Agent Quest

[Patrick]

How about a story about a writer going through all kinds of crazy schemes trying to land an agent?  He can be very desperate and try things like kidnapping agents and forcing them to read his work by gunpoint.  Other situations that come to mind:

He could call in a bomb threat on the agent's office, then when the building is empty, sneak in with a box of his manuscripts and replace every manuscript in the office with a copy of his own.  (maybe I actually thought of doing this, maybe I haven't)  He gets away with it and is very pleased with himself.  But just as he leaves the building it blows up.

Or, he finally lands an agent, only to discover that said agent is a mass-murderer.  He is about to report this to the police when he realizes, "So he has a few faults, at least he's an agent." and hangs up the phone.  Now he has to keep his agent out of trouble, at least until a book deal comes through.

With this we can have a little fun, vent some frustration, and get in some good writing exercises.

[justwrite]

Sounds fun. Now, why don't YOU start it?

[Lotheus]

  The book was the best in the history of the world, and Michael Priest knew it.  His mother had told him so.  He hadn't even had to write a second draft.  It was that good.  But as the years dragged on and the rejections to his query letters continued to roll in, Michael began to face a frightening possibility.  Agents did not know greatness when they saw it.
  Michael had taken the college courses, and he had read all the books on writing fiction, but he found that they had little to teach him.  What he found was that if he listened to his heart and let the characters speak, then the books wrote themselves.  The characters did not require editing.  This would be interfering with what they were trying to say, and what they had said in his finished manuscript was beautiful beyond anything he had ever read.  But the agents refused to listen.  They would not recognize his work as the inspired genius that it was, and now that he had exhausted his avenues of traditional approach, he realized that he was going to have to do something radical, something beyond what anyone else had ever thought of.  The world could not be robbed of the opportunity to read his masterpiece.  These heathens could not be allowed to stand in the way of a work of such significance.  He would have to force them to see...

There you go!  Have fun with it!

[justwrite]

 

I need time to respond to that!!! Wonderful!

[justwrite]

The book was the best in the history of the world, and Michael Priest knew it.  His mother had told him so.  He hadn't even had to write a second draft.  It was that good.  But as the years dragged on and the rejections to his query letters continued to roll in, Michael began to face a frightening possibility.  Agents did not know greatness when they saw it.
  Michael had taken the college courses, and he had read all the books on writing fiction, but he found that they had little to teach him.  What he found was that if he listened to his heart and let the characters speak, then the books wrote themselves.  The characters did not require editing.  This would be interfering with what they were trying to say, and what they had said in his finished manuscript was beautiful beyond anything he had ever read.  But the agents refused to listen.  They would not recognize his work as the inspired genius that it was, and now that he had exhausted his avenues of traditional approach, he realized that he was going to have to do something radical, something beyond what anyone else had ever thought of.  The world could not be robbed of the opportunity to read his masterpiece.  These heathens could not be allowed to stand in the way of a work of such significance.  He would have to force them to see...

He thought back to the morning of his awakening. Strange it coincided with the day his wife let the trailer screen door slam, their screeching triplets balanced on her hip. "Michael Priest," she yelled through the screen, "there hasn't been a customer at the garage for two months. Do you know what diapers cost? Do you care? I'm moving back with mama."

It could have been four mosquitos circling his head for all it mattered to Priest. Nothing mattered but the quest. Not his foundering auto body shop, nor the nearly mummified mother he no longer visited at the nursing home. She knew he was the one, anyway. He only needed a sign from the heavens affirming his task as a messenger of the divine word.

Priest stared into his soggy cheerios, the rattling slam of the screen door already forgotten. A single glorious beam of light streamed through the tattered curtains like a spotlight. One soggy O rose from the bowl and began to speak.

"You'll make those agents understand, Michael. But you need a plan."

[Lotheus]

OMG!!!  A talking Cheerio?!  That's fabulous!

[justwrite]

Are you stunned into silence? Keep going ...OR if you want something else to do look at my new first chapter for Freaks of Nature, the woe-begone ms I am trying to sell.

[Lotheus]

Oh, no.  I will do more.  We should try to get others involved though.  I need to get a piece of that talking Cheerio...

[Patrick]

Would Fruit Loops be more appropriate?

[Lotheus]

Maybe in your world...

[justwrite]

 

I think we need a better title for this...Agent Quest sounds like its about business.

The Quest of Doom
Epic Quest
 

[Lotheus]

Michael Priest and the Cheerio of Doom

[Lotheus]

The book was the best in the history of the world, and Michael Priest knew it.  His mother had told him so.  He hadn't even had to write a second draft.  It was that good.  But as the years dragged on and the rejections to his query letters continued to roll in, Michael began to face a frightening possibility.  Agents did not know greatness when they saw it.
  Michael had taken the college courses, and he had read all the books on writing fiction, but he found that they had little to teach him.  What he found was that if he listened to his heart and let the characters speak, then the books wrote themselves.  The characters did not require editing.  This would be interfering with what they were trying to say, and what they had said in his finished manuscript was beautiful beyond anything he had ever read.  But the agents refused to listen.  They would not recognize his work as the inspired genius that it was, and now that he had exhausted his avenues of traditional approach, he realized that he was going to have to do something radical, something beyond what anyone else had ever thought of.  The world could not be robbed of the opportunity to read his masterpiece.  These heathens could not be allowed to stand in the way of a work of such significance.  He would have to force them to see...

He thought back to the morning of his awakening. Strange it coincided with the day his wife let the trailer screen door slam, their screeching triplets balanced on her hip. "Michael Priest," she yelled through the screen, "there hasn't been a customer at the garage for two months. Do you know what diapers cost? Do you care? I'm moving back with mama."

It could have been four mosquitos circling his head for all it mattered to Priest. Nothing mattered but the quest. Not his foundering auto body shop, nor the nearly mummified mother he no longer visited at the nursing home. She knew he was the one, anyway. He only needed a sign from the heavens affirming his task as a messenger of the divine word.

Priest stared into his soggy cheerios, the rattling slam of the screen door already forgotten. A single glorious beam of light streamed through the tattered curtains like a spotlight. One soggy O rose from the bowl and began to speak.

"You'll make those agents understand, Michael. But you need a plan."

The day at the garage went as he expected.  The lack of customers gave him plenty of time to devise his first strategy on how to make these people see what they were really missing.  It was simple, really.  If they would only just read the words; if only they would listen to the characters.  That was what would make all the difference.  He had tried the query letter and the synopsis, but no one would respond to him, and he was running out of money for self-addressed, stamped envelopes.  He had to meet them in person and convince them in person with his passion and fervor.

“I’m an aardvark, man,” Michael whispered to himself.  “An aardvark.”  He finished polishing his tools five o’clock, and pulled down the garage door for the last time.  With Marlene and the boys gone, he would have the freedom to do what he needed to do, and then she would see.  She would come back to him then, and they would live in that double-wide that she had pointed out to him last year, the one with the bright pink front door and the chandelier in the dining room.

He went home and piled his few belongings into his Vanagon, and at 6:45 pm on Friday afternoon, Michael began his historic journey toward New York City, and toward his destiny.

[justwrite]

How about just

Agent Quest: The Cheerio of Doom

[Lotheus]

That's beautiful.  You better respond again, jw, I'm already cooking up another section!!!