What Would You Do?

by Elaine Grant

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            I wrote the perfect manuscript.  Just suited for a certain popular category series populating the shelves of all bookstores, superstores, drug stores, and of course Amazon.com.   I sent it off, expected a call within the week from not one, but multiple agents.  Of course, when they called, I would mention the other four books I have planned for the series and would immediately be offered a contract for those, too.   Ah life would be good.  Champagne, chocolate, dreams of royalty sheets with actual positive dollar amounts--five figures...  Because, of course, it was the perfect little book. 

            NOT!   As I soon learned from a spate of rejections from coveted agents.  Anything from a boilerplate We were not sufficiently enthused... blah, blah to those horrid little quarter sheets of paper announcing We are just swamped with submissions therefore are exempt from being polite or even having to cut this rejection strip on a straight line. 

            Then, that “good” rejection letter.  The one that says, I can’t offer representation now, but this is what I saw wrong with your book  and if you want to revise, I’d be happy to look at the work again.  Aha, a hint.  Nothing really concrete.  Hmmm, wait a minute!  She’s suggesting I change the PERFECT MANUSCRIPT.  What could be wrong with this agent that she didn’t recognize perfection when she saw it? 

Now the real problem.  Do I follow my heart and leave this book carved in stone or spend the time revising a 350 page manuscript that the agent still might not like?  I’m Pisces, the fishes swimming in opposite directions.  I did both.  I saved a copy intact, just in case.  Then started brainstorming the broad suggestions from the agent with my critique partners and others.  I discovered a couple of things.  Some of the problem was in my synopsis.  It gave the bare bones of the story, but didn’t put in the emotion or reflect the pacing of the story.  One experienced author who read my synopsis thought the black moment came in Chapter 4.  When I protested, no, it came in Chapter 16, she said immediately, “Then you have serious problem with your synopsis.”  She also pointed out some possible snags in the plot, as well. 

Did I end up revising the book.  Yes.  Was it worth it?  In this case, yes.   The agent took me on as a client, and subsequently sold the book..

To revise or not to revise:  It’s always a personal decision based on your feelings about your manuscript, balancing possible payoff against work required, and, in my case, how the book is being received overall.  In this case, because I’d already garnered a few rejections, I knew something was off-kilter.  I considered the fact that this agent took time to give me suggestions when most don’t bother.  And I rewrote.

What would you do?

Copyright© 2007 Elaine Y. Grant
All rights reserved

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