To my Delight, To my Dismay

So I submitted my synopsis and personal info to another agency. Then the very next day, I had an email to ask me for more material!! Jumping out of my skin excited, right! So, I reply to the email, attaching a further three chapters and....hotmail postmaster informs me the email did not go through. So, I try copying the email address out and sending again....with predicatably, the same result. Fine, so I go back to their website to have a look for another way to contact them. This is where things got shady. Not only did their website not come up when I googled their name, I instead find a whole host of threads on how you should avoid, avoid, avoid, this agency. They run under several different names and is dodgy as. To top it all off, they would make you pay half of the publication costs (thousands of pouds!). Don't you just love google! That line of enquiry therefore has been snipped off.
With my stiff upper lip in place, I have moved on to my next submission, which is really my first choice submission and hence why I had been delaying so that I could make everything perfect.
Another possible life line....my dear friend has a roundabout contact with an agent and is making some enquiries on my behalf!
On the whole things are looking up!
x

Can I get back to writing?

So after my little email blunder the other day, I only received a standard email to confirm they have received my book....and that it may be up to three months before I hear anything back.
I am slowly, but surely realising what a long road it will be to try to get this book published. Trawling through dozens of literary agents' websites is yaw breaking boring. Yes, it is exciting, because of the prospect of getting published, but finding agents who accept fantasy seems like gold dust out there. Most of whom are not accepting email submissions. I can only wonder why not....At least my list of who I can post it to is growing. Hopefully by next week this time, I will have sent my submissions out to quite a few more agents.
I want to finish all the submissions so I can get back to the business of writing!
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I had a response!

Generally, on literary agents' websites they state that they will respond to a submission within six to eight weeks....do you think that stopped me from checking my email first thing today and again when I got home from work? Of course not! Much to my surprise there was actually a response tonight! I was so excited to open the email.....only to discover it was only a polite response letting me know that currently he is not accepting any fiction submissions. Great. That would have been useful information on their website.
I guess at least it was not an outright rejection.....right? So onwards and upwards or if I wanted to be more country-correct, keep a stiff upper lip. So what now? Well, of course I submit to another agent. I painstakingly go over every detail in my email. Checking grammar and spelling and every comma and full stop is in the right place. I press 'send' and my heart stops. I had misspelled THE NAME of my book in the subject bar!! Honestly, if I was an ostrich my head would be in the ground, if I was mole I would be completely buried under the ground...if I was one of the magical characters in one of my would be books, I would magically recall my email and send it off perfectly correct instead. AH! Frustration does not cover it. I mean for heaven's sake! The stiff upper lip is in danger of trembling and sagging into a self pitying pout.
Find out tomorrow if I get a reply saying LOL.

So who am I?

I guess the most exciting thing about me right now is that I am an aspiring author. I have finished my first novel and am looking into submitting it to agents! A bit scary...what with the prospect of getting rejection letters, but didn't someone say that the best things in life are often the most difficult? Or something along those lines.
During the day I am an optometrist and although in some ways this is a fulfilling carreer, my dream is to be a successful author.
I guess that means I need to get back to tweaking my synopsis and covering letter, which supposedly, is to include relevant education/training (does reading novels count?).
My story continues tomorrow.....x 

Time to get it together and submit!