My editor called today to say that she liked the work I did on the revision for The Forest for the Trees. Especially the ending. I no longer thought it worked, too overblown, but I kept moving paragraphs and sentences around like the wheel of a combination lock, hoping they would click into place if I got each sentence lined up just so. Finally, I scrapped it and started fresh. I think doing that is almost always the best solution to pages that have been over-worked.
So, dearest darling beloved readers of this blog. FFTT will come out next fall. I owe you a lot for helping me find my mojo again as the ever positive and cheerful promoter of writers and all things bookish. We will have to have a party. I may even get a fresh quantity of customized pencils made. I know you want them. You do.
One last piece of business. Check this out from today’s PublishersMarketPlace new deals column:
FICTION: DEBUT
Laurie London’s BONDED BY BLOOD, the first in her Sweetblood series, about a vampire warrior who must protect a human woman with a particularly delicious blood type from the vampire predators who hunt her, to Margo Lipschultz at HQN, in a two-book deal, by Emmanuelle Alspaugh at Judith Ehrlich Literary Management (World).
That coulda been us. ‘Nuff said.
Filed under: Books, Publishing, Writing |
Betsy Lerner 
im so happy that you finished! i just returned the forest for the trees to my library, and i have to thank you for putting it out there. the information was clear and it answered so many of my questions. thank you!
Is it just me, or does this new vampire book have a hint of deja vu?
Can’t wait for TFTT next fall.
And then there’s this. Still have my vampire proposal out there…..
Stephen King’s First Comic Book
by Shannon Donnelly from The Daily Beast:
Stephen King is finally taking the plunge into comics with American Vampire. Its creator, Scott Snyder, speaks with The Daily Beast about the high-profile guest writer.
I just want to thank you for this blog and the fact that you actually read submissions. Of late, I’ve been getting passes signed” “Editorial Intern.” That does not instill any hope for us. I know agents are busy, but the gatekeepers for published books are “Editorial Interns?” Betsy Lerner is the best.
Nah, I’m sure you never really lost your mojo. It was probably just buried beneath the submission pile.
Let me know when the party is; you can sign my copy of the new edition with one of your witch-titted pencils.
Awesome. Does the revised book include a chapter on writing and marketing your vampire book?
Let me begin by saying: Congrats on finishing your revision of The Forest for the Trees!
Let me follow up by saying: I went to a dinner party over the weekend thrown by a friend of mine who happens to be a literary agent (sci fi/fantasy/horror). Welp, he quite happily shared with me the details of a recent deal he had made for one of his authors — to the tune of several hundred thousand dollars. A two-book zombie tale. I glazed over and felt like a zombie myself as the details unfolded: a 27 year-old author, her manuscript rescued from the slush pile, and her living in the sticks of Western Buttfuck New York. A long strand of drool spilled from my lower lip to my belly button as my Literary Agent Friend spoke softly of the touching love story within said zombie novel(s). It took all I had not to ask, “Oh? Does the heroine fall in love with a vampire?” Unfortunately, the best I could offer up in the moment was, “Fuck her.”
So am I just another jealous writer, angry because the memoir I’ve been working on will probably only fetch a few thousand dollars IF a) I ever finish it; b) if I ever find agent representation and c) if said memoir is actually ever published?
I am happy for my friend (really, I am; he’s a good guy and I’ve known him for many years now and, well, he deserves his recent good fortune). Perhaps I should redirect my anger toward the consumers — the few of them that are left. Because you know they’d just eat up another “Tuesdays with the DaVinci Load” or “Marley, Morrie, and Me: Tales from a Sage, Diseased Old Man Who Shits His Pants While His Cute, Retarded Dog Humps My Leg.”
Yours,
Zombified & Disgruntled
Well I, for one, thoroughly enjoyed reading that. In lieu of having to write something similar myself. Thank you. I would totally read Marley, Morrie, and Me.
But have we no sense of history? Remember back in the early 1990s? When Anne Rice’s vampires were the hottest way to read soft-core porn disguised as genre fiction?
Well I do, and I remember what came after that: Angels. You couldn’t get away from angels in the late 1990s; some people said because of the looming Y2K thing, but I think because we’d had enough of those damn vampires. And angels, I predict, are going to be the Next Big Thing, along with Mayans. Sexy angels, conflicted angels, angels in love with humans, angels in love with Satan (who is supposed to be pretty hot stuff himself), angels with wings like peacock feathers.
Let’s get ahead of the curve, here.
Tuesdays With My Hot Mayan Angel, anyone?
Sarah Palin_ 1.2 million for HER!!!! memoir. Oh yes, she has a platform.. and won;t comment more since this is not a political blog.
She won’t comment because its not written on her hand.
Mazel tov on finishing. That’s huge. How Ever Does She Do It? One sentence at a time, I suppose. And HELL YEAH I want a pencil! Just say the word and a SASE’s en route.
Lapidary, that’s the writer’s life. Nothing to do with fame or fortune. Congrats Betsy on the revision.
Congratulations!
Come next fall I’m going to offer special classes, side-by-side readings of FFTT, wherein we parce the changes and annotate the choices of voice, tense, and syntax. We Lernerologists are particularly interested in the use of the subjuntive and four-letter words.
Congrats on being finished! Huge accomplishment right there.
Yay Betsy! Congratulations.
I’m walking on fresh snow up here but the sun will be shining on it soon. Can’t wait to see the new edition!
Great news about the new edition–except that means the ones I’ve been buying/hoarding and gifting to promising students will soon be out of date. Guess I better gift a bunch of them this year to get ready.
Congrats on the revised version of your book coming out soon. I love the first one. Still do, so no past tense, so it’s gonna be strange reading a revision, but I’ll still be doing it.
As for the vampire thing – If I see another f’ing vampire book, I’m, well, I’m tempted to say something overdone, like I’m gonna jump off a bridge, but hell, I don’t wanna jump off a bridge, so there you go. I’m guessing we’re stuck with vampire crap for a while longer, although doesn’t it feel like saturation point has GOT to be here soon?
Please wear those kick-ass Mary Jane’s in your cover photo for this fresh new edition of FFTT.