Why you don't get published.
Tuesday, March 20, 2007
Face-Lift 298
Guess the Plot
Fear of Landing
1. After Sylvia gets her pilots license, her boyfriend comes up with an idea to get her out of his hair: a quest to visit every island in Great Britain and write a book about it. But some of those runways look more like driveways.
2. Now that she's at 27,000 feet, watching the landing gear fall toward Kansas, Wanda Carson realizes she should never have agreed to fly for Bare Budget Air Freight. But that free carpet shampoo was irresistible.
3. Tommie Landing has bullied the entire school all year, and not even the teachers can control him. The staff are terrified of what will happen when Tommie is promoted to third grade next year. Will the district recommend home schooling? Or can little Tara Smidley tame his savage heart?
4. Three year old Jeannie is just figuring out staircases. The straight up and down ones aren't too bad--just a matter of velocity adjustment near the bottom. But word from her older brother is that the ones that turn halfway down have monsters on them.
5. At first, Erica was agoraphobic, fear of the outdoors. Then she was aviatophobic, fear of flying. Now it’s fear of the Dead Cat Bounce (Felinus-Bouncy-Bouncy-Thudda-phobia).
6. The last three starships to return to Earth exploded upon reentry to the atmosphere. As physicists back home try to discover the cause, the captain of the Hephaestus, returning from Alpha Centauri, considers an unscheduled layover on Uranus.
Original Version
Dear Agent,
I understand that you represent non-fiction books and would like to introduce my work-in-progress: Fear of Landing, about my travels in single-engine plane around the British Isles, told from a unique international viewpoint.
I am a 39-year-old German-American (brought up in both countries) currently living in Spain with my British boyfriend and very confused son. After I received my Private Pilots License, I found I wasn't keeping the hours up without a goal. My boyfriend set the challenge: fly to every island possible in the British Isles. [Recommendation 1: Dump this guy immediately.]
I have identified 38 islands with usable runways within the geographical British Isles, from Jersey off the coast of France to the icy Faroes, located halfway between Iceland and Norway. Ireland and the Aran Islands lie to the West and the Scottish Shetlands are my unexpected Eastern boundary. [Recommendation 2: Has it occurred to you that with a sea plane you could get to islands with no runways? 38 isn't bad, but 100, now that would be a feat.]
Highlights include Lundy in the Bristol Channel (population 7 [8, if I survive the landing]); Mainland, an intriguingly named island in the Scottish Orkneys; Barra in the Outer Hebrides with a runway only available at low tide [Technically it's available at high tide, but the landings tend to be a bit abrupt.] and Walney Island in English Cumbria, which appears to have no redeeming value whatsoever. [Recommendation 3: Make sure you have plenty of fuel when you land on Walney Island. The last time someone got stranded there overnight he literally died of boredom. True story.]
I have a blog about the project at http://www.fearoflanding.com/ featuring planning and historical information and photographs from my trips.
Excerpts from my initial travels have appeared in Piper Flyer and the Guernsey Star and Press.
Fear of Landing will be my first full-length book. I am happy to send you a more detailed overview and the first three chapters at your request.
Thank you for your time,
Notes
It's not clear whether the book is about the islands, flying, or you. In other words, I'm not sure whether the book is intended mainly for travelers, with photos and information about each island, in which case it wouldn't matter how you got to them, and the book might seem more complete if you made it to the Italian Chapel at Lamb Holm , or to Iona Abbey, even if you can't fly in; or if it's intended more for other pilots who might want to try something similar; or if it's mainly about the personal accomplishment of flying to these islands. The title is clearly more appropriate if it's the latter. But the query doesn't make it clear that this is an amazing feat. Have you given yourself a limited amount of time to pull this off? Is it amazing because you do have a fear of landing?
"Available only," rather than "only available."
Recommendation 4: In view of the book's title, and to make it a more daring accomplishment, include Sealand as one of your stops.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
12 comments:
There's a non-English Cumbria?
This book sounds interesting, especially if it does come with photos.
I'm surprised there's no GTP describing it as the sequel to "Fear of Flying."
There was. It didn't quite make the cut.
I grew up on a small island and I can't figure the draw of that "told from a unique international view" thing with your various countries of origin & residence. Seems like it might be a fancy way of saying -- told by a tourist.
Maybe you can drop that part of your query and use the space to give more info re: the content of the book.
Author, it sounds from the query as though you haven't finished flying to all 38 islands. You "have identified," "Excerpts from my initial travels have appeared," "FoL will be my first.." Is the book complete? If it's a memoir, it will need to be finished before you can actually pitch it (I'm assuming this is just prep work for the big day!). If it's a travelogue, you can start pitching now. But then, if it's not a memoir, you'll need a whole non-fiction proposal with platform, audience, competition and the whole shebang.
I'm with EE in that I don't know what this book is supposed to be and who it's aimed at. Sounds like anyone traveling to most of those little isles will have a "unique" perspective since they seem pretty remote. How is the American/German view different from the British view in this case? Is the unique viewpoint humorous? Witty? Nostalgic? Do you give island history? I'm sorry. I'm just not getting the purpose of this book. Maybe it's a coffee table book with lots of pictures and little text?
Depending on audience, you might want to mention what kind of plane(s) you're flying, what constitutes a "usable" runway (paved, grass, lighted, etc -- I fledged on grass runways myself, so I wouldn't discount them), and if you're island hopping or visiting them one at a time with a long rest in the city inbetween.
Why is your son confused? Why is he in the query?
First paragraph needs an "a" -- "about my travels in a single-engine..."
I'd like to be more helpful, but I'm with your son there -- confused. Sorry.
The writer hasn't told me what her books is about.
The writer has told me what she's done, but what happens? What one line anecdote can she share that will let me know about her experience?
Another question she has to answer is what puts this travel book on par or a cut above Paul Theroux, Bill Bryson or Pico Iyer?
Make another pass. Shorten it. Bring the reader in quick and don't let it go for too long.
Good luck!
Hi Author,
This sounds like it would be fun to read. I'm guessing since you said you had a "work in progress" that the book is progressing along as your flights are progressing along. Is that right?
Are you planning on staying for a bit on each islan - even if the island is as long as a decent landing strip- there's gotta be someone to "interview" - and learning about each island, the history of its inhabitants, etc?
This could be a bit like Bill Bryson's stuff. I'm thinking A Walk in the Woods, because he had a set goal- the Appalachian Trail, with history, anecdotes, conversations, personal trials, etc.
Good luck with it.
So the flying aspect is merely your way of getting to the islands? And the book will be a travelogue about British islands with runways? Tourists may buy your book planning to use it to decide which islands to visit. It's possible islands they would enjoy visiting aren't even mentioned in the book because they have no runways. You could probably catch a ferry to some of these islands. Otherwise you'll be explaining that island X, while among the most interesting in Britain, isn't covered in my book because you can't get there by airplane. To you, 38 islands is a massive number. But will the book feel incomplete to others?
I got more of a feeling of travel memoir, with external AND internal journeys being chronicled.
I'm also a sucker for this kind of book, so I hope you can pull this together and sell it, author. You might want to check out the travel presses--Lonely Planet, Vintage, Flamingo, among others--and see what they're looking for to customize your query.
Sealand. I just clicked on the link.
Almost, but not quite, unbelievable.
Well, that's the question people ask in the travel book industry. Those are the natural comparisons when anyone says, "I travel, I want to write a book." You should read Don George's essays and interviews on travel writing.
Run through those books. You'll see in each scene "something happens." Whether it's Paul Theroux riding the rails with teems of Indians, Bill Bryson trying to dismantle the meaning of "Waltzing Mathilda" something has to unfold.
Sounds like you've got a good start. You've got the raw material via the personal experience and the photos. Now it's a matter of mining through it and finding the book you want to write.
Keep going. I think if you press yourself you can pull this off,
"trying to dodge rabbit holes on a miniscule runway,"
Now that's interesting. That shows me that you're in the picture, it shows me the funny drama of a situation.
You might also check out books like "Actic Dreams" by Barry Lopez, "A Short Walk On The Hindu Kush" or "Round Ireland In Low Gear" by Eric Newby.
But.... don't drag the reader to all 38 islands. You can mention them, but as far as the experiences, those have to be plucked from the most memorable. In other words, you have to make your 60,000 word book fly at a quick pace.
You might consider starting a blog and posting your stuff there if you want more feedback.
Post a Comment