Monday, October 24, 2011

Here's the windup.....and the pitch!

The world series is going on and it's nearly Halloween, so why not throw a little of both in here. This past Saturday, my critique partner and I went to the Hearts of Denver Romance Writers conference. Neither one of us writes romance, but it was open to any genre and we had the opportunity to pitch to an agent. The idea was that we would give this a shot and see how it went, you know, kinda like being in the bull pen, practicing.

We get there and I find out that I'm the very first pitch of the day - right after the welcome and introductions. Here is where is gets Halloween scary. I think I might have looked like Elsa Lanchester in the Bride of Frankenstein. I'm pitching to an agent from New York, not a local agent, but one from the city of the New York Times Best Seller's list (cue Psycho music).


So during the introductions/question and answer session, we meet the agents. They are normal people. They even seem a little on the nervous side themselves. Okay, maybe this won't be so bad. This line of thinking did nothing for my Tell Tale Heart, which was trying to beat it's way out of my chest. Taking a few deep breaths, squaring my shoulders, and putting on my most determined face, I made my way to the table and introduced myself. After that it was a blur. I actually managed to recite my pitch (log line/elevator speech) from memory (and the crowd roars!) and I answered all the questions he asked without hesitation and satisfactorily. Then when I expected him to say, 'Well, it sounds interesting, but I don't think you're ready.' he takes his business card, flips it over, clicks his pen, and writes on the back, '50 pages and synopsis' (hallelujah!). My critique partner, Lisa, came away with the same results. We are happy and ready to learn about openings and query letters, and even though it was a long day, it was a good one.

The day ended with getting my blog fixed up and some delicious chili prepared by Lisa's daughter. A big thank you to Lisa, Brandi, and family. It was great to meet Lizzie T. Leaf! And thank you Jim McCarthy, for chasing the ghouls away and giving me the chance to tell you about my story. I hope to send those 50 pages soon!

Bwahahahahaha,
Robin

1 comment:

Unknown said...

yeah, it was scary, but we did it!! It was nice to have our first pitch go positive even if he did ask for every author he met with to send them their first 50 pages...that does not matter, he asked for ours lol!