Saturday, September 14, 2019

Squeaky Wheel


         A week and a half ago, out to lunch with people from my complex, I took a deep breath and asked if anyone would be willing to be literary guinea pigs.
My book may be finished, but it’s far from done. I’ve been staring at the darn thing for so long I barely see it anymore, and definitely not in its entirety. I needed new eyes.

          Two of the ladies said they’d be delighted to help. This was perfect. These weren’t people I saw every day, or close friends, or relatives, so hopefully they’d be less likely to just say nice things.

          I handed them both cards with my email address on them. And I waited. Two days went by, three, a week.

          Should I contact them? Maybe they left that day thinking, “What did I just get myself into?”

          An additional problem – they had my email address, but I didn’t have theirs. After some detective work scouring past reminders about the luncheon, I found contact information for one of them.

          Was I being pushy? After all, we live here. Maybe now she’d suddenly change direction if she saw me out walking my dog.

          I took a deep breath, wrote what I hoped was a friendly and ‘you don’t really have to do this’ kind of email. I hit send.

          An hour later I received a reply saying, “I emailed you two days after the luncheon but never heard from you.” Followed by another reply, “Whoops! I just realized I’d typed your address incorrectly the first time! Please send the book!”

          Phew.

          More detective work and I’ve emailed the 2nd victim volunteer.

          Fingers crossed, she won’t report me for stalking her.

5 comments:

  1. Fingers crossed. And I so feel your pain/worry/fear when you didn't hear from them.

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  2. Something to remember when giving out your email address, always get theirs at the same time. I hope your book does well.

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  3. I am glad it was something simple and not a rejection. Good luck with your readers. I hope they will have good things to say when the time comes. :-)

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  4. Ha! I'm glad your first "victim" (as you said) was open to helping out. Editing a book must be a big task! (But certainly not as big as writing one!)

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  5. nothing's scarier than waiting for The Reviews when you don't really know the reviewers. and by the same token, you're less apt to take it personally. Good luck with the book.

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