Throwing Darts, Blindfolded

Alternate title: What I learned from entering a bunch of mentorship contests.

Hey writer people. I know it’s been another tumultuous week in the world of aspiring writers, with the most recent round of Author Mentor Match mentees announced yesterday. First, congratulations to all the writers chosen! I hope this is the beginning of an amazing writing friendship that takes your book to the next level and helps you reach your goals.

Now scoot so I can talk to everyone else.

Hey guys. I’m sending all my love to those who weren’t chosen. I know, it hurts. And while I recognize that the “I’ve been there and look at me NOW!” blog posts work a lot better when they are written by a published author, which I am not…

I’m doing one anyway.

Okay, so I am not published, nor have I signed with an agent (Yet. It’s been two weeks since PitchWars ended, so give me a minute) but one thing I do have experience with is getting rejected from writing contests.

Yay?

Anyway, here goes nothing.

In the past year I applied to rounds 1 and 2 of Author Mentor Match, one round of RevPit, and one round of PitchWars. Both times I entered AMM, I received zero requests. I had two requests for RevPit but ultimately wasn’t chosen. One mentor thought I might be ready to query, which was lovely to hear, but I didn’t *feel* ready so I turned my hopes toward PitchWars. Then, for Pitchwars I had three requests and WAS chosen, which was awesome, but… why such different responses?

It was the same chapter, after all, albeit different versions each time.

True, looking back a year ago to my first AMM submission, I can see aspects of my writing sample that could have been better (and, in fact, are now) but you know what? I think my entry was still pretty good! So maybe I had no requests because it wasn’t perfect, or maybe I had no requests because I simply didn’t submit to the right mentors, or maybe it was just that there were a LOT of writers competing and we just can’t win them all. Since I haven’t read everyone’s submissions, I can’t help much with option 1 (But I’m willing to try! Check out the bottom of this post for details!) and none of us can control option 3, so let’s talk about option 2.

See, here’s the thing. When choosing which mentors to submit to, just like when querying agents, we read their wishlists and try to guess who would love our story. Trying to predict which mentor or agent will fall in love with your story isn’t an art or a science. It’s a guess!

With PitchWars, I spent ages trying to choose which mentors to submit to. Some of them were an easy choice. I read their wishlists and thought THIS IS AMAZING THEY ARE DESCRIBING MY BOOK IN PERFECT DETAIL! WE’RE A MATCH MADE IN HEAVEN!

Others sounded lovely and wonderful but I doubted they would pick my book. Maybe they seemed more drawn to contemporary, or there was something in their bio that made me think they wouldn’t like my first chapter enough to read more.

For example, the incredible Molly E. Lee, mentor extraordinaire, said in her wishlist that she wanted books with strong, confident female leads. Now, I knew my main character meets that criteria by the end of the book, but in NO MAN’S LAND, she starts out as someone who wants to blend in, to fit in, and occasionally, to disappear entirely. A huge part of her story arc is about her learning to be a strong, confident young woman, but I remember thinking that Molly might not like my first chapter because of this. Submitting to her felt like a gamble, at least more so than the mentors whose wishlist described so many aspects of my book.

Another lovely mentor also seemed great but I suspected she might prefer contemporary rather than speculative. By chance, she ended up giving me a query critique as part of a giveaway pre-pitchwars and she was so sweet and helpful that I added her to my mentor list anyway.

Now, obviously you know how this story ends, but I didn’t at the time. And it turned out that the OMG THEY WILL LOVE MY BOOK mentors… didn’t request it. One mentor I added at the last minute did, the mentor who I was so sure would prefer contemporary did, and so did Molly! I very nearly self-rejected from submitting to the mentors who liked my book the most. If I had chosen differently, I might have walked away from PitchWars with an inbox full of crickets, convinced my book was never going to make it, instead of embarking on two months of revisions with a wonderful mentor who loves my book as much as I do.

In other words, luck played a huge role. And I know, that stinks when luck didn’t go your way. But it doesn’t mean your book wasn’t worth choosing. All it means is that the handful of mentors you chose to submit to chose something else. That’s it.

Because remember, you know that your book has those deep themes/plot twists/beloved tropes, etc, etc, etc, but you can’t fit everything in your first chapter and while that mentor might love your book if they got to read the entire thing, they can’t read every manuscript.

It doesn’t mean your book isn’t awesome.

Please, writer friends, don’t give up. When people say it’s about finding the right agent or the right mentor, the one who will adore your book, they aren’t just saying it to make you feel better. It’s so true.

Keep going. Keep writing. Keep learning. I can’t wait to hear about all your future successes. And hey, when you’re cruising to the top of the NYT Best Seller list, you can write an awesome blog post about the times you got rejected before you hit it big!

I already mentioned this on Facebook, but if you are an AMM hopeful who was not chosen, please feel free to reach out to me if you’d like new eyes on your query or first ten pages. I’m happy to check it out and let you know if I see some things that I believe could be tweaked. DM me on twitter @ethiedee, leave a message here, or tag me on the AMM hopeful Facebook page and I’ll try to get back to you as soon as I can. (Note- if I don’t respond to your message, it just means I missed it! Feel free to email me at ektwrites at gmail dot com.)

It is nanowrimo time so I’m a bit busy these days but I promise I’ll do my best.

Keep on writing!