Found an old checklist from 2007, when I began shopping the novel:
Tasks to complete before shopping a manuscript:
1 ) Write a novel you would pay for. Check.
2 ) Solicit feedback from people who have no love for the concept, your writing, or your wit and hopefully know a lot more about the material than you. Check.
3 ) Receive and implement that feedback. Check.
4 ) See step 2 and 3. Check.
5 ) Revise, revise, revise. Check.
6 ) Develop a two page synopsis proving there’s a story behind that novel. Check.
7 ) Craft an engaging query letter reducing the story, and your qualifications to write said tale in four hundred words or less. Check.
8 ) Realize that the publishing world has changed dramatically in the last twenty-four months, and that step 7 need serious reconsideration.
And that’s where I am right now, working on and towards a new step 7–and beyond. What seemed unthinkable and hardly an option at all in February 2007, which is when I began and then shelved this entry, now in January of 2007 seems worth a try.
More on this in the next few days . . .