2017 Pitch Wars Pimp My Bio

I'm not going to lie, I've been terrified to post this which is why I'm doing it after submission opened. I'm Hailey Niederhauser, but I plan on writing under the pen name Racheal Ross hence the blog (which don't judge too harshly, it's been awhile...). Ok, so, on with why you're here. 

Susceptible
                            

Susceptible is my YA Sci-fi Romance (light on the Sci-fi, heavy on the romance).

• As I said, heavy on the romance. It's what I love.

 
  via GIPHY (I was a Twilight teen and I'm not ashamed)

• Experimental genetically determined marriages (try having your pre-teen maturation class come with that bomb dropped on you)
• Let's just say I throw a wrench in the arranged marriage trope. Shhh.

  via GIPHY

• I've also got the rebel boy and the best friend (yes a love triangle. I'd say I'm sorry, but I totally love them).
• And humans genetically altered to turn into predatory animals, hence the very pretty melanistic leopard in the aesthetic.
• And we can't forget this (the non love interest kind)

 Because best friends are what get us through everything.

I have an entire playlist for this book, but this song is probably one of the strongest matches.

About Me As A Mentee

Learning to take criticism was a hard road for me, until I'd gone through it a fair amount of times and took a step back. I was astounded by the improvements I had made as a writer. I've also experienced one of the harshest critiques any writer can ever get when a professor told me it was time to shelve the novel I'd spent years slaving over. I cried, and I raged against the idea, and then I picked up my iPad and wrote the first chapter of a new idea I'd been playing with in my head and that's how Susceptible was born. I love this story and its characters. I love how they took the story from me when they had plans of their own. But because I love it, I want nothing more than to perfect it and do what it takes to share their story with other people. Which is where you amazing mentors come in. I hope that one of you will fall enough in love with Savannah, Jack and Will and help this story reach its full potential. 

About me

 So now that I've teased some of Susceptible and hopefully haven't scared you all off. Here's some things about me...

• I write YA and NA romance across a wide array of sub-genres
• I'm a mom of 5 crazy but wonderful blondies. 
• I married my high school sweetheart (although the sweetheart part is questionable 😜 He's obnoxious, but I love him)
• I found writing as a teen when I needed it most and it mellowed/focused my racing mind.
• I have a BS in English with an Emphasis in Creative Writing and a minor in Psychology.
• I have a strange love of human biology.
• I have a love/hate relationship with the reactions I get from people when I tell them I don't like chocolate, but I love chocolate milk and hot cocoa. (Although please don't let this exclude me from being picked as a mentee. I'm mostly normal otherwise, I promise). 
• I have a Mini American Eskimo named Jasper (got the name because it rhymed with Casper and he's all white), but then I got a Bengal cat and I wanted them to get along so I named her Alice so they wouldn't have a choice, but now no one believes me that his name wasn't intended to be a Twilight reference. 🙃 
• And now we have a puppy named Izzy that we're supposed to be selling, but she's adorable and it hasn't happened yet

Can you blame me?

Books/Authors who have had a major impact on me

• J.K. Rowling and Harry Potter (who wasn't impacted?)
• The Dragonlance Chronicles by Margaret Weis and Tracy Hickman (their stories were a huge factor in inspiring me to write in the first place)
• Jennifer L. Armentrout especially her Lux series, but pretty much all of it. She's an amazing writer and I aspire to write as fast as she does.
• Richelle Mead I 💜 Adrian and Sydney so much!!!
• Can't leave off Twilight. It was my first exposure to YA romance and I've never gone back.
• Fallen series by Lauren Kate
• The Violet Eden Chapters by Jessica Shirvington
• Wendy Higgins!
• Katie McGarry
• Melissa Landers
• Honestly, I could go on forever because I just love books

Susceptible Playlist

• Somebody That I Used To Know by Gotye
• Ho Hey by the Lumineers
• Change Your Mind by Boyce Avenue
• Every Breathe by Boyce Avenue
• More Things To Say by Boyce Avenue
• Find Me by Boyce Avenue
• I Won't Give Up by Jason Mraz
• Icon For Hire's entire album Scripted
• It's not you by Halestorm
• In Another Life by the Veronicas 
• Like We Used To by Rocket To The Moon
• The Waiting One by All That Remains
• Coming Down by Five Finger Death Punch
• Nothing Like You And I by The Perishers
• Monsters by Matchbook Romance
• Be Still My Heart by the Postal Service
• Whatever It Takes by Pillar
• Never Look Back by the Nearly Deads
• I Knew You Were Trouble by Taylor Swift
• Listen To Your Heart by DHT

Then the best friend got her own aesthetic because it was fun and I really love her.

Rejection and Recovery

So it has been almost a year since my last post.  That definitely falls under the definition of neglect! I would say some updates are in order.

I'll start with Susceptible. I did some fun work editing and slaved over my submission packet (submission packets are the work portion of being a writer that's for sure). And then came submission time. That was an emotional roller coaster like I've never seen before. Excitement. Terror. Dread. Hope. Panic. Lots and lots of panic. Let's face it, when you're a writer, rejection is kind of the name of the game and that is what I got. And the most disheartening part was the slew of form rejection letters (for those of you not familiar with the industry, that means I got a pre written letter, that may or may not even have my name slapped on it, saying thanks, but no thanks).  I shouldered through those without a single tear. As a person that cries at just about everything, I was proud. But I had prepared myself for it. I knew I stood little chance at being picked up right off the bat. Then came the letter from the agent of my favorite author and the agent that I wanted probably more than any of the others.  This letter was personal and the rejection stung a little bit more. I'll let you read for yourselves.

Thank you for sending along your query and sample pages for SUSCEPTIBLE. While we enjoyed the opening pages of your project and thought your query letter was well done, we have decided to pass at this time. To be honest, the YA editors that we work with are simply not interested in dystopian stories at this time. Trends tend to be circular and we're sure that there will come a time when they will be interested in seeing dystopia again, but for now we are not having any luck selling these types of stories. 

 

We encourage you to continue with your writing and perhaps even with this project. Your writing is strong and your characters are interesting. Another agent may feel very differently about the state of the market when it comes to dystopia and may be able to successfully champion this work.

I think the fact that I was being shut down because the market wasn't in my favor and not because I wasn't any good was hard to digest.  It filled me with hope and pretty much shattered the dream in one fell swoop. Anywho, after reading several more articles that reaffirmed the fact that dystopia was not just a sinking ship but that thing was at the frigid bottom of the deep blue, I decided it was time to shift focus.

So came about the project I'm about to wrap up. I'm just over five chapters from the big finale. It is entitled Guardian and stars a character that is a little rougher around the edges than I'm used to working with. This book has already stretched my knowledge base and toyed with any confidence I have as a writer. I have a good list of things to edit and I'm excited to share more about it soon.

Drumroll please...it's finished!!!

You read that right.  At 12:55 a.m. January 30, I finished the first draft of Susceptible.  I feel like letting out a giddy scream, but I'm afraid that would wake up everyone in the house.  So I'll have to resort to a silent happy dance as soon as I'm done with this post and it actually hits me that I'm done.  I'm a month over my original goal of finishing by the end of 2012, but I'll take it.  Done is done and a month extra isn't too bad.  So here are some fun stats...I started Susceptible sometime in April of last year (that's right, only 10 months!).  The final word count for the first draft is 106,008.  According the Pages, the word processor I used to write it, it is 337 pages long.  And it has 44 chapters.

So anywho, now it's time to celebrate.  I plan to spend the next month feeding my reading addiction(with the kindle gift card I earned from the best, most motivating and awesome IR ever), watching a little t.v. for once, sleeping, all sorts of crazy activities with my kids and anything else that suits my whim.  Then after my month of laziness and celebration, it will be time to get back to work.  But this time, I'll be crushing my soul with editing.  :-(  Oh and posting songs that inspired or fit along with scenes in Susceptible is on the agenda for my party month.  And possibly teasers and pictures.  We'll see. Well, it's time for my happy dance.  Night all!!!  Eeeeeeeeeeeek!

Ideal Reader

So this post is dedicated to my best George (and yes for some strange reason I refer to my awesome best friend as a Harry Potter character.  It's a random story that wouldn't make sense to anyone but us.  Yes, we are that special. )  Anyway, so I have this super awesome best friend, yes that's you Ali, and she just happens to like the same book genre as I write.  So she has been given the torturous/privileged (depending on how she decides to look at it :-)) task of reading my chapters as write them.  This has been a huge help to me.

Without realizing it, she has filled an important role.  Something I heard people talk about all the time in my writing classes was the importance of having something known as an IR.  Well, me, being the novice that I was/am, had no freaking clue what that meant.  After a little while, people finally explained that an IR stood for Ideal Reader.  And Ideal Reader is someone that loves the types of stories that you write and that you trust to read your work.  This is the person that you aim to please with what you're writing.  If they're not diggin' what's going on, then it's quite possible that it's not working.  After I figured that out, I went a long time being sad because I didn't have one of those and I didn't think I was likely to find one because most of my family thinks my reading/writing obsession is a little crazy and even those who like to read aren't really big on the fantasy or paranormal romance genres.  (don't get me wrong though, they're all uber supportive.)

Well, I worked so long on my first novel that it had been awhile since I had tried writing something new so I was a little self-conscious after I started writing Susceptible.  To appease my self-conscious side, I sent my first and second attempts at chapter 1 to Ali to see what she thought and she has just been reading chapter after chapter ever since.  It seems kind of silly to me that I didn't think of her before.  I mean, who sat outside Barnes and Noble with me for hours waiting for the next installments of our favorite series?  Who do I recommend books to?  Who recommends books to me?  It was an obvious choice and she does the job well.  She doesn't get to know any of info before hand so she doesn't get a tainted view of what I'm writing, but she gives me a great look into whether or not I am accomplishing what I'm intending.  She also is a great motivator in getting the next chapter. I believe I was told I was fired once if I didn't have my next chapter to her by midnight.  And not only does she give me deadlines and threats, but knowing that I'm gonna get to see her reaction when she reads it, just makes me excited to send it.  

Anywho, ideal readers are awesome sauce (especially mine, she deserves some awesome reward for sticking with me and dealing with all my obnoxious questions) and I would really recommend finding one.  I hope that all of my fellow writers can fine theirs.

NaNo and Plotting Follow Up

So November has come and gone which means that NaNoWriMo has come to an end as well.  I have to give myself a "not too bad for a first try" rating.  I ended the month with 33,500 words, leaving my novel at 57,625.  It's not as good as I was hoping for, obviously, but, in the end, I added a hefty chunk to my novel and that's what matters.  And I'm full of excuses like holiday excitement and a painful trip to the dentist to get my wisdom teeth removed to placate myself ;-).  I learned some good things to take into consideration when I try next year.

The other thing I need to follow up on is how plotting out my novel went/is going.  I love it!  I think I'll stick with starting letting the cards fall where they may for the first few chapters so I can get aquatinted with the characters and the story before I really decide where things are going.  I also have to say that I am very proud of myself for sticking to the flexible rule.  I combined ideas that were supposed to be in different chapters and added several unexpected twists that presented themselves as I was working along.  It has been a great tool for not forgetting scenes of awesomeness before I can get to them.  I caught myself jumping ahead chapters several times and my outline brought me back to the right spot in no time.  It also made it so I didn't get stuck for days at a time, trying to figure out what the next best step to take would be. Once one chapter is done, it's easier to jump right into the next one.  So as of now, I am a believer in flexible plotting.

I started on my post about my muse, but I need another night of sheer hyperness to get it going.  That is just not a post you can do while you're calm or surrounded by other people.  I also have a section in my novel entitled blogging awesomeness so I have plenty of material to keep myself and hopefully you entertained in between potty training, trying to finish my novel, Christmas shopping and work (just call me Super Mom!  Haha just kidding.  One or more of those will probably get put off until the last minute, but hopefully not)

Let's Make It Hurt!

Sometimes it's easy to believe that it's a good thing no one can see the future.  Having the foreknowledge that I do about the fate of my characters (that's not to say that they don't put their foot down and make decisions for themselves without my say so, because honestly they surprise me all the time), I found myself holding back from specific characters because I knew not to get attached.  I have to love and hate my characters along with my heroine and I found that instead of loving a certain character like I was supposed to, I was not allowing her to love him like she was supposed to so that I could get away with making her final decision easier on myself.  Experience and pain shape fictional characters just as they do real people or at least it should if you want a good story. So I can't expect my character to end up the way she's supposed to if I don't give her the chance to hurt the way she must.  Fiction is about living vicariously so if I tell a lie to my reader by holding back what was intended then I am betraying myself, my characters and my readers.  So it's time to stop holding back. Let's tell the true story.  Let's get the experience right.  And if the truth hurts...Let's make it hurt.

Plotting...is it as scary as it seems?

So, every writer has their own habits that work for them.  Some people work in the morning.  Some are night owls.  Some can't work unless they've had their cup of coffee or their favorite music playing in the background.  Writers tend to be rather fickle creatures.  Don't believe me?  Try watching one work sometime.  One issue we tend to debate is whether it is better to have a strict plot that you stick to or if it's better to go with what you come up with in the moment kind of thing.  Well, I have always been one of those people that decided okay, here are my characters, add some magical element and a vague idea of where the last chapter would lead and then I embarked on the journey.  And those have been very long roads.  I worked on a book called Thunderstorm for about 3 years before I called it complete, and then spent the next 6 trying to rewrite the dang thing before someone wiser than me suggested I shelve it.  (Shelving that novel is a story for a post of its own.)  As you can see, that method took me about 9 years to no avail.  I had a few side projects, but I never finished any of them.  So, considering my 9 year and counting record, I have made some pretty far reaching goals for Susceptible.  And that means that I'm going to have to change up my game.
I am switching from my free-spirited ways to a more organized plotter.  However, I am writing myself a reminder on all my notes that everything is FLEXIBLE!!!  I am one of those people that struggles--okay freaks might be a better word--when things don't go according to plan.  So, flexibility and reminding myself to still embrace those moments when my muse decides to dump on me.  (Look for a post in the near future where we delve into the identity of this muse of mine.  Its strange ways are beginning to intrigue me.)  Anyway, I started my plotting today and it almost made me giddy to have the basic flow for 7 or 8 chapters ahead of where I am currently working.  The mysterious middle section of my novel that's been looming over my head began to take form and made my NaNo goals seem attainable.   I won't have to waste several days trying to figure out what the heck is going to happen next that will lead us to that ultimate goal of the awesome conclusion.  The beginning, middle and end must contain equal parts awesome sauce ( and yes Ali, that phrase was used just for you) with maybe a slightly larger heap of awesome at the end.  The middle is the meat.  It must not be neglected.  We'll see how my muse and I handle this new idea of plotting.  Stay tuned to find out. :-)