Welcome to #TeamTangledWeb Part 2

In which we discuss our Mentoring Methods & the elements we love most within our chosen genres!

What Can You Expect From a #TeamTangledWeb Mentorship?

Feel free to check out the Pitch Wars guidelines for all the official rules and dates concerning feedback once mentees are chosen, but here are a few more details too!

First things first, expect to do some work!

Nothing strengthens a manuscript better than a thorough revision. If you sub to us with the mind to work, we're already one step closer to making the perfect team. Once chosen, we'd love some kind of face-time (skype, google hangout, etc.) call in the early days, but it's not mandatory. This is so we can chat and get to know you and blather incoherently about how much we love your book! You'll receive your first edit letter before the call, so we can discuss any concerns and brainstorm if needed. At a minimum, we’ll do another pass for sentence-level revisions and line-by-line commentary after the bigger-picture changes are complete. We’ll also work on your pitch, your query, and your synopsis.

But those are MINIMUMS. If the changes require a second big-picture read-through, we’re here for that too. We are absolutely committed to making your manuscript the best it can be!

We love both big-picture AND sentence-level revisions. We’ve both been CPs and betas for years, and our feedback has helped other authors find agents and eventually sell those same books. Since we both write books that contain elements of mystery combined with unexpected twists, we’re well-versed in tightly-plotted manuscripts and understand the importance of pacing, tension, and stakes.

We also both write a damn fine sentence, so we can definitely help with streamlining and refining your prose. So often, agents reference the importance of voice, which is a very hard thing to teach. But sometimes sentence-level changes can clear away the clutter and bring out the voice that’s been buried beneath it.

We believe critique can be honest without being hurtful. We don't give feedback with the intent to make someone cry. Critique can hurt—it's hard to see someone pull apart something you've worked so hard on—but we believe pointing out a manuscript's weaknesses also helps bring out its strengths.

We are not plotters. In fact, we both self-identify as capri-pantsers. Or maybe: semi-plotters/touch-our-capri-pants-and-we'll-kill-you-in-our books sorts. It works for us. Whatever works for you, works for you. So we won’t ask you to fill out a detailed outline or beat sheet (they give Andrea hives,) but we will give you some suggested reading for craft books that have made an impact on our writing. And we will review your overall plot, your character arcs, and how your themes pull through your entire narrative.

One More Thing

We believe mentoring is a partnership. We'll be available for DMs, emails, Skype calls. Whatever you need to feel comfortable. And we'll never forget that this is your book. That means every decision is ultimately yours, and we'll never try to force my ideas onto you. We promise to take the entire process seriously--because we know this is your career, and that your manuscript means as much to you as ours do to us. But we also believe you have to laugh when you can. So, we're going to make your amazing manuscript even better, but we also promise we're going to have fun while doing it!

Things That Make Our Hearts Happy!

• Feminist themes! Any and all. Bring it.
• Inclusivity! We want diversity in all forms and love #ownvoices books

          —Side note on #ownvoices—we recognize not everyone has the privilege to be vocal about their marginalizations, so we won’t ask if you share your MC’s.

          —We’re open to any and all romantic subplots, but serious bonus points for f/f representation.

          —If you’ve written a main character with a marginalization you do not share, please make sure you’ve done your homework.

• Sex positivity
• Unlikable female characters (this is an Andrea always-and-forever love)
• Lyrical and literary writing. We love gorgeous prose and beautiful turns of phrase.
• Unusual formats or structures. I (Andrea) wrote a book with a POV character who isn’t named. If, while writing, you thought to yourself, “I will never pull this off,” I’ll probably love it.
• Complex friendships, especially between girls.
• Complex parent/child relationships.
• Sisters!
• Enemies to lovers.
• Romantic subplots: we love some romance, but not too heavy. Slow-burn with lots of surrounding plot is best! No insta-love™️.
• Twists! Give us all the surprises and unexpected endings! (Or midpoints! Or all points in between!)
• Immersive settings. Settings that feel like another character. Settings woven so seamlessly into the narrative they color the entire book.
• We love dark, gritty, and raw... (and murder)

             -Kay told me (Andrea) to delete the murder part but it’s true so I’m leaving it. #MurderCornerForLife


Things That Make Our Hearts Sad

Please DO NOT send us these. No one likes a sad heart.

• Rape as a plot device or method for character agency (and absolutely no rape of female-identifying character as a way to provide agency or motivation for male-identifying character.)
• Discrimination or bigotry, or anything that tells a story from the POV of the oppressor.
• On-page abuse or death of young children
• Manuscripts that center on abuse, addiction, suicide, or self-harm. You can have these elements in your manuscript, we’d just prefer they not be the main premise.
• Horror genre or any gratuitous violence
• Historical. You can take us as far back as the 80s, but nothing beyond that. We’re just not the best fit.
• Clowns

Still Have Questions?

Feel free to reach out on twitter (@Andrea_Contos and @KayLMcCray) or the Pitch Wars forums!

We have an AMA on the forum HERE

We'll also be participating in the Pitch Wars #askmentor twitter event on August 16th, from 8-10pm!

2018 Young Adult Mentors

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This writer is finally leveling up!

Cue Mario mushroom noises!



That's right! I have an agent. I've reached that glorious second level of writer careerhood—taken a bold step outside my own creative bubble—and I couldn't be more grateful or relieved! My agent story is an unusual one. Literal proof that the "many paths to publication" adage is a real thing.

Day of the Excessive Exclamation Point ahead!!!

(because ! is my current aesthetic)

This story begins like most agent stories do. With a manuscript—fresh off the fingertips and still glowing with first draft naivety. This manuscript is HOW TO SAVE A LIFE. In the beginning it was my Mary Poppins—practically perfect in every way—but as the weeks went by and the file grew stale in my documents folder, it started to lose its muchness. I knew it needed that elusive MORE, but the feedback I was receiving from CPs was mostly a lot of thumbs uping. So I became stuck, wanting to revise but having no direction to work towards.

This is the point in the story where I rejoined twitter after a very long hiatus to attempt social media-ing again. And to stalk...uh, follow the very small handful of agents I'd queried! It was July 2017, and there was this buzz on twitter about this prestigious writing mentorship contest.

"Pitchwars," I thought to myself. "That sounds like a scary and glorious opportunity!"

I threw the idea of entering at one of my CPs and got an enthusiastic "DO EET!" in return. So I did eet, and boy am I glad I did!!

Long story short, the fabulous Kit Frick, YA author of SEE ALL THE STARS (preorder HERE. No really...you want this book. I'll wait.) selected HOW TO SAVE A LIFE as her mentor pick, and finally I had a direction to revise in! I could write an entire blog post about how amazing Kit and her edit letter were, but I'll save that for another day. Just know that she rocks! A lot!!

November 2017 brought with it the Pitchwars agent showcase—the pot of gold at the end of this bittersweet and exhausting revision rainbow. Spoiler Alert: my pot of gold ended up being more like a teaspoon of gold. I told myself no matter what, the real prize was this shiny new manuscript of mine. But it still felt like a punch in the emotional gut to watch so many amazing agents breeze past my entry. To witness the (very well deserving, mind you) manuscripts around mine zoom to 40+ requests while mine slowly clawed its way up to 3.

I was a failure. An impostor.

(Disclaimer: neither of these things were true for me or anyone else in the Low to No PWs Request Club. But there's no denying those feelings did exist at the time)

And then something happened—something so far off my "this is the real-world" radar it almost felt like I made it up. A fellow writer & friend was chatting with a non-Pitchwars agent, and the topic of the Pitchwars showcase came up. Fellow writer (you know who you are, and I love you for what you did) expressed disappointment in watching so many good entries be ignored. The agent's curiosities were peaked when my entry was mentioned, and I was asked to send the query + full manuscript to her personal email. With freshly lifted spirits, I readied my work and sent it off to both her and my teaspoon's worth of Pitchwars agents.

This is where my life changes—drastically and all at once.

Less than 36 hours after hitting send I woke up to an email from the non-Pitchwars agent who went out on a limb for me. I held my breath, braced myself for the rejection, and opened it. But it was not a rejection, it was an offer—a beautiful, tear-inducing offer. I ran straight to Kit Frick's inbox with a totally level head. 

Me Actually:

The first agent to read my manuscript actually loved it?? Is this real life? So, I wasn't the fluke or the woeful stain on the fabric of the Pitch Wars name my mind kept trying to convince me I was?

That email was clearly the validation I so badly needed. And Kit, being the fabulous mentor she is, walked me through it all. I wiped my tears, calmed my heart, and politely let the other agents with my work know I had an offer. I also notified those agents I'd managed to query in the 36 hour window between "hitting send" and "offer received".

Cue the sound of floodgates being opened!!!!!!!! (I did warn you about the exclamation points)

I had poked a soft patch of snow on a steep mountain, and was soon buried up to my eyes in emails for requests, rejections, and more offers!! And me? The girl coming off a heartbreaking agent showcase & preparing for the long haul? I wasn't ready for it!

But I survived the avalanche of emails and emotions leading up to my offer deadline! And through it all my heart kept going back to that original offer—the one that started it all. I spoke to incredible agents, some twice, because I had to know who was the right fit for me and my little book. And I'm so proud to announce that the right fit is the remarkable Allison Remcheck at Stimola Literary Studio.

Yes, she was the non-Pitchwars agent and original offer. She loved my work at a time when it felt like no one ever would, and I can't wait to see where it leads us both!

So, thanks to a series of very fortunate (and strange) events, I'm an agented woman! Proof there's no one way to achieving a dream. And proof that no stone should ever be left unturned in this industry. Don't give up when one stone breaks your heart. Keep turning. The next one could be your Allison Remcheck! 

I've got a few levels left to unlock, but for now I'm going to celebrate being one step closer to the dream!

Ta Ta for now!

MY 2017 #PITCHWARS BIO

Hi, I'm Kay L. McCray, and I write books! Welcome to my #PimpMyBio for this years Pitch Wars.

This will be my first time ever participating in Pitch Wars and the manuscript I'll be submitting is a YA Contemporary with a speculative twist titled HOW TO SAVE A LIFE.

For seventeen-year-old elite snowboarder Ina Nilsen, some things are just a given—the anti-anxiety medication on her nightstand, the many weird and wonderful moods of her best friend Amy Detweiler, the hopes of one day having as many Olympic titles as her beloved Norwegian father, and the fact that school shootings are something you only hear about on the five o'clock news.

But when the "five o'clock news" hits home in her small Pennsylvania town and the things she loves most are taken from her, Ina discovers that nothing in life is ever actually a given. Paralyzed from the waist down and unable to attend the Snowboarding World Cup or her own best friend's funeral, Ina sinks into a depression broken only by a strange phenomenon that allows her to communicate with the now deceased Amy.

When Amy offers Ina a deal—go back twenty-four days before the shooting and try to stop it from happening again—Ina naively accepts, going headstrong into a painful past with the idea that she's saving Amy's life and taking back her Olympic dreams. But Ina soon realizes she's gotten herself into something much deeper when Amy reminds her that the most important victim is the one who took everything from her in the first place—seventeen-year-old Lucas Kemp.

Complete at 86k words, HOW TO SAVE A LIFE is a speculative contemporary that explores how our lives affect others, with a strong focus on forgiveness, friendship, and taking responsibility for the differences—good or bad—our choices can make in other's lives. For fans of Jennifer Brown's THE HATE LIST and those who enjoy speculative elements such as those found in Lauren Oliver's BEFORE I FALL and Gayle Forman's IF I STAY.


FEATURING:

1. Undying friendship.
2. Biracial MC (South Asian/Scandinavian)
3. The creation of wounds, both emotional and physical.
4. Many Norwegian words (and several Italian ones too).
5. On and off-trail Snowboarding.
6. Anxiety Disorders.
7. An inseparable father/daughter duo.
8. Longboarding down abandoned roads (with said father).
9. Family secrets and the problems they foster.
10. Much discussion of physics projects.
11. Chuck Norris jokes!!
12. Awkward conversations.
13. The healing of wounds, both emotional and physical.
14. Many mistakes.
15. Many apologies.
16. Unexpected friendships.
17. And an even more unexpected romance.

If you want to see more, find the link to the Pinterest board I created for this project HERE.

HOW TO SAVE A LIFE is my second completed manuscript, and the first in its genre for me. My writing life began in the fantasy world and then spilled itself over into almost every other genres.

NOW THAT YOU'VE MET MY BOOK...

A little about me. In case you've already forgotten (an easy thing to do when you're staring down your screen at 100+ potential mentees) I'm Kay! My interest in Norwegian culture started when I was just a child and a Norwegian woman spent several months in our home . I've traveled to Norway three times since, and have been slowly learning the language for a couple of years now (Jeg snakker lit Norske!). Anxiety has also been in my family for several generations, and so it's a very personal issue for me.

I first started taking writing seriously about seven years ago, when I began uploading my work on the now deceased HarperCollin's website inkpop.com. I made the top five three times (twice for two different drafts of my first completed novel, and once for a WIP that is yet to be finished) and received incredible and helpful editorial reviews. Over the years, through various writing websites and critique partners, I've learned to LOVE the burn of constructive criticism. No pain, no gain! I'm so proud of my latest manuscript, but also ready to give it some much needed tough love. I've come to treat writing as a job, and will always invest the necessary time to take my work to the next level.

Some of my writer idols include Maggie Stiefvater, Elizabeth Wein, Lani Taylor, Melina Marchetta, Erin Morgenstern, J. K. Rowling, and Gayle Forman.

I can be found on twitter @KayLMcCray. So looking forward to potentially working together with one of you fabulous #PitchWars mentors. Thank you to Brenda Drake and everyone else behind the scenes for this incredible opportunity.

Ta Ta for now,

To check out more Pitch War hopeful's blogs, click HERE.

Introductions and Things

Hello world, I'm Kay—a writer, a reader, & all around creative. And not necessarily in that order either. I don't pretend to be the expert in anything writing/reading/internetting, so this blog is mostly for fun and news updates!

Reasons for starting this blog:

1) The emotional roller coaster of writing/revising/querying a manuscript is well...exactly that. A roller coaster. Unloading some of that emotional baggage for others to commiserate over/shake their heads with/roll their eyes at is a win for all (I hope).

2) I don't get to read a lot, because life has a way of interfering. So when I manage to make it through a whole book and get all these strong feelings—good and bad—I like to share them/discuss them/debate them with other readers.

3) Other reasons I haven't quite figured out yet.


Ta Ta for now,