As you might imagine, YA is not my typical genre. In fact, I'm pretty certain I've never read one word of YA anything.
In this piece you've transported me back to a time of horny, teenage angst, and perfectly captured the awkwardness and self-importance of the simpler yet more impossible moments in our lives. Superbly done.
This chapter could certainly function as a standalone short story. If you've got more like it without a home, I'd consider sharpening them into solo pieces and submitting them to journals or competititions.
GASP! Be still my EGO! I was almost certain the YA badge would deter you, but perhaps the promise of bad behavior in church was all it took to get you in the door. 🙃
Yes, I have more of these. Four complete novels worth of them! I’m not calling them “failed” novels just yet. They haven’t suffered enough industry rejection to earn that status. I’ve essentially been hoarding them to keep them safe from meanies. It is my reluctant goal this year to send at least two of them off to languish in the query trenches for a frustratingly indeterminate amount of time before I get fed up with the system and started serializing them on Substack.
Should you want to be transported again, here are two more excerpts (from different novels) I threw down last month, before you came aboard.
Four novels -- wow! Well, my advice to you is this: query those four novels to death this year and don't worry about the response. The default assumption is rejection, so there's only upside. Plus, the publishing industry is kind of a joke, so don't let the gatekeepers crimp your style.
I'll bookmark those excerpts for later. Need to build up my YA immunity so I don't overdose. :-)
And by the way. I figured out why I liked your https://agowani.substack.com/p/dinosaurs-dont-kill-people story so much. It's leaning dangerously into YA territory itself. Teenage protagonist. Quest to save his friend's life. Battling against the tyrannical forces of... grownups. Not to mention the very real threat of "dinosaur" violence facing school aged kids every damn day. And you might think it's too "unhinged" for a teen audience. And you'd be wrong. I just finished reading a novel where the last moment involved a girl cutting her would-be husband's chest open, ripping his heart out, eating it, and then turning into a dragon and flying away. Boom. Feminism. Your story would require some tweaking (and stretching to turn it into a novel), but the guts are there. And if you need help crafting an angsty, hormonally charged, pseudo-romantic side plot to distract your MC, you know where to find me.
Haha, I'll take that as a compliment! The narrator is a teenager in the original entry of The Thirtieth, so if the piece sounds YA that just means I got the voice right. Yay.
I know YA is basically boundless at this point. Nobody likes to say this part out lout, but most adults read YA because it's easier and shorter. Asking people to read "adult" novels when TikTok exists is ludicrous. That's the world we live in.
I'm still stuck in neutral at the end of my current novel, but I wouldn't be averse to writing a YA-style story. Though the teenage/angsty romance bit really isn't my thing. If/when I finish my novel -- and it inevitably gets passed on and I put it up on my Substack -- I'm going to focus on short stories/novellas.
The market for adult fiction is somehow too small and overflowing with options at the same time. Bad combination.
Oooh. I just have to call you out on one thing. Adults don't read YA because it's easy and short. They read it for the EXACT reasons you said you liked this piece! See your original comment for clarification. And you don't have to include angsty romance if you decide to write YA. I'm just not going to read it if you don't. 😋
"...So, he’s clean. And… moisturized..." "I undid his last button with my teeth..." "...What would Jesus do?..."
These wonderfully tweaked lines, plus all her inner dialog while being in the church setting, just cracked me up. I adore this piece. I was 16 again for a few minutes... and believe me, that was a looooong time ago. Thank you, Meg.
Hi Gloria! So funny that you stumbled across this excerpt, as I was considering replaying it this week because of its "Christmas" timing. 🙂 I used to have a short blurb about the books my excerpts were from, but on a recent cleanup of my archive, I removed them so the posts would look ... cleaner. 😂 Anyway, this particular excerpt is from my novel SEE DOT SMILE, which won a Watty award last year! 🥳 My hope is to make that book (as well as a few others I've written) available as ebooks and/or paperbacks this year, but for now, you can still read SEE DOT SMILE for FREE on Wattpad.com. https://www.wattpad.com/story/340543646-see-dot-smile
Awwww... this is great! Such tension! More! More! Let those hands go! But don’t! Not yet! But do! Now! But no! But yes! But no!
If I ever manage to publish this book, you're writing the jacket copy. 😂
Well this was gripping and awesome! Nicely done!
Thank you, Medha! So glad you enjoyed it.
As you might imagine, YA is not my typical genre. In fact, I'm pretty certain I've never read one word of YA anything.
In this piece you've transported me back to a time of horny, teenage angst, and perfectly captured the awkwardness and self-importance of the simpler yet more impossible moments in our lives. Superbly done.
This chapter could certainly function as a standalone short story. If you've got more like it without a home, I'd consider sharpening them into solo pieces and submitting them to journals or competititions.
I've done something similar with my "scenes from a failed novel" here: https://agowani.substack.com/s/fiction
GASP! Be still my EGO! I was almost certain the YA badge would deter you, but perhaps the promise of bad behavior in church was all it took to get you in the door. 🙃
Yes, I have more of these. Four complete novels worth of them! I’m not calling them “failed” novels just yet. They haven’t suffered enough industry rejection to earn that status. I’ve essentially been hoarding them to keep them safe from meanies. It is my reluctant goal this year to send at least two of them off to languish in the query trenches for a frustratingly indeterminate amount of time before I get fed up with the system and started serializing them on Substack.
Should you want to be transported again, here are two more excerpts (from different novels) I threw down last month, before you came aboard.
https://stockfiction.substack.com/p/the-part-where-christian-said-i-love
https://stockfiction.substack.com/p/as-long-as-were-not-kissing-each
Thanks for reading outside your usual track, and for the encouragement!
Four novels -- wow! Well, my advice to you is this: query those four novels to death this year and don't worry about the response. The default assumption is rejection, so there's only upside. Plus, the publishing industry is kind of a joke, so don't let the gatekeepers crimp your style.
I'll bookmark those excerpts for later. Need to build up my YA immunity so I don't overdose. :-)
Roger that.
And by the way. I figured out why I liked your https://agowani.substack.com/p/dinosaurs-dont-kill-people story so much. It's leaning dangerously into YA territory itself. Teenage protagonist. Quest to save his friend's life. Battling against the tyrannical forces of... grownups. Not to mention the very real threat of "dinosaur" violence facing school aged kids every damn day. And you might think it's too "unhinged" for a teen audience. And you'd be wrong. I just finished reading a novel where the last moment involved a girl cutting her would-be husband's chest open, ripping his heart out, eating it, and then turning into a dragon and flying away. Boom. Feminism. Your story would require some tweaking (and stretching to turn it into a novel), but the guts are there. And if you need help crafting an angsty, hormonally charged, pseudo-romantic side plot to distract your MC, you know where to find me.
Haha, I'll take that as a compliment! The narrator is a teenager in the original entry of The Thirtieth, so if the piece sounds YA that just means I got the voice right. Yay.
I know YA is basically boundless at this point. Nobody likes to say this part out lout, but most adults read YA because it's easier and shorter. Asking people to read "adult" novels when TikTok exists is ludicrous. That's the world we live in.
I'm still stuck in neutral at the end of my current novel, but I wouldn't be averse to writing a YA-style story. Though the teenage/angsty romance bit really isn't my thing. If/when I finish my novel -- and it inevitably gets passed on and I put it up on my Substack -- I'm going to focus on short stories/novellas.
The market for adult fiction is somehow too small and overflowing with options at the same time. Bad combination.
Oooh. I just have to call you out on one thing. Adults don't read YA because it's easy and short. They read it for the EXACT reasons you said you liked this piece! See your original comment for clarification. And you don't have to include angsty romance if you decide to write YA. I'm just not going to read it if you don't. 😋
This was so enjoyable to read! ❤️🔥
And really fun to write. 😊
"...So, he’s clean. And… moisturized..." "I undid his last button with my teeth..." "...What would Jesus do?..."
These wonderfully tweaked lines, plus all her inner dialog while being in the church setting, just cracked me up. I adore this piece. I was 16 again for a few minutes... and believe me, that was a looooong time ago. Thank you, Meg.
Aww. Thanks Sharron. I love writing YA for the simple joy of getting to be 15, 16, 17, and 18 again. So many feels!
Wowww...amazing. What novels are your novel excerpts from?
Hi Gloria! So funny that you stumbled across this excerpt, as I was considering replaying it this week because of its "Christmas" timing. 🙂 I used to have a short blurb about the books my excerpts were from, but on a recent cleanup of my archive, I removed them so the posts would look ... cleaner. 😂 Anyway, this particular excerpt is from my novel SEE DOT SMILE, which won a Watty award last year! 🥳 My hope is to make that book (as well as a few others I've written) available as ebooks and/or paperbacks this year, but for now, you can still read SEE DOT SMILE for FREE on Wattpad.com. https://www.wattpad.com/story/340543646-see-dot-smile
Merry Christmas!!! 🎄
Thank you so much, Meg!