must-See TV?" And how many times have you heard the phrase "appointment viewing" or "appointment television" applied to this or that HBO or critically acclaimed drama?)

So even in the face of a to-do list full of a million other tasks, I've decided to make my manuscript reading a priority today.

How about you? How do you carve out time for the things you care about?

New Year's Resolutions

School starts here next week, and even *cough* years after my high school graduation, Labor Day still feels like a new beginning. I miss having the excuse to buy school supplies. Especially pens. Are you guys obsessed with pens, or are you all devout computer-only types?

My all-time favorite is probably still the Pilot Precise (V5, black or blue ink), used in conjunction with a spiral-bound notebook, unlined, with paper thick enough that the ink won't bleed through. My thoughts seem to unfold differently (better) when I write by hand instead of typing. I often compose first drafts of my submission letters that way; it's as if my brain keeps up with my hand/s better when the mechanical process of writing is slowed down.

I'm a serious list-maker, as I think I've mentioned here before. I often have multiple versions of the list going in different places (not always a great idea) because I derive so much satisfaction from writing things down, but it's really not the same if I'm typing the list-- too sterile, and too detached. It's harder to remember the items on the list, too, somehow, if they're not in my handwriting.

Most of my lists are of the to-do variety. I'm currently experimenting with the Auto-Focus system, which Erin Doland at Unclutterer linked to a few weeks back. It's working pretty well so far, but I find I still need a secondary list of the day's "musts," to make sure nothing slips through the cracks. But I do like it, and it's worth trying if you are looking for a new technique for keeping track of all the different parts of your life.

But I also love making lists of other things, and one of the most satisfying (personal) things I've done in the past several years is to do the "101 in 1001" project. There's a link here to a fancy sharing website, but I just made my own without getting all high-tech or social media about it. Part of what the "deadline" did for me was to encourage me to make time for all the "someday" items on my list.

I'm sorry about all of the "unnecessary" "quotation marks" today, guys. I'll move on to the grocer's apostrophe in my next post, I promise.

Anyway.

I didn't come close to finishing my 101 in 1001 list, but it got me out of a rut, and reminded me that weekends are not just for laundry and the grocery store. I'm thinking I'll do the project again soon.

Right now, though, with the new school year upon us (or already begun, in many places), I'm itching for some New Year's Resolutions. Here's a couple of mine. If you're inclined to join me, I'd love to hear yours as well.

-Get faster at responding to queries, especially the ones that I'm excited about! Too often, I set aside the really good ones because it's easier and faster to deal with the quick no's.

(An aside: Jill Corcoran of the Herman Agency had a thoughtful post a couple of days ago about why she doesn't send rejection letters-- I assume she refers here to rejecting the initial query, not a manuscript she's requested from the author. I try to at least write a "this isn't right for me" form letter, so at least the author knows the query didn't vanish into an electronic black hole, but I'd really like to hear how you feel about all of this, being on the other side of the table.)

-Impose more structure on my work day so that I don't spend all day on email or phonecalls. Block out at least two hours a day just for reading, both client work and prospective client work. Get back to prospective clients while my thoughts on their manuscripts are still fresh in my mind.

-Find or DIY a notebook and pen combo that will fit inside my e-reader case, so I can keep better notes as I'm reading. Maybe then I can stop wondering what I meant by a Kindle note that reads like this: "I want to knww moe abt the crmny pls... also why j said hat in the last ch"

-Develop a more realistic sense of what can get done in a given week. Make a good list of the "musts," work through them diligently, and stop beating myself up about anything that has to be shoved to the next week.

-Twitter every weekday.

-Blog at least three times a week, unless I'm traveling. I am, as always, open to requested topics!

What's on your fall list? Tell me all your secret plans.

Time's up!

Comments are closed on all the writing prompt entries-- but if you didn't get a chance to enter the contest in time, don't let that stop you from writing on any of the prompts that inspire you.

Back with contest results early next week.

Thanks for making summer extra-fun, everybody!

Public Service Announcement

Hi all,

A kind reader brought to my attention that people with WordPress blogs had trouble leaving comments under the old comment system, so I've switched to a new comment form on the blog. So if you've had trouble commenting in the past, I hope you'll try leaving a "test comment" here.

New writing prompt is coming right up!

Writing Prompt #1

I'm glad you guys are excited about the writing prompt idea. So here's your first one:

"What I Did on My Summer Vacation."

But I want ludicrous, spectacular falsehoods. Make up every bit of it. Were you a stowaway on the last space shuttle mission? Too bad. Write about something even crazier.

Post your prompt-response (someone please give me a better term for that, ugh) on your blog, and post a link in the comments. I promise to read all of the entries. Maybe later this summer we can have some kind of a grand prize-- a query letter critique or something, if you like. Let me know what sounds fun.

Don't have a blog? Why not start one?

EDIT: So, let's do this: post a response to any of my writing prompts between now and August 26, and I'll pick one winner whose query letter I will then critique on the blog the following week. (We can remove the identifying details, if you want; we'll figure that out later.) I'm not promising representation, but I'm not ruling it out either...

Tell your friends!

On the fabled "summer slowdown."

I can sense August around the corner: my email inbox is quieting. Publishing industry folks and prospective clients alike are heading out on vacation (or at least taking a "tech vacation," a very 21st century term for a practice I highly recommend). Things feel a little sleepy at this time of year. I know I'd certainly rather sit on the patio with a glass of white wine than put the finishing touches on the "tough love" critique letter I owe one of my clients.

It's a great time of year for daydreaming, I think, and that makes it a great time of year to brainstorm ideas for new writing projects.

I'm thinking of taking a break from the "inside baseball" posts for a few weeks, but I've been missing all of you. If I posted writing prompts for a while instead, would anyone play along?

I'm thinking it would work like this: I post the prompt, and you write on the prompt on your blog (and post a link in the comments-- I promise to click over and read!). If your favorite genre is haiku, you can put the whole thing in the comments.

What do you think? And how is your summer going?

On getting back to routines.

I'm back in my office on this rather warm NYC day, after a nice long weekend. Hope yours was good, too.

Not gonna lie, though; I'm having trouble this morning with the re-entry. Does any of this sound familiar?

"Oh, of COURSE checking Twitter counts as work." (I'm @millercallihan, if you're interested.)

"I should really say hi to everyone in the office before I sit down at my desk."

"I'm just going to read my email before I do the three things I promised myself I'd get done before lunch."

And so on.

Really, though, part of the reason I'm stalling is that a lot of what I need to do this morning is to make phonecalls-- especially chasing payments for my clients-- and it seems cruel to call anyone the minute they get back from their long weekend. (After all, there's a Twitter feed to catch up on!) And presumably some of them, when I do finally call, will still be traveling, extending that nice long weekend just a little bit longer.

So I fear today won't be as productive as I'd hoped.

Fortunately, I have a backup plan: a long list I made before the long weekend (hooray!) of all the things I want to tackle this week. Chief among them, after the phonecalls, is to catch up on my reading, especially my clients' manuscripts. And that I can do no matter who's available.

Which leads me to another topic: professionalism and communication. One of my authors was good enough to email me to let me know she's going to be out of town, and out of email contact, the rest of this week. Hers is one of the manuscripts I need to give feedback on this week, but now that I know she's away for a few days, I know I can have until Friday to get back to her with my notes, leaving me to concentrate on other things in the meantime.

My work life is packed with these kinds of decisions, and I am always, always grateful for updates like J's.

Your turn: tell me about someone who's impressed you with their professionalism, or something you strive for in your own professional life. These needn't be writing- or publishing-related; I'd like to think behaving like a pro translates across all industries, no?

On coffee

I'm doing a caffeine-fueled happy dance over this.

hello out there

Hi there.

My name is Courtney Miller-Callihan.

I'm a literary agent with Sanford J. Greenburger Associates, Inc., in New York.

My agency webpage can be found here.

And now I have a blog!

So what would you like to know?