Writerly updates
As tightening UK immigration laws are making it look like it's basically going to be impossible for me to stay here when my visa expires next year (1 March 2013, to be exact, unless someone would like to offer me a £20,000/year job? I'm working on it), I've decided I need to focus on some of the more positive things going on right now, which coincidentally all seem to revolve around writing. Yay!
-I got to speak to an agent and a publisher about my current novel at this pitch event last Thursday. They had this open submission thing where they then selected 10 writers to speak to, and I was chosen to be one of them. It wasn't as nerve-wracking as I thought it would be, but I still babbled like an idiot for most of the ten minutes I had to speak to them privately. Anyway, the outcome is that if my manuscript is complete within the year, they'll both take a look at the whole thing.
So, I now have given myself a deadline of 24 June to have the first draft of novel #3 complete. Can I make that deadline? Probably, if I stop writing on LJ...
-Today I emailed my work to another agent recommended to me by one of my lecturers. He told me that she is happy to look at unfinished work from students at my university (and is willing to represent Americans), so I decided I should send my stuff over. So, that was done this morning. We'll see what happens there.
-Got a one on one tutorial with the head of an Ivy League MFA program in the States who was visiting our uni. He liked the short story I gave him to look at and gave excellent advice on how to fix stuff and ideas on how to extend the story. I can see why he's the head of such a department. The guy was a master at giving critical feedback in a positive way. He also said that I seemed to have the "sensibility" to become a professional writer, so that was uplifting.
-I'll possibly be published in my uni's student literary magazine. I know this because I'm also on the editorial board for the magazine, so I saw that my entry made it to the second round of judging. But I promise no nepotism is involved! I never reviewed my own entry and I don't really know the other people doing editorial because they're all in a different program than me, so no friends amongst them. The editor-in-chief and her co-captain were deciding on the final entries today, so we'll see.
-My Sherlock story has been through its second round of edits and is now in the proofreading/brit-pricking stage! So, I will have something published this year, though it'll be under a pseudonym and I won't be telling any of family about it because they don't know I write fic. (Family just shouldn't know about all the ways you can torture Sam Tyler.) But still, I'm excited!
-As part of one of my courses, my uni is helping me do a mini-Writing in Residence type thing somewhere in London. They're going to help me approach the Imperial War Museum so that I can do some research there or something. This is in the early, early stages yet so I have no idea what will happen.
And in non-writing news excitement -
culf and I are finally getting a new microwave! It broke in January and we've been waiting for the letting agency to get around to replacing it. It was finally delivered to them today and they're going to bring it over, hopefully tomorrow.
So, that's the news/progress. I will hold onto all these things as I try to cope with the idea of just what the hell I'll do if I'm sent permanently back to America next year.
-I got to speak to an agent and a publisher about my current novel at this pitch event last Thursday. They had this open submission thing where they then selected 10 writers to speak to, and I was chosen to be one of them. It wasn't as nerve-wracking as I thought it would be, but I still babbled like an idiot for most of the ten minutes I had to speak to them privately. Anyway, the outcome is that if my manuscript is complete within the year, they'll both take a look at the whole thing.
So, I now have given myself a deadline of 24 June to have the first draft of novel #3 complete. Can I make that deadline? Probably, if I stop writing on LJ...
-Today I emailed my work to another agent recommended to me by one of my lecturers. He told me that she is happy to look at unfinished work from students at my university (and is willing to represent Americans), so I decided I should send my stuff over. So, that was done this morning. We'll see what happens there.
-Got a one on one tutorial with the head of an Ivy League MFA program in the States who was visiting our uni. He liked the short story I gave him to look at and gave excellent advice on how to fix stuff and ideas on how to extend the story. I can see why he's the head of such a department. The guy was a master at giving critical feedback in a positive way. He also said that I seemed to have the "sensibility" to become a professional writer, so that was uplifting.
-I'll possibly be published in my uni's student literary magazine. I know this because I'm also on the editorial board for the magazine, so I saw that my entry made it to the second round of judging. But I promise no nepotism is involved! I never reviewed my own entry and I don't really know the other people doing editorial because they're all in a different program than me, so no friends amongst them. The editor-in-chief and her co-captain were deciding on the final entries today, so we'll see.
-My Sherlock story has been through its second round of edits and is now in the proofreading/brit-pricking stage! So, I will have something published this year, though it'll be under a pseudonym and I won't be telling any of family about it because they don't know I write fic. (Family just shouldn't know about all the ways you can torture Sam Tyler.) But still, I'm excited!
-As part of one of my courses, my uni is helping me do a mini-Writing in Residence type thing somewhere in London. They're going to help me approach the Imperial War Museum so that I can do some research there or something. This is in the early, early stages yet so I have no idea what will happen.
And in non-writing news excitement -
culf and I are finally getting a new microwave! It broke in January and we've been waiting for the letting agency to get around to replacing it. It was finally delivered to them today and they're going to bring it over, hopefully tomorrow.
So, that's the news/progress. I will hold onto all these things as I try to cope with the idea of just what the hell I'll do if I'm sent permanently back to America next year.