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The Fast Path and the Slow Path @ 10:52 pm
Current Mood: 
disappointed
disappointedI expect I'll write about this on both blogs tonight. I was going to try not to be too repetitious, but on second thought I think I'll just crosspost, mostly.
There is a Doctor Who episode, "The Girl in the Fireplace," in which the Doctor visits Madame de Pompadour at key moments throughout her short life. For him it all happens in less than a day, but, as she remarks, she experiences the relationship from the perspective of "the slow path." My contrasting experiences with my last two submissions of Heirs of Mâvarin has me thinking about the fast path and the slow path, and which one is better in this particular context.
A timeline of the slow path:
- February 20, 2006: mailed cover letter, three chapters and synopsis of Heirs of Mâvarin to Tor Books in NYC.
- February 23, 2006: the submission package arrived at Tor, according to the USPS, and was presumably consigned to the slush pile.
- February 28, 2006: eight days have passed, and the book hasn't been rejected yet, this time around. The last time I mailed it out (an earlier draft back in the late 1990s), it was back in my mailbox exactly one week later.
- June 23, 2006: the four month anniversary of the slush pile arrival marks the first date I can reasonably think that I might hear back on the submission, based on the "at least four to six months" mentioned in the Tor FAQ. Nothing happens.
- August 23, 2006: six months out, the "at least" part of that phrase kicks in. Hey, it doesn't say "at most." I consider whether it's time to query about the status of the submission, but decide to hold off.
- January 1, 2007: someone I admire but have never met offers to ask PNH of Tor about my submission. I say yes, and thank him in advance.
- January 4, 2007: I follow up by snail mail, politely asking the status of my submission.
- January 7, 2007 (date approximate): someone I admire but have never met actually does ask PNH about my submission.
- January 9, 2007: my contact reports back that PNH "did recall" the submission.
- February 23, 2007: I celebrate the one-year anniversary of the submission's arrival on the slush pile by designing a humorous anniversary card. I decide that the longer I wait, the more likely it is that it will not be rejected out of hand. It occurs to me that I once sold a logic problem to Dell over two years after submitting it.
- March 20, 2007: I celebrate the 13-month anniversary of the package's initial mailing by emailing a query to an agent who prefers to operate by email.
A timeline of the fast path:
- March 13, 2007: I read an article from Writer's Digest Online about agents seeking new clients. I save the info to a file, narrowed down to the three that match my needs (i.e., they handle Fantasy, SF and YA)
- March 17, 2007: after working on it in my head for a few days, I write Version 1 of the query, and send to a few friends for feedback.
- March 20, 2007, 8:54 PM: After good advice from my friends, careful study of the agent's guidelines and multiple revisions, I email the query. I spend the rest of the evening updating my mavarin.com entry page and my online bio, in case the agent peeks at either.
- March 21, 2007, 7:39 PM: I get an emailed "standard rejection letter," identical to the one the agent posted on her blog sometime in the past week. It's a nicely worded, encouraging letter, but it's still a form rejection, the same one I would have received had I sent a 20-page, misspelled horror of a query promoting a gerbil cookbook, a foundation document for a new religion, and fifty other unlikely projects.
So which is better, the fast path or the slow path? It's kind of hard to be sure, because I'm still on the slow path. If it ends the same way as the fast path, with a form rejection and no feedback, then it will be a far greater disappointment than the one received in less than a day. But like that logic problem, my slush pile submission may be making its glacial way toward a good result. Let's hope so, anyway.
As for the quick path, I'm thinking, as it begins to rain here, that it is possible to find at the end of it, not a pot of gold or even a rainbow, but a pewter lining in place of a silver one. At least I didn't have much time to get my hopes up. At least I've now worked out a pretty good query to send out, even though it didn't do the job this time. At least I have a few more places to try, and no more need to wait for this one to respond before trying the next.
And maybe it doesn't matter what I think, either of the fast path or the slow one. It's not as if I get to choose which one to travel on. Some publishers and agents tend to respond quickly, others slowly. Some individual examples may be highly variable in this respect, depending on the submission and the circumstances. Even if it is possible to find out which publishers and agents respond more quickly or more slowly than others, the info shouldn't be a deciding factor as one prepares to address the envelope or the email. I will gladly wait two years for a "yes" answer from a good agent or a mass market publisher, if that's what it takes. If it's a no, then sooner is better, but it's not something to aim for. Better to get on with editing Mages and writing Revolutions, and try not to obsess about timelines. The reply will get here when it gets here.
Dang, I'm depressed.
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