Today I got a reply from a literary agent to a submission of KEPT.
Not quite her thing, she said. (Heart sinks).
BUT she'd be interested to read the psychological thriller I mentioned I was developing in my notebook.
Heart leaps! Then I realise that this means I actually need to write the damn thing. It means leaving behind the novel I have toiled over for the last five years and moving on before I've seen it grow up in the world.
It got me thinking: when is the right time to move on?
Most authors become better writers over time. Some people believe it's a gift, but you only have to read the early work of Curtis Sittenfeld to see how she developed from Prep to American Wife. Better writing comes with practice. Editing is a different kind of discipline.
That's not to say that we should abandon our first work completely. But we should not let our emotional attachment to it hold us back. Even if it does not get picked up ever, it is not wasted, because every sentence written took us forward to becoming better writers. It may not be the first novel that catches the agents attention. In July 2015, Harper Lee published her second novel Go Set a Watchman, which was written before To Kill a Mockingbird.
There are many more literary agents I could (coulda shoulda woulda...) contact, but I also see the value in coming back to editing with a more critical eye from practicing.
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