Dear Alice,

I have written proof that what one person loves, another hates. I had an agent request the manuscript of my children's book a couple of months ago. I sent him an email copy right away but didn't hear anything at all from him (which according to querytracker.net was unusual) so I sent him a hard copy the last week in November. I got a handwritten rejection from him a few days later. His nearly-illegible note contained some interesting and, in a way, ironic feedback. Just a couple of days before his note arrived, the critique arrived from the Spirit of Writing contest. The judge raved about my word choice and mental images and he/she especially loved my ending. The agent hated it. He didn't understand what the "silver cup" was. Um, a silver cup. He didn't like that he got to the end of the story and there was another clue to another treasure. The judge liked that the reader could use the clue to daydream about what else was out there and that I'd left the door open for a sequel. Proof positive that what floats one boat, sinks another.

I've stopped querying on both manuscripts at this point. It's too close to the holidays. It will probably be the end of January before I pick up again. My niece and I are taking off for NYC right after New Year's so I can do some research for my current WIP. I'm getting closer to figuring out just who Angela is, which is a good thing since she's my main character. It's turning out to be a much more emotionally charged story as she is rejecting her culture and wants to be "normal". Part of her hates her specialness yet she has embraced it at the same time. My difficulty will be keeping it light and playful yet deal with the unhappiness that is also there. It's coming in slow bits and pieces. I won't start the actually writing until after I get back from New York. If you'd told me that I'd be taking six months off to just think about it when I first started working on it back in June, I'd have told you you were crazy! I'm beginning to learn that writing is a process that truly takes years.

That's all for this time. I'm off to a Christmas open house at the neighbors and then need to plan how to fit in all the Xmas running around I need to do for tomorrow. I'm leaps and bounds ahead of many people I know, yet it still seems like I'm behind. Maybe it's just the rural living and every errand taking half a day to get done. 20 years and I still haven't left behind my suburban clock.