Pitches, Bitches

I have new and improved pitches to share with y'all. My good friend John helped me to un-fuck what I was working with.

For the short story collection, now re-re-christened with it's orignal title, "Men in Strange Arrangements":

Dear ______________,

MEN IN STRANGE ARRANGEMENTS is a collection of thirteen fiction short stories about the odd circumstances boys and men have to deal with, and the consequences if they fail.

Tom is a clean-cut honors student – and a pyromaniac. He has an awakening: fire doesn’t destroy – it only converts energy to a new form. He’s eager to share his epiphany with his best friend Bill, even if it takes a Molotov cocktail.

Nick is a bullied middle-school student, eager to fight back, but the best he can do is correct the spelling when his worst tormentor Kyle writes, “Nick M. sucks cok”. Nick is shocked to later find common ground with Kyle, amid a famous catastrophe.

Trey is a college student in the midst of court-appointed anger management counseling, following a bar fight that left a bouncer’s jaw detached. His treatment starts with a writing assignment: talk about your most functional relationship and why it works. For Trey, that means discussing his best friend, Jared, who Trey had to all but drag out of the closet. Trey is surprised when his analysis puts him at odds with the unwritten rules of hetero manhood.

These are tales of men in strange arrangements. The collection is 45,000 words and three of the stories have been previously published. “Divine Hand” was a top ten finalist in the 2012 Saints and Sinners fiction competition and was published in the anthology. “The Camp Seminole Wiener Wall” is a current nominee for Sundress Press’s “Best of the Net 2012” award. Thanks for your time and consideration.

-James Russell    

I feel much better about my publishing prospects in 2013 with a pitch like that. Here's the one for "Jesse Rules".

Dear ____________,

Fifteen-year-old Jesse Amos is going to rule the world. That way he won’t have to worry about what people think anymore – not his grade-crazed mom, not his sex-obsessed peers. Ruling will allow him to focus on what really matters: winning the Holy Cross student council election, getting a Metallica-worthy gig for his grunge cover band, Colostomy Grab Bag, and putting more time in at church, to bury all those awkward feelings he’s been having for Tony, his guitarist.

One problem: his friends and band mates aren’t as easy to control as Samus Aran in “Metroid 3” or Baraka in “Mortal Kombat”. When controlling his feelings proves equally frustrating, Jesse realizes that in order to rule the world, you have to first shock and captivate the masses, and nothing gets attention like murder.

JESSE RULES is an 83,000-word trangressive novel, my debut. Thanks for your time and consideration.

-James Russell

In other news, this blog has passed the thousand-view mark, which Celebutants can fart out in a heartbeat, but for a noob like me, it's something.

In other news, "The Camp Seminole Wiener Wall" is still up for Sundress Press's best of the net 2012 award and "Mountainview" is in the 2013 Saints and Sinners contest. Meanwhile, I just passed the 60,000-word mark on "Rise of the Paramancers", the first Fantasy novel in a four-part series, "War of the Twin Gods".

Happy New Year everyone. My quest to get books on the shelves and e-shelves resumes in 2013.

-J