I am doing a big push to find a literary agent that may want to talk to me about some of my projects I am developing. Please forward or copy or share this letter I sent to an agent here in Denver with any people you may know who may have a contact I would be able to talk with...... thanks! Query Letter To Sara Megibow, a literary agent here in Denver Dear Sara Megibow, About three years ago-- through a series of late night misapplied keystrokes-- as I began to form the nucleus of an idea of a journey across the world that developed from three months of traveling to now a third year, I fortuitously found myself gazing at Kiva.org. What that has to do with why I am writing you I hope to make abundantly clear before you lose interest and go on to the next query. If you don’t know-- like I didn’t at the time-- Kiva.org is a not-for-profit company that leverages the power of the Internet to give people like you and me the ability to award small micro-loans of $25 or more to people in impovershed countries to start their own businesses. I have to admit to you... I had no idea how I ended up on this site except maybe the fact that I was doing some research about returning to Vietnam and maybe in my fog-addled mind I mistook the word ‘loan’ as maybe a chance to find a way to have my trip financed by someone else! Instead, about an hour later, I was now the proud supplier of funds to four different enterprises in four asian countries on my planning list to visit in the next months. I was a mini-mogul lending out thousands of pennies with the exciting prospect of a return of my investment equalling exactly the amount that I had leant. In otherwords, if these savvy business owners paid back every cent borrowed my account would return to equal. My book query to you is not about finances and return on investment and fulfilling peoples dreams and basic needs in under developed countries (though Kiva.org makes this ridicuolously easy for us to participate in). My book query is about what I did the next day. Sara, before I tell you what I did I need to fulfill the promise of why the Kiva incident led me to you. I’m quite sure you are glancing at this query on a computer screen of some sort-- I’m actually typing this into my iPhone Notes just like I’ve written the nearly 1,000 poems and essays that I’ve composed in the last three years (not to mention the 150,000 photos I’ve taken in the same way). It’s no secret the way we communicate, read, watch things, has changed expoentially in the last few years. The very idea of traveling and how we research destinations and how we move about cities and how we meet people in foreign countries--- this entire process is forever changed and made new again. I’m writing you, kind lady, because I woke up in the middle of the night yet again and yet again my mind was racing about the past three years-- all the things that I’ve accomplished, all the accolades I’ve gathered on social media, all the people that I’ve talked to before groups of my peers and all the signatures I’ve signed in my two books of poetry and photography, and this night, back in Denver once again, I am now sleepily awake and missing my Italian guy (our first date in Italy was at a pizza restaurant-- of course!-- and the way he cut his pizza, left the crust untouched all the way around and kept it for the last, well, isn’t that just the most perfect thing in the world?) and wondering, what the heck am I doing and where is this all leading and it would be nice to have a literary agent who I could work with and, Jay-- I am thinking-- remember the Kiva thing a few years ago... just punch in a couple things and see what happens.... literary agent, denver.... and there you are, Sara Megibow. The day after I donated my thousands of pennies to business ventures on Kiva.org, I bought a one way ticket to Singapore and never looked back. Well, that’s not exactly true. Yes, I bought that ticket and yes I went to Singapore, but through the course of three years, I have gone backwards and forwards, fallen in and out of love, roamed foreign streets in search of McDonald’s (if the local food looked questionable) and learned something valuable and I think universal—that we all get thrown bucketfuls of challenges and for all the diversity out there in the world we are really just one community of people with all the same wants and needs. Sara, I have a compelling story to tell. Three years ago I was a broken man. My partner of seventeen years died unexpectedly, my parents passed away, my business teetered, my eyesight got wonky after a botched Lasik surgery-- I was a man that subsisted on the vision photography gave him and the sense of family and purpose that put warmth into my words; and I lost it all. You can say this is Elisabeth Kubler-Ross, On Death and Dying, you can say this is Eat, Pray, Love (man’s version) you can say this is a photography how-to book using the new wondrous smart-phone devices and apps, you can say this is a primer on social media, you can say this is a poetry book closer to the style of Billy Collins and Wendy Cope... the one thing I can definitely assure you is that a screen play is impossible but the seems-so-ancient way of talking before groups and spreading the word has already begun. I need help. I am confident about my abilities as a writer and photographer. I am driven to succeed and to develop several different writing projects... The one I want to share with you now is The Unobtrusive Eye. This isn’t fiction. But it is There and Back Again, and 2 1/2 years ago my guy in Italy created a wondrous ring with his pizza crust, and I have battled my share of the creatures of Mordor and I have climbed to the top of Mount Pusi in Luang Prabang and said goodbye to my father the day he died by setting free a bird from a tiny wooden cage. My magic is nothing more than the magic of a village lady in Hoi An, Vietnam who somehow managed to let an Internet organization know she needed a loan of $50 to finance a laundry business and paid every penny back to me and said Thank You, Cam On.... interest paid in full with words of thankfulness. Yes, I’ve had my share of hard knocks-- who doesn’t by the time they are in their forties-- but I have been on a magic carpet ride of discovery. I’ve taken that turbulence in the air and crafted something universal and beautiful out of it, a story told through images and words, at once deeply personal and also intimately familiar to all. I would like you to consider talking with me and showing you the book I am now working on. I am in Denver for the next several weeks. I return to Italy at the end of August. Part of the appeal of what I have to offer is writing something deeply rooted in the sweeping changes of new technology but based on personal connection. I can write and write and write about why a man in Italy captured my heart with flour and water, but you had to be there. Wouldn’t it be cool to think that something unexpected could happen between us because we took the chance to consider a project that yesterday was not even on your radar, but for me, last night, sleepless, all I could think about was, I got something here, but I need help. (And where did these puffs of flour come from on my tee-shirt?) Sincerely, Jay Desind 303-246-5094 colocoolguy@gmail Facebook: The Unobtrusive Eye
Posted on: Fri, 19 Jul 2013 19:17:40 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015