Special

I had lunch with an editor a couple of years ago. A really brash guy making a name for himself, funny, intelligent. He also has two kids and he told me, "I try to get it through their heads that my wife and I adore them, their grandparents love them dearly, but once they get out of high school or college, absolutely no one cares. It's a cold, cruel world. You have to own your inner specialness but realize everyone else thinks they themselves are special, too."

And he's probably right. I raise each of my kids to know, deep down, they are extraordinary. But every other parent on the planet thinks the same of THEIR kids. And so when the time comes to make their way in the world, my kids and everyone else's have to do it on their own. Their friends may cheer their small victories, their big victories, their parents may brag to the nieghbors, but after a while, the world doesn't hand out very many gold stars.

The same thought can be had for your manuscript. I wonder if the average writer realizes what thousands of unsolicited manuscripts LOOK LIKE. You know those HUGE canvas bins the Post Office pushes around? Think of dozens of them FILLED to the top with slush. Hundreds and thousands of manuscripts. Every one of those authors thinks they have a gold star manuscript.

We each think our character is clever and funny or brooding and interesting. But in reality . . . I remain a firm believer in the hook. You have to get an editor interested because of some concept so different that they really haven't encountered it before. Or there has to be something there that elevates you. Otherwise . . . it's like the hundreds of thousands of college grads each June who go out into the workplace and realize, that yes, every single other person they are competing with has that piece of paper too. So what lands them the job? That charisma. That charm, that something extra that when they walk in the room, people notice. That unusual internship. Whatever it is . . . it's something special.

A woman once told me about her book at a conference. It was a perfectly ordinary pitch. Acceptable. Nothing that rang any alarms as being outside of marketable. But nothing I could even remember once she stopped speaking. I always think, "Give your agent something to work with . . . Give an editor something they can go into committee with that will make everyone around the table sit up a little straighter and pay attention."

Here's the other thing. You can't say "It's the writing." Because no editor or agent can hand-sell to ten thousand readers or book buyers and say, "Yes, you've heard this before, but this is about the writing."

Thoughts?