Carole Sojka: Author Idol

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Carole Sojka: Author Idol

I found the program called Author Idol a truly exciting panel at the 2013 California Crime Writers Conference. The panel consisted of all the agents at the conference, and the moderator was Harley Jane Kozak, actress and writer.

The program was supposed to be a test of agent interest. Any of the conference attendees could submit a page from a work in progress. The rules didn’t specify the first page, so it could be from further along in the work. Harley Jane’s job was to pull a page out at random, and without looking it over, simply read it out to the audience. She was fabulous: introduced the page by giving the title, indicated whether it appeared to be a first page or part of the rest of the story, and then read the page with feeling and wit.

The job of the agents was to listen closely and indicate by raising a hand when each of them would have stopped reading a submission they had received. Some pages made it all the way to the end, some barely made it past the first paragraph. Agents run a cut-throat business.

I had submitted a page and waited hopefully while Harley Jane picked page after page. Most of the submitted pages were very good, and I was impressed by the quality of the writing and the imagination shown.

Was my submission picked and did Harley Jane read it? Did she make it all the way to the end of the page, and did the agents all wait until she was finished before raising their hands? Did I get an agent who was crazy about my work from this exercise?

Well, no. My page wasn’t selected, and I didn’t have agents fighting to represent me. Still I found it a really fun exercise, and I’ll submit a page again this year. You never know!

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Carole Sojka graduated from Queens College before earning a Master’s Degree from the University of Southern California. She spent two years in Africa as a Peace Corps volunteer and later worked as a law office administrator. Now a mystery writer, she is the author of A REASON TO KILL and the forthcoming SO MANY REASONS TO DIE.