Dreamstuff

In January 2005, as I scanned through Yahoo's Weekly Picks in my inbox, I stumbled across a blog by an anonymous literary agent who called herself Miss Snark. I had just sent out a batch of e-queries to agents, and the responses were beginning to come in - a bunch of polite refusals, one request for an exclusive, two requests for partials and one agent who wanted the complete manuscript right off.

Over the next months my life got a bit more stressful: agents were reading; the one with the full called to offer representation two months after I sent the package; I signed with her; she began marketing the novel. I could have gone crazy with the tension, but Snark's blog saved me. I read it everyday, several times a day, learned about the industry, laughed at her wit, was part of a great community of writers. Although I myself was anon, I came to know and appreciate many of the regular commenters, the vast majority of whom were unpublished/wannabe/author hopefuls - just like me.

One such regular was Orion. She doesn't know who I am, but I remember her. When I started this blog almost two months ago I decided to look up the blogs of some of the commenters I remembered from Snark, and that's when I found out that Orion's debut novel, Lottery, was going to be released on August 2. And not just released, but released in grand style.

Orion is Patricia Wood, a 54 year old writer who lives on a boat in Hawaii (I can hear my surfer son shouting "Hawaii! Waves! Swells!") She is right now living the extreme fantasy of every writer: the dream agent, the book auction, the six-figure advance, the publisher who spends major moolah on publicity, the foreign rights sales to 10 countries, the features in major magazines and newspapers, the signings, the movie buzz, the mind-boggling Amazon and Barnes & Noble sales rankings that took off before the book was even released...

She's living the dream, and sharing it with us on her blog and website. I don't know if I'd feel any more excited if it were me.

Thanks for sharing, Orion. I'm looking forward to reading Lottery. Congratulations. I - along with the teeming hordes of the 'devotion' from Snark's, I'm sure - wish you stratospheric success with Lottery, and a long, glorious writing career.