Slamtastic!

Kristen King

www.inkthinkerblog.com — Yesterday’s Pitch Slam at the Fourth Annual BookExpo America Writer’s Digest Conference was an amazing experience. There were 23 agents to choose from, covering nonfiction, fiction, and children’s writing. I spoke with three (the lines were loooong).

As I mentioned in an earlier post, one agent, was completely not helpful. Unfortunately, he was the first person I spoke with, and it was so bad that I almost didn’t go to see anyone else! After 30 seconds, I realized how stupid that was and hopped in another line, but for about half a minute, I was really doubting myself. I thought I was going to burst into tears. This is not by any means what he said, but this is what I heard after I pitched my idea: “Don’t ever write anything ever again — not even a phone message. You’re an embarrassment to writers everywhere. Seriously, don’t even pick up a pen for the grocery list — you’re that incompetent.” It was awful. Then, I reminded myself that one man’s opinion, however strong, is not necessarily correct, and I know that my idea is a good one. I made a few notes about what constructive comments I could take from the three-minute interaction with him (and that was hard, let me tell you), and kept going.

The next agent I spoke with, Kickass Agent, was awesome. After waiting for about half an hour (during which I had some very pleasant conversations with the people around me), I pitched my idea and he loved it. “Don’t waste your time dicking around with this agent crap,” Kickass Agent told me. Mine was an idea he said I could take straight to the publisher, and we both had the same “perfect publisher” in mind, which I’ll call Really Big House. Well, check this out: Editorial Director of Really Big House happened to be right down the hall, and Kickass Agent
told me to go talk to her like now. The only thing an agent’s going to do is take 15% off the top, and you don’t need that with a book like this, Kickass Agent explained. Really Big Publisher will take something like this straight from the author. Good luck, he told me.

I had met Editorial Director earlier in the day in passing, but didn’t feel ready to make a direct pitch, so I jumped in another line an struck up a great conversation with the romance writer with the amazing nonfiction book idea while waiting to talk with Agent Who Doesn’t Work on My Kind of Book But Thinks the Idea Is a Good One and I Should Take It Directly to Editorial Director of Really Big House Who Happens to Be Right Down the Hall. I guess that one’s kind of self-explanatory, huh.

So then I took a deep breath and headed down the hall to the room where Editorial Director of Really Big House was hanging out and reintroduced myself. I told her that two of the agents I had spoken with had suggested that I come directly to her and would she have some time to talk with me soon. “How about now?” Um, okay. So I pitched my idea and she was totally psyched about it. “It’s very needed,” she told me. We talked about the other title in their backlist that dealt with a similar topic but with a very very different focus from what I had proposed, and about what she had in mind for a book dealing with the topic area. We batted a few ideas back and forth. “Would you like to see a proposal for this?” I asked. She sure does. I left with high spirits and her e-mail address.

Forgive the dimwitticism, but needless to say, I’m psyched. Editorial Director of Really Big House wants to see a proposal from me. Wow!

I met back up with some folks I’d seen earlier and found out that two agents requested one friend’s book, and several other new pals had had great success as well! I ALSO learned that Guy Who Hated My Idea That Everyone Else Liked was really unreceptive to everyone I ran into who had spoken with him. I have yet to hear of a single idea that he was excited about. I’m sure there were a few, and I know that he has a very good reputation and is a great writer (I have a couple of his books in my library and one on my wish list!), but it sounds like he just did not have a good day yesterday. Once I got over the initial panic that followed his reaction, I stopped taking it personally, but it definitely helped to know that it wasn’t just me.

The moral of the story is that if you have a good idea and you know it will be awesome, stick with it. One great piece of advice I received yesterday in one of the sessions went something like this: “If anything can stop you from being a writer, it will. If nothing can stop you from being a writer, then nothing will.”

I will definitely be keeping that in mind while I work on this book proposal… Yipee!

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www.kristenkingfreelancing.com
Finalist in 2006 Writer’s Digest Best Writer’s Website Contest