As many of you may (or may not) know, for the past two years, I’ve been working on a manuscript about songwriters in Nashville. It started out as a thesis for my MFA program, but since I graduated I’ve been thinking of it more along professional lines. I haven’t mentioned it here because I tend to be fairly quiet about such things, and because it makes me nervous.

The inevitable rejections a writer faces privately are tough enough, so you’ll rarely hear me or any other prudent writer I know touting the fact that she has just sent out seventeen book proposals to agents. The truth is that I tend to be pretty hesitant to send anything out (nothing’s ever perfect, you know) – which means that I’m often spared rejection, but also sparsely published. But, this summer, at the urging of a persistent advisor, I wrote a book proposal for Bluebird (see Jupe’s awesome book covers!) and sent it to one agent.

I got an email from him the day the FedEx hit his office in NYC. He asked me for three weeks’ exclusivity (pretty normal, from what I understand), to which I happily agreed. After his deadline was up, JW called me and asked me on what I imagine as the literary world’s equivalent of a second date. He said he liked my writing and that he liked the manuscript’s subject, but that he wanted to see a different chapter excerpt – preferably something more character based.

Now, because I was so sure that JW was simply going to send me a letter that said, “Thanks, but no thanks,” that he asked me out on a second date felt nothing short of miraculous. But, as second dates go, anxiety and intimidation set in; I realized that to give JW what he really wanted meant having to rethink the structure of the whole manuscript – 225 pages of which I meticulously stitched together over the course of my two-year graduate program. For reasons I won’t bore you with, I believe that taking the whole darn thing apart is the right thing to do. But I have been stalling, unsure of how to proceed.

This week, however, I gave myself an October 1 deadline. Whether JW wants the second date by then or not – he said there was no rush – he’s getting it. Otherwise, Bluebird will never be heard from again.

Now – I’d like to ask a favor of you. I’m curious to see if any of you would read the attached document (lorna-revised.doc, below) and tell me – honestly – if you’re intrigued. I need this thing to jump right off the page; I need you to be hungry for more of the story. If it doesn’t, and you can’t get past page two, please tell me. Thanks!