Feeling cooped up

LIKE everyone who has written more than two sentences that coherently combine, I am trying to market my book to a publisher or literary agent willing to take a leap of faith on an inspired yet unrecognized author. But I passed on all those extension classes and seminars on “how to publish” that were usually scheduled for nights or weekends. (I just don’t function on an intellectual level much above “Law & Order” after 7 p.m.) I’d rather sip a margarita in the evenings or attend the Angel game and read how-to books such as “Getting Your Book Published for Dummies” or “The Insider’s Guide to Getting an Agent.”

Step 1, after I had completed my weighty manuscript, was to craft the quintessential query letter -- the single page that would categorize my book, detail my publishing resume and reflect my entire story so as to snare a publisher or agent who is the recipient of an average of 1,000 such letters monthly, according to New York literary agent Lori Perkins, as cited in Writer’s Digest.

Over coffee with the only friend who has read my future bestseller, we brainstormed my approach: How could I word the letter differently? What combination of elements would entice a professional beyond the proposal to request the manuscript?

“Maybe you need to change what you call it,” my friend offered. “It isn’t really a novel because it doesn’t have the format. It’s not fiction because it’s true, but the names are changed so it’s not technically nonfiction.” Well, I pointed out, nonfiction can include everything from “How to Do the Laundry With Windex” to “The History of a Third World Country.” Was it a memoir? Can one label it such if he’s not Bill Clinton or she’s not the first woman to run for president?

Lo and behold, a friend of a friend, a published author of mysteries who lives in Hawaii, called me just as I was tapping away at the keyboard (“nonfiction memoir save for the fictionalized character names”) and asked me to describe the book.

“You’ve got yourself the most popular genre out there,” he said. “It’s what every publisher is looking for, but you’re not going to like what you have to call it to get the attention it deserves.”

I braced myself.

“It’s chick lit.”

He was right. How could I lower my standards to using terminology that stemmed from the ultimate movie put-down, “chick flick”? My ears heard his suggestion as my brain blocked the message, preventing my fingers from typing those words. But when my issue of Writer’s Digest arrived, the feature story heralded none other than chick lit as the most popular and rapidly emerging genre. I was consoled when the editorial content conveyed the fact that these stories are deeper and more significant in character development than they used to be, and quoted Nadia Corner, a literary agent with the Creative Media Agency in New York City, as saying: “The novels are no longer just about owning that great pair of shoes.”

“Don’t worry, Mom,” my daughter reaffirmed when I called her on the phone to discuss my angst. “Everybody here calls Jane Austen chick lit.”

Harlequin, home of tried-and-true desperate housewife themes, whose covers traditionally depict musclemen bursting out of their shirts and women busting out all over, is now publishing chick-lit erotica for its Spice line.

More along my lines, this publishing house is also the home of Red Dress Ink, which finds profit in “hen lit” for middle-aged heroines like me. Executive Margaret Marbury, the Writer’s Digest story relates, “indicates that the quality of submissions has steadily improved as writers have gained an understanding of the chick-lit approach.”

And so I found myself immersed in researching this trendy field I had known little or nothing about. I went on reading to discover there is “mommy/mom lit”, and young adult chick lit that a spokesman for Dorchester Publishing calls “locker lit” because the locker is where girls keep these books. Sadly for the guys, “lad lit” is not doing as well. I can tell them, being the mother of two girls and married to the father of two boys, that guys would never put themselves through what girls do to make any decision, whether it’s falling in love or even crossing a street. And ultimately, women would rather read about men’s dilemmas (if they have them for more than 10 or 15 minutes) than men would. As the article mentions, it’s women who account for most of the audience for “What Women Want” or “Jerry Maguire.”

So now that I have too much information, what am I? I sat down once more at the computer and opened the file named “query letter.” As I typed, my muse kicked in, my fingers acquired a mind of their own, and the keys simply took over for me as I reworded the first paragraph to agents and publishers:

“Dear Submissions Editor,

“Thank you for considering the publication of my mother-hen lit memoir that, since the story involves my teenage daughters, is also locker lit. You should know, however, that since the post-divorce main character worries about anything and everything, even when she finds true love at 50, perhaps I’ve broken ground on a whole new genre -- chicken-little lit.”

Eat your heart out, Jane.

Kathleen Clary Miller can be reached at [email protected].