My Spicy Sweet Chili Self

Dream Agent, bless her heart. After a few rounds of email tag (how did I manage this before BlackBerry?), we finally manage a business call. And it's a doozy.

She looooooooooves the high concept hook of my proposal she has in house. The execution, not so much. As in, not crazy about the inciting incident, not completely wowed by some other story elements, not really feeling the narrative/dialogue balance. Just not. But looooooooooooooves the high concept hook. What can I come up with to re-vamp the story and make it fly?

You ask so little. But I am a professional (even though I must get this obligatory whining off my chest), so I will dive in and try something different. I already have a couple of possibilities, courtesy of Kel and middle sis, and I'll probably pick up a couple more before I actually start writing. That, I'll manage. Why? Because I'm Spicy Sweet Chili Doritos.

Let me 'splain, Roocy. After breaking the bad (but not unrecoverable) news, Dream Agent and I launch into a conversation about authors and markets and so on, and we agree on a mutual sense of "meh" for the currently white-hot paranormal/urban fantasy/sex with things that sprout fangs or claws and also that one wildly popular author of much more regular women's fiction doesn't do it for either one of us. I can read and enjoy her, but she's just not my cup of tea. Not an auto-buy. I'm trying to figure out why, exactly, when I glom onto a metaphor and say, "It's like she's Lay's Potato Chips, and I'm Spicy Sweet Chili Doritos." DA busts out laughing and says "Exactly!! You are Spicy Doritos!!" We agreed, Lay's are awesome, and I said I had no problem eating Lay's if there were no other choices, but if it came down to Lay's and the Doritos, I'm all over the Doritos.

And that's a good thing, DA reassures me. Better to be me than another chip, even if that chip is wildly popular and a fixture on BookScan. Too bad the book she has isn't showing off enough of my spicy, my sweet, or my chili self. Guess I got some work to go. Good thing school's out--I have a deadline in two weeks for a proposed revamp, another proposal sent, and a general outline and character sketch for the YA series. Nothing like relaxing all summer, huh?

Oh, and Doritos are buy one, get one free at Publix this week, starting today. Omen? I think so. I'm stocking up on purple bags.