out the door
Every year the SCWW conference hosts a silent auction to help offset the costs of the conference. The biggest sellers are the critiques offered by conference faculty (usually agents but sometimes publishers and authors pitch in as well).This year, instead of bidding on a basket of books that will end up in my teetering To Be Read pile, I decided to plop my money down on a professional critique. I’d met with two agents (Holly Root and Janet Reid) and received good (but completely different) reviews on the first ten pages of Mountain Malice, so I decided to bid on the critique offered by publisher Karen Syed of Echelon Press. She was offering not only a basket of books, but a critique of the first 100 pages of my manuscript.
My last minute bid got me the last minute win!
So finally, in the wee hours of the morn, I submitted my excerpt to Ms. Syed. Now, may the waiting begin. I wonder how long it will take? The auction bid sheet said to provide the excerpt within 30 days and the critique would be returned within 30 more days. So hopefully I’ll know how much of my novel needs to be cut by the end of the year.
Not a bad Christmas present, if I do say so myself.