Welcome SYTYCW Author Janie Crouch

Welcome Janie, who is sharing her So You Think You Can Write experience with us today. Thanks for being here.

Q. Overall, how would you rate your experience with So You think You Can Write Global 2012?

A. Well, I’m determined that I’ll never do it again, so what does that tell you? :-)

Honestly, I thought SYTYCW would be my big break. Not that I figured I would win the contest, or even come in the top three. But I was excited that a real live editor from Harlequin (oooh, aaah) would be reading my chapter. Surely once she read my chapter, there would be a request to send more chapters or the full manuscript.

Or perhaps they’d love it so much that they would offer me a book contract *on the spot*.

But alas: no. Nothing. Nada. Never heard anything back from anyone as a result of this contest. It was a heavy blow to my writing self-esteem.

Q. Ouch, I've suffered similar blows. Unfortunately they are part of this crazy business. We were required to upload the first chapter as our entry in SYTYCW. Is that chapter still in its original form or has it gone through more revisions?

Minor revisions. My book was complete before I submitted it to SYTYCW.

Q. How about the rest of the book? Is it finished? Going through more revisions?

I wrote my book as part of National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo) – November 2011. I completed the novel in 30 days then put it away for three months. I didn’t want to look at it at all during that time. Finally, I found the mental fortification to really dig into and edit the book. Surprising, the story itself was pretty good; no real holes and it flowed at a good pace.

There were definitely some inconsistencies in the novel (blue eyes in chapter 3 turned to green eyes in chapter 6, etc) that had to be fixed. And dialogue that had to be expanded or chopped – or changed completely. I fully edited it two more times before I would let anyone else even glance at it. After a couple of trusted friends read it and encouraged me to keep tweaking, I did line edits with the help of an outside reader. It was completed finished long before SYTYCW.

Q. Any thoughts on submitting your entry to another publisher or agent?

A. I have definitely come to understand that my writer’s “voice” is not a good fit for the Harlequin Love Inspired line. I am a little too irreverent and biting where they are looking for traditional and sweet. Nothing wrong with traditional and sweet, that’s just not my style. At this point, I have given up hope that I will be an author for the Love Inspired line.

I submitted the first chapter of my SYTYCW entry to another Christian publisher – one that has a more progressive reputation – at the end of January 2012. On February 25, they requested my full manuscript. I plan to have that off to them soon.

Q. Finding the right fit for your style is important. How long have you been writing?

A. Unbreak My Heart, my SYTYCW entry, was my first novel. I completed it in November 2011. Before then I concentrated more on non-fiction and academic writing.

Q.What are your thoughts about the promotional aspect of the contest?

Basically, I went Looney-Tunes crazy during SYTYCW. It’s hard for me to talk about exactly how nuts I got, but I’ll give you the highlights:

1) I bugged every friend I had (or used to have, most of them probably unfriended me) on Facebook for TEN DAYS STRAIGHT asking them to vote for me in this contest.

2) About 2 days into the contest, I realized I could also TEXT PEOPLE and ask for them to vote for me on their phone. Coincidentally, lot of my friends changed their phone numbers during that time. And didn’t give me their new number.

3) I went to the Apple Store at the mall 8 days in a row and voted for myself on every device they had hooked up to the Internet (which is 57, btw).

4) I made my children vote for me on their Nintendo games and iPods. And told them to ask their friends to vote too.

5) Do you know that the public library has multiple computers patrons can use? Want to know how I know that?

6) Because voting was blind, I had no idea how many votes I had versus the other entries. What I could see was how many Facebook “Likes” an entry had (which had nothing to do with voting, but still… at least it seemed like real data). So I went through ALL 690 ENTRIES and wrote down the title of any entry that had more than 100 Likes. There were 120 of them in case you're wondering.

7) I got ABSOLUTE NOTHING done the three days between when voting closed and they announced the finalists because I was so nervous and anxious to find out the results. Nothing – I don’t even think I cooked or took a shower.

8) On Monday, Oct 15 when they began to announce the finalists, I checked my email incessantly even though my email gets sent to my phone and Tom Hanks announces “Houston, we have a problem” on my phone whenever I get email. Still, I manually checked. You know, just in case it was broken, or Tom Hanks didn’t feel like talking…

8) I didn’t help my kids with their homework on that Monday because I was so busy watching Twitter to see who the winners were.

9) I threw an absolute fit when one of the finalists started tweeting about how she didn’t even have manuscript finished so she better start writing *fast* so she’d have something to turn in.

HAVE SOMETHING TO TURN IN???? I had an entire book ready to turn in! How good can yours be if you’re writing ¾ of it in 2 days?

And… scene.

Do the words: outlandish, preposterous, ridiculous, or absurd come to mind? They should. Basically I lost two weeks of my life to this stupid contest. And by “stupid contest” I mean: “a perfectly reasonable contest in which my behavior was asinine.”

It’s hard to watch a train wreck while you’re also conducting it. But somehow I managed.

Q. If you had to do it over again, what would you do differently, if anything?

A. Not enter. Or if I did enter, not involve any of my family and friends in trying to get them to vote for me.

Q. What are you working on now?

A. In November 2012, just after SYTYCW ended and I was wallowing in self-pity for not being chosen as a finalist, I received a request from Harlequin for a full manuscript from an entirely different book (also completed). See No Evil, was sent to Harlequin Intrigue in December 2012. I am still waiting to hear back, although on February 20th I received word that the Intrigue Editor was in the process of reading my manuscript. Hopefully that means I will hear one way or the other soon, perhaps by the first of April.

Q. Please keep us posted on your Intrigue full request. I have everything crossed for you, and envy anyone who can write Intrigue. Where can we find you on the Web?

A. Blog: www.run-janie-run.blogspot.com

Twitter: @janiecrouch

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Adventures-of-Calamity-Jane/375033609178636

THANKS FOR COMING BY, JANIE