The Challenges of Writing in the First Person

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Challenges of Writing in the First Person

Episode: The Challenges of Writing in the First Person
Release Date: November 28, 2024
Podcast: The Shit No One Tells You About Writing
Hosts: Bianca Marais, Carly Watters, and CeCe Lyra

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Introduction

In this insightful episode of The Shit No One Tells You About Writing, host Bianca Marais, alongside literary agents Carly Watters and CeCe Lyra from P.S. Literary Agency, delve deep into the intricacies of writing in the first person. Tailored for emerging writers striving to enhance their craft and navigate the publishing landscape, this episode emphasizes the nuances and challenges inherent in first-person narratives, particularly in memoirs and fiction.

Books with Hooks: Query Letter Critiques

The episode features the beloved segment "Books with Hooks," where the cohosts critique submitted query letters and opening pages. This segment serves as a practical exploration of crafting compelling narratives in the first person.

1. Critique of a Memoir Query Letter ("118,000 Words" by Michel)

Carly Waters reads the query letter at [02:14].

Key Points & Critiques:

• Word Count and Typos ([04:44]):

  • Carly: “This one came in at 420 words. I'm gonna say it because we have to point this out. You misspelled Carli. You wrote Carla, which is another name...”
  • Emphasizes the importance of meticulous proofreading to avoid minor yet impactful errors.

• Narrative Clarity and Causality ([04:44] - [11:09]):

  • Carly: “You are highlighting elements of the plot instead of creating a very carefully connected story...”
  • Critiques the lack of a clear cause-and-effect relationship in the narrative, making the memoir feel disjointed.
  • Suggests restructuring the query to demonstrate how events are interconnected, ensuring a cohesive storyline.

• Maintaining Unique Elements ([08:13] - [12:22]):

  • Bianca: “I love the line between Jesus Christ and Prince Charming...”
  • CeCe: Advises reserving distinctive lines for marketing rather than the query letter.
  • Emphasizes preserving unique voice and memorable phrases while ensuring they serve the narrative purpose.

• Voice and Psychological Acuity ([13:29] - [17:48]):

  • Carly: “I do not know what I gave birth to monsters in my dreams means...”
  • Highlights the necessity of conveying the protagonist's internal state and psychological depth.
  • Encourages incorporating the protagonist's evolving consciousness to mirror successful memoirs like Educated and The Glass Castle.

• Balancing Technicalities with Emotional Depth ([17:48] - [29:32]):

  • CeCe: “There was so much that was summary of different events...”
  • Advises staying "in scene" to maintain immersion and avoid pulling the reader out of the narrative with excessive summarization.
  • Recommends layering world-building with emotional and psychological elements to create a rich, first-person perspective.

Notable Quote:

Carly Waters [04:44]: “But you are not Lena Dunham. I'm saying this with love, and it just won't work in terms of, like, actual comps that an agent can use when submitting your plot paragraph.”

2. Critique of a YA Steampunk Query Letter ("Victoria" by Isabel Houden)

Carly Waters presents the second query letter at [18:59].

Key Points & Critiques:

• Genre-Specific Comps and Clarity ([22:48] - [24:59]):

  • CeCe: “Neither of these are in your genre, which is a bit of a question mark for me...”
  • Advises ensuring comparable titles accurately reflect the genre to assist agents in contextualizing the work.

• Narrative Structure and Element Integration ([24:59] - [29:53]):

  • Carly: “You're giving me disjointed plot points...”
  • Highlights the issue of listing elements (e.g., bionic hand, AI trained typewriter) without demonstrating their integration into a cohesive narrative.
  • Encourages showcasing how unique elements drive the plot forward and enhance character development.

• Emotional and Interiority Layering ([29:23] - [29:53]):

  • Carly: “You are doing a really good job at the world building, but it's not layered with emotionality and interiority...”
  • Stresses the importance of intertwining world-building with the protagonist's emotional journey to create a compelling first-person narrative.

Notable Quote:

Carly Waters [25:03]: “The query letter should not be a list of elements. The query letter should be a compelling promise of a story.”

Challenges of Writing in the First Person

Throughout the critiques, the cohosts underscore the complexities of first-person narration, especially in memoirs and rich genres like steampunk fiction. Key challenges highlighted include:

• Voice Authenticity: Capturing the genuine voice and evolving consciousness of the protagonist to engage readers effectively.

• Causality and Cohesion: Ensuring events are interconnected, demonstrating clear cause-and-effect to maintain narrative flow and believability.

• Balancing External Elements with Internal Depth: Integrating world-building elements seamlessly with the protagonist's emotional and psychological landscape to avoid a disjointed narrative.

• Technical Precision: Maintaining impeccable grammar, spelling, and structure to present a polished and professional query that reflects the writer's capability.

Notable Insight:

Carly Waters [13:29]: “It is so important in any book, especially a memoir... your query letter needs to show me that you can bring things together in a way that feels really braided in, organic and intentional, because compelling.”

Conclusion

This episode serves as a valuable guide for writers aiming to master first-person narratives. By dissecting real query letters, Bianca, Carly, and CeCe provide actionable feedback and highlight the delicate balance between storytelling and technical execution. Listeners gain a deeper understanding of how to craft compelling first-person narratives that resonate emotionally while maintaining structural integrity.

Whether you're penning a memoir or delving into the imaginative realms of steampunk fiction, the insights shared in this episode equip you with the knowledge to overcome the inherent challenges of first-person writing. Tune in to transform your narrative approach and elevate your writing journey.

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For more episodes and resources, visit theshitaboutwriting.com.

Transcript

[Bianca Marais]

Omg. Have you seen the Deep Dive Virtual retreat lineup for the 1st and 2nd of February? It's incredible. Gatekeepers galore. As well as the authors who managed to get past them, we've got the editors and agents who worked on phenomenal projects like Station 11, Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow, Crazy Rich Asians, the Flight Attendant, Maame Wayward, the Wife, Upstairs Stairs, the Tinder Swindler, Big Little Lies, the Perfect Couple, the Other Black Girl, and so much more. The presentation topics are brilliant, so practical and valuable regardless of where you are in your writing journey. One of our speakers, the brilliant Annabel Monaghan, who wrote the best selling Nora Goes Off Script, was a delegate at the very first Deep Dive Retreat and now she's kicking butt on all over the Place. Coming back to present. That could be you one day. Those of you who take part in the Thousand Words of Summer will also be super excited to see the fabulous Jami Attenberg in the lineup as well. Trust me, you do not want to miss this. Head to our website theshitaboutwriting.com go to the deep Dive page to see more information and to register. We hope to see you there. Hi there and welcome to our show, the Shit no One Tells you About Writing. I'm Bianca Marais and I'm joined by Carly Waters and Cece Leera from PS Literary Agency. We'll be kicking off today's episode with our usual Books with Hook segment, after which we'll go to today's guest. Hi everyone, welcome back to another Books with Hooks. Remember, if you want to submit for this segment, you can go to our website, the Shit About Writing. Look for the Books with Hooks tab and you can do your submission there. And if you have submitted in the past and you weren't chosen, you can wait two or three months and then you can revise and resubmit. Right. Cece is going to kick us off with the first query letter.

[Carly Waters]

Dear Cece, A writing buddy recently told me about the Shit no one tells you about Writing podcast and I have been binge listening the episodes ever since. A big thank you to Carla, Bianca and yourself for all of your advice. It's so helpful to hear about the challenges and success stories of other writers. Between Jesus Christ and Prince Charming, I needed to choose a savior. When the communion wafers started tasting stale, I met Charlie and thought he might be it. I am contacting you because you are looking for the next Educated by Tara Westover and because you consider that a good memoir reads like a novel packed with tension, conflict and stakes. My memoir, 118,000 Words, is a cross pollination of Westover's bestseller and Lena Dunham's not that Kind of Girl. Committed to dark humor, this coming of age story shares how I distanced myself from my family and church's dysfunction while discovering hope through friendship and education. It will likely appeal to anyone interested in learning more about oppressive religious communities as well as new adult readers in search of make your own savior kit As a teenager, I gave birth to monsters in my dreams. I donned a purity ring and promised to save my first kiss for marriage to make the nightmares go away. Enter 17 year old Charlie, a bassoonist with a love of Kurt Vonnegut. After borrowing his books and writing in his car, I decided to date him, defying my parents wishes and God's for the first time. While my mother wrestled with her own family secrets and our chaplain father clashed with my neurodivergent sibling, I turned to friends from school, tumbling into a world of drinking, drugs and addiction. I used to be a Christian soldier, but that's not information I share on job applications. By the time I moved to France at 19, I'd long retired from God's army. Now I live in Nantes where I lead a monthly writers group and I'm currently pursuing a PhD in American literature. I have a Master's in General and Comparative Literature from the Sorbonne and have experience writing articles as a content manager for a business school here in France. I have attached the first five pages and would love to send you my full manuscript if you're interested. Thank you in advance for your time and consideration. I hope to hear from you soon. Warm regards, Michel.

[Bianca Marais]

Thank you. Cece. I think you said we needed to play a drinking game every time we did a comp to educate it. So we are all having a sip of something now. Okay, what was the word count there and what was your take on that?

[Carly Waters]

So this one came in at 420 words. I'm gonna say it because we have to point this out. You misspelled Carli. You wrote Carla, which is another name, which is why I think you're spellcheck. Didn't catch that. Typos and names happen. You don't have to beat yourself up over it. But like double check if you can. It's a minor thing, but I wanted to say it just in case you hadn't seen it. Let's start with the very, very first one liner. You know, it's a paragraph that's essentially one line, you know, between Jesus Christ and Pence. Charming. I Needed to choose a savior. I think you need to remove that. It's a great line. Like, the whole between Jesus Christ and Prince Charming communion wafer turning stale. Like, it's good. But I was so confused when I read that. I was like, huh, what am I reading? And Charlie is in all caps. So I was like, is this the title of the memoir? Is it Charlie? That's even more confusing. Like, either insert this into your plot paragraph in a way that feels organic and makes sense or remove it. I think you should remove it. You are again comping to educated, which you are not wrong. I do want to find the next educated. It would real me to find the next educated. And I can see why. Like, I can see why you're comping to educated. It makes sense. But then you're also comping Lena Dunham. And, like, she's obviously a huge celebrity. So I think you need to find a different comp, because that's just too different. Like, you are not Lena Dunham. I'm saying this with love, and it just won't work in terms of, like, actual comps that an agent can use when submitting your plot paragraph, I made a list of what we know about the plot based on what we have here. We know that the protagonist is rebelling against her family when she starts dating a guy. We know that she tumbles into a world of drug use. Okay, that's what we know about the protagonist and the plot. We also know that the mother has a secret and then the father is clashing with the sibling. But I don't see how these two things are connected. Like, in my opinion, you need to rewrite this query letter to honor the dominoes tipping over effect and to honor the fact that everything must be tied to the protagonist. The protagonist is your story's son. This is especially true in a memoir. Imagine, for example, that none of us know the story of Cinderella. Like, no one has ever heard of Cinderella. It's not something that we all know. Okay, imagine if someone were pitching Cinderella as a book and they said, you know, she grew up, she's under the thumb of her abusive stepmother and she wants to escape. So she meets talking animals, rides in a pumpkin turned carriage, and attends a party. And at the end she must figure out if she will be saved or not. Like, that's just confusing, right? You're highlighting elements of the plot instead of creating a very carefully connected story. You're not doing the whole A causes B, B causes C, C causes D, which we talk about all the time. I feel like, we're like broken records at this point. But it's really important because without causality, I'm just getting highlights. I'm getting all these highlights that I don't see how they come together. And I'm sure they do come together. But one of the biggest challenges of writing a memoir is that you might have an interesting story, but are you a storyteller? Now, these are different things, and I hope you are. Like, I hope that is you. But your query letter needs to show me that. Your query letter needs to show me that you can bring things together in a way that feels really braided in, organic and intentional, because compelling. You'll already have. You already have a compelling story, clearly, but it also needs to feel tight and connected. So I hope you revise this, because I feel like it does need revising, because you clearly have a very interesting story to tell.

[Bianca Marais]

Thank you. Cece, can I just say, I love the line between Jesus Christ and Prince Charming. You have got to find a way to braid that in further down. Just please don't get rid of it. I absolutely adore it. Just find a way to make it work. Okay.

[Cece Leera]

Carly, I feel like that line, you can save that for some marketing material. You know, that's your newsletter banner. Like, there are so many options for marketing. So definitely, definitely save that line. Okay, so my notes, like, on the technical side, you had Charlie capitalized, which is kind of a common synopsis technique, more in screenwriting, to be honest, than in book publishing. So you don't need to capitalize Charlie's name in all caps. That should definitely not be capitalized. I thought that was the title. And we have a note from this person that they want to keep their title secret, and that's totally fine. So I'm not going to out you, but I thought that the title was Charlie, and so just make sure that we know that that was just a name. Okay, Comps. I had the exact same notes, which is. These are both super tough. That kind of girl is from a celebrity. It's also 10 years old. Educated. It's in a tier of its own. And just for saying educated, I have to take a drink. Okay. All right, so next note. I do feel like while this topic in the story, this is obvious. Your life. You know, this is a very interesting story. There have been a lot of memoirs in this space, so we really do have to focus on what is unique about your story, because we kind of go from the paragraph. You know, I turned to friends from school tumbling into a world of drinking, drugs, and addiction. And then you kind of get into what I think should be the author bio paragraph. But because this is a memoir, there isn't really an author bio paragraph. It gets into the I used to be a Christian soldier, da, da, da, da, da. And then you get into, you know, where you live. And so there's not really an ending to this story. Right. A memoir needs a beginning, a middle, and an end. I didn't get the sense that there was an end to this, which makes me feel like, is this a book? Why did we need to write it now? What is the beginning and middle and an end of all of this? I also sense that the metaphors in this were. I don't know if, like, reaching is the right word, but I did not know what I gave birth to monsters in my dreams means. Like, is this a metaphor? Because gave birth. Birth denotes that you had sex, and then you. In the next line is, I don a purity ring. So then I'm like, what is happening? Like, is she having some sort of dreams about her sexuality in a way that is at odds with the purity ring? But, like, that is a lot of metaphor to get into in terms of, like, one line in a query letter. All very interesting if, like, that's where we're going with it. But for a query letter and that being a metaphor, I don't know, I felt like that was maybe reaching there. So, yeah, I don't know. I think your brain is working in super interesting ways. It's just as a query letter, we have limited space to get across what we need, which is the beginning, middle, and end of what this story is. So those are my notes for you.

[Bianca Marais]

Thank you, Carly. So I'm wondering if we show the causality again. So based on the point that you just said, if we say something like, despite donning a purity ring and promising to save my first kiss for marriage when I was a teenager, I gave birth to monsters in my dreams. Does that show more of a causality that despite having the purity ring, this was such a big thing, that even in her dreams, she was giving birth to monsters? Or are you? Like, that's not compelling enough to kind of be there. Do you feel like it should be taken away entirely?

[Cece Leera]

CeCe has something to say. I'll let CeCe go first.

[Carly Waters]

I mean, I want to know what both of her opinions are, but for me, it makes it better. The whole despite smart, but I don't need it. Like, you are focusing on interiority. You're focusing on, like, dreams that you're having. That. That's great for the pages. Please keep it for the pages. The skill set that goes behind writing a query letter is just so different from the pages. And the same thing happened with the whole communion wafer between Prince Charming, which I agree is a great line. Does it belong in the query letter? I don't know that it does. And certainly not at the very top, like you're dancing tango when you're supposed to be swimming in a pool. You know, like, they're different skills.

[Cece Leera]

Yeah, I don't really have anything to add. I like so much. As I said about the way this writer's brain thinks. Is this all right for a query letter? Probably not. It probably just needs to go.

[Bianca Marais]

Yeah, man, query letters are so freaking hard. I feel your pain, writers. I feel your pain. Okay, Cece, are you going to summarize those opening pages for us?

[Carly Waters]

Okay, so the protagonist is 12 years old, celebrating her purity vow at Red Lobster. She got to choose the place. She's talking to her dad about a vacation they took. They order food. And then there's a second scene where she's five and she's on her mother's lap reading a story about Mary Magdalene. And her sister's there, too. And we learn about how she grew up thinking it was her job to show others in their community, in her school how, you know, a good life was lived under the principles of Jesus Christ. Christ.

[Bianca Marais]

Thank you, Cece. Okay, so I'm going to be assuming that this is written in the first person, since it is a memoir. How do you feel about us beginning a memoir when the character is so young and we're writing in the first person? What's. What's your take on that? And what's your take on the opening pages?

[Carly Waters]

So that is a very good question. I feel like starting a memoir in a scene where she's really young in the first person can work really well. The Glass Castle does it. Aftershocks does it sort of. I mean, it's her remembering when she was really, really young. So it's sort of. But Educated does it. And it actually brings me to a really big picture note. I have the reason why all these memoirs I mentioned, especially the Glass Castle and Educated, were so successful is because the author captured the evolving consciousness of a child in a way that was very compelling and was filled with psychological acuity. Again, I feel like I keep harping on about this, but it is so important in any book, especially a memoir. And so right now, she does not seem 12. Like, that is my big picture note. To you. I read this and I was like, this is not a 12 year old. Like, the voice is not of a 12 year old, to be clear. I know this actually happened. I know you remember being 12, so maybe you're like, cece, what are you talking about? I am me. I am writing about me being 12. But it doesn't sound like you're. There's a difference between you being qualified to write this, which obviously you are, and being able to pull off the voice of someone who was that age. So I recommend that you go read not just memoirs, but novels, honestly, in which the protagonist is really, really young and it's written in the first person. And see how the authors created that. A really good example is Pet, by Katherine Chitney. It's fantastic. The protagonist is. I don't remember how old she is. Eight, maybe. I don't know. But it's so well written. And she captures the voice perfectly. So it is a challenge because writing in the third person, when you're writing from a child's point of view, is typically easier. But in a memoir, you can't do that, nor would I recommend it. So, yeah, it's hard. So the other note I want to talk about, which ties into my big picture note, is, again, I want to talk about psychological acuity and how important psychological acuity is. And I'll use a scene from these pages to. To exemplify what I'm saying. We have the protagonist at Red Lobster, which is a restaurant she chose because it's her special day. And she tells her dad that she was thinking of getting the lobster because she's never tried lobster. And the father says, get whatever you want, Michelle. This is your special day. She looks at the lobster tank and sees all the lobsters crammed together. And then she orders the tilapia, just like her father. Now, is this a good excerpt? Is this, like, good dialogue? Yeah, the dialogue's well written, but it's missing interiority. When she tells her dad, I told him I was looking at the lobster, but I was worried it was too expensive. What is she anticipating? His reaction will be like, is she thinking that he will say what he ends up saying? Is she expecting him to say something else? I want to know what her expectation is, because that will inform his response. And when she decides not to get the lobster, I know that we have a moment of her looking at the tank, but I don't know if that's actually the reason why she doesn't get the lobster. Is it? Or is it because her father Got the tilapia and she wanted to please him. Did she clock in his reaction after she ordered the tilapia to see if he would be pleased by her decision of being perhaps more frugal? Or is it something else? Did she immediately feel disappointment when she ordered the tilapia? I'm mentioning all these things because they don't actually take up a lot of space. Clocking in expectations, clocking in interpretations of reactions. But they go such a long way, like, such a long way into developing psychological acuity. How someone interprets others actions changes wildly depending on not just who you're talking to, which is obvious, but who you are, what your relationship is like. Like, it just makes such a big difference. Each 12 year old girl on this planet having that same dialogue with her father at the same restaurant would be thinking something different, would be expecting something different. And the uniqueness of that is really, really important. So you have the potential here. I just think you need to develop more. And that really just takes time. That's normal. That's a huge part of the storytelling process. But I'm excited to see what you can do with this.

[Bianca Marais]

Awesome, Cece, thank you. Carly, your thoughts.

[Cece Leera]

I'll go with just one main note, which is that I felt like even though we were in scene, there was so much that was summary of different events or the past or, I don't know, just. Just things about what she thought was gonna happen. You know, on the first page she talks about everything, about tonight was perfect. Being able to spend time alone with him like this, getting out of the house. He'd even let me choose the restaurant for a special father daughter date. Like to me that's like, is that factual? Is that synopsis? Like, you know, I was kind of like, huh. And then later on, then the next page he says something. I remembered that I must have been about seven, we'd gone to the time chair. You know, it's like something would happen in the scene and then right away that paragraph would take us into a bit of summary. And so I really just wanted to be in scene more. And I think, you know, Cece's giving great ideas about how to stay in Seedmore and an opportunity to get into that psychological acuity. Because I felt like every time we were just like getting into the moment, I was getting taken back out of it. So I would just be kind of guarding against that, watching for that, because that was something that flagged for me.

[Bianca Marais]

Okay, thanks, Carly. All right, we're now going to look at our second query letter. Today will you please read that for us.

[Cece Leera]

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[Carly Waters]

What?

[Cece Leera]

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[Bianca Marais]

Okay, word count there and your take on that.

[Cece Leera]

All right, so we're clocking in approximately 334 words. Okay, so let's start with the comps as usual. So neither of these are in your genre, which is a bit of a question mark for me. I would definitely think there has to be some steampunk ways that we can comp to here. I don't know that category in and out by any means or really at all, so I can't really offer any comps for you. So I would definitely recommend calling into our comps hotline and potentially utilizing that service that we offer, because I can't give you the answer, but I know that these ones aren't going to be quite right because an agent and an editor neither could use these. So I would be coming back to that section. Overall, as a premise, this is super interesting, right? I think you did a really good job of talking about the stakes not only for the situation and the time period and the character and the world that they live In. So I think you have a lot of the stakes elements set up properly. So I think that works. A couple things I want to focus on kind of word choice wise. The line that says, being a single young woman in Montreal's 1870 leaves her little agency. I felt like. And we're missing something. Like in Montreal's 1870, what? I don't know, it just felt like there was a word missing there. And then when you say when she lands in London, comma, the biggest metropolis in the world, comma, I think that's pretty obvious, personally. Unless there's again, something else you're trying to tell us about your world, where it is the only city, or again, this is steampunk. And therefore, you know, your world could be a little bit different. But at that time, London would probably be the biggest, at least English speaking metropolis in the world. So I don't know, I. I don't know if we need that line there. I don't think we need to name the friends. Because you say in the one paragraph, three allies willing to secretly cross the Atlantic. I love that. And then in the next paragraph, you know, you kind of like stowaway thief and retired time traveler. I'm like, I don't know them yet, and they're not really contributing to the story. So I think you can just stick with your three allies. I think that would be fine. There in the author bio paragraph, I really like that you explain, you know, you're fully bilingual, avid reader of both languages. I think that's super interesting. So those are my notes.

[Bianca Marais]

Thank you, Kali. Okay, Cece, what have you got to add?

[Carly Waters]

I just feel like my new anthem is, you know, I love you writers, but you're giving me disjointed plot points like, I don't know what the bionic hand, AI trained typewriter, stolen zeppelin. And then we have another line that's like, there's Frank and then there's a stowaway thief. And then the retired time. You're highlighting things, you're listing things. The query letter should not be a list of elements. The query letter should be a compelling promise of a story. They're very different things. And I know it's really hard. All the empathy, all the criticism comes with a lot of empathy, but it's still true. You still have to do it. So I think you need to revise. I think we need causality, we need dominoes tipping over. We need all the stuff that I keep harping on about. Feel free to ignore me because I also am mindful That I don't read ya. It's not true that I don't read ya. I don't represent ya. So I'm not well versed in it. So, you know, you get to say, thank you so much, Cece, but no thank you.

[Bianca Marais]

Which is true for all the advice we dispense on the show all the time. Right. Okay, Carly, will you please give us a summary of the opening pages?

[Cece Leera]

All right, here we go. Montreal, Canada. September 1870. In a world almost like ours. All right, so Victoria is our main character.

[Carly Waters]

She.

[Cece Leera]

She is hungry. She has nothing in her pantry. She's very, very hungry. She is kind of driving around through the different city streets on her way somewhere, zigzagging through. We're kind of getting a picture of Montreal. She stops in front of the Montreal Chronicle, which is the oldest English language daily newspaper, and she is going up the steps because she is kind of working for them to produce some news articles, but she is a woman, and so she's not allowed to use her name. So she is talking to John Marshall, who is the owner and editor in chief of the paper about the whole situation. There's kind of a familiar banter between them. And then we find out he's a pseudo uncle to her. Not biologically, but, you know, one of her father's oldest friends. He kind of explains that, you know, because she's a woman, that she can't do this and that, that, that and the other. And then they talk a bit about the dad's disappearance, and that's where we end.

[Bianca Marais]

Wonderful. Thank you. Okay, what was your take on those pages?

[Cece Leera]

All right, so I really liked this kind of drive through the city, naming different stops as she, you know, she's naming, like driving down Notre Dame street, you know, making a turn here, describing the heavy wooden door. The Montreal Chronicle. So I really did get a good sense of place and setting. So I think you did a really, really good job there. Coming back to the. And I mentioned this a couple times in my summary because it was mentioned a couple times in the pages about how hungry she is, and she knows she needs the money from the writing to. To feed herself, basically. It's mentioned a number of times I flagged where I think we can cut things and make things a little bit simpler. But I do think, obviously, you know, being hungry and eating food is a great motivation for a character, especially one who has some of life stacked against her. I like the introduction of some subtle things that explain that this is steampunk. So there is this typewriter, the uber script typewriter. 1900 is what it's called. It was invented three years prior. They're using it in their journalism. The machine can render any muddled thoughts into coherent sentences in an instance. This is kind of the promise of that AI machine that was mentioned in the query letter. So we're starting to kind of get a sense of the world, get a sense of how technology is integrated into it in a subtle way through the actual interworkings of the office. So I thought that was really good. I think we have a lot of potential here with the dialogue between herself and John Marshall. So I like that they're a bit familiar with each other, but then I'm kind of like, if they are that familiar with each other, there's probably some other things we can do with that moment of dialogue. Some of it did feel familiar, the sense of, like, he's saying, your work won't be taken seriously. People knew it was written by a woman. And then she says, you know, you mean you wouldn't take it seriously? And then he has the good sense to look embarrassed. And, you know, I know it is, but I didn't make the rules. And I'm paraphrasing a bit here, but it is a familiar trope, and it's something that we have heard before. So what is it that's unique about her particular situation? And the fact that they're, you know, have this familiarity with each other again gives us this opportunity for us to get a little bit deeper with this dialogue.

[Carly Waters]

And.

[Cece Leera]

And it felt a little bit rehearsed, you know, a little bit for the sake of the reader. So, again, if we're going to keep that dialogue, I would come back to that. I'd revisit it. And that's my notes.

[Bianca Marais]

Thank you, Kali. Okay, Cece, handing it across to you.

[Carly Waters]

I'm going to do something I never do, which is be brief. I feel like you are doing a really good job at the world building, but it's not layered with emotionality and interiority, and I would urge you to do that so you don't have to remove any of the world building, just add extra layers.

[Bianca Marais]

Yeah, that's the thing when you're writing fantasy or anything like this, you've got to do the world building super fast on top of the interiority, on top of the emotionality, and it is really, really tough. So, as the kids these days would say, I won. Hundy P. Feel for you, man. Because it is hard. It is really, really hard. Okay, Carly and Cece, thank you so much again for your excellent insights. We'll be back again in two weeks time with another Books with hooks and we'll see you next week with the author Interview.

[Cece Leera]

A reminder that this is an unscripted program and our conversations have been edited and condensed and is not a full picture of our feedback or conversation directly with each author. As always, refer back to our written notes for the fulsome picture. Carly Waters and Cece Lira are agents at PS Literate Agency, but their work on this podcast is not affiliated with the agency and the views expressed by Carly and Cece on this podcast are solely that of them as podcast co hosts and do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, policies or position of PS Literary agents. A reminder about all the ways that you can support us as a show. Rate us five stars on Apple Podcasts. Tell your writing friends about us. We'd love to help as many writers as possible and follow us on our Substack newsletter. Get our stacked newsletter on a weekly basis. Bonus videos, articles, essays, advice and more. You can find it at the about writing.substack.com that's theshitaboutwriting.substack.com and that's it for today's episode.

[Bianca Marais]

I hope you'll join us for next week's show. In the meantime, keep at it. Remember, it just takes one. Yes omg. Have you seen the Deep Dive Virtual retreat lineup for the 1st and 2nd of February? It's incredible. Gatekeepers galore. As well as the authors who managed to get past them, we've got the editors and agents who worked on phenomenal projects like Station 11 Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow, Crazy Rich Asians, the Flight Attendant, Maame Wayward, the Wife Upstairs, the Tinder Swindler, Big Little Lies, the Perfect Couple, the Other Black Girl, and so much more. The presentation topics are brilliant, so practical and valuable regardless of where you are in your writing journey. One of our speakers, the brilliant Annabel Monaghan, who wrote the best selling Nora Goes Off Script, was a delegate at the very first Deep Dive Retreat and now she's kicking butt all over the place coming back to present. That could be you one day. Those of you who take part in the Thousand Words of Summer will also be super excited to see the fabulous Jami Attenberg in the lineup as well. Trust me, you do not want to miss this. Head to our Website the about writing.com Go to the deep Dive page to see more information and to register. We hope to see you there.