Agents, pt. 1

I wrote my first short story of any note in high school, back in 1969. My story was just for Pen & Ink, Haverford High School's monthly "literary" magazine. The 300-word piece was a dopey sort-of science fiction (natch) story that was really just a set up of a joke. This was the first time I was ever "published" and I use that word loosely because they were so starved for content that they rarely rejected anybody's work.

In college, I wrote a bunch of short stories and eventually got brave enough that I sent some into science fiction magazines with the hope of not only getting published, but getting paid to write. No such luck. I got quite a few rejection notices, very nearly all of them form letters, usually just pink slips with the same message. My final story, "Mars, Get Ready" was also rejected but this was accompanied by a personal note from an editor who told me that while this particular story was not suitable, I should keep at it. This was in 1973, the same year I wrote the first full draft of VIRUS 5.

Then life kicked in and I kind of stopped writing until 2001 when my second wife left me. That was when I got the idea for a game show called "The One That Got Away" and I said to myself, I can write a book. Why not? It took me about a year and by 2002, I had the first draft of what came to be known as Future Past.

I was well aware that Future Past wasn't good enough to get published but it showed me that I had the stamina to write a 330-page novel so I rolled up my sleeves and got to work on the full-length novel VIRUS 5. The manuscript also took me about a year to write and polish but no sooner had I finished that book when I got the idea for the second and third parts. By 2008, I had three (what I thought at the time to be) well-written novels forming a trilogy. Surely that would be considered desirable to prove you weren't a one-hit wonder. I knew the days of directly submitting manuscripts to publishers was long gone and the only way to get your foot in the door was through an agent. So I bought a book called The Writers Market 2008 and dutifully noted the section regarding agents.

In September of 2008, I hopped aboard what I now call the "agent-go-round" which is a never ending cycle of sending in query letters, the first three chapters and waiting. The more polite agents got back to you and told you that what you had wasn't their cup of tea or not suitable in some other way. Others never got back to you at all. The road was paved with unending disappointment.

Tomorrow, a sad footnote to the journey described above but why there may now be hope again.