Author Archives: Julie Sondra

Pitch Wars: The Story So Far

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So the ship has sailed and the submissions are in for Pitch Wars. The avalanche began December 2. The mail fairies sorted the applications for us and we gained access to our submissions on December 3. Today is December 4.

I haven’t begun to read mine yet, and I am frightened.

I ended up being the ninth most popular mentor out of the forty-six of us (well, at least that was my “rank” when I counted at the beginning of yesterday). I received over seventy hopefuls. Three of our mentors (that I counted) got over 100 submissions. (Good luck, ladies.)

We’ve been having a few e-mail issues, and those have clogged up our process, but I think we’ve got it straightened out now. But I still wouldn’t have started yet. For the record, it’s mostly because I got a book deal at a kind of difficult time, and my publisher’s requests for information have kept me a bit busy the last few days. I’ll be able to start devouring submissions when I get through with my publisher’s questionnaire.

But once I start, here’s how I plan to handle my submissions!

  1. I will open each submission and read the query letter. I will make notes on what I like and don’t like.
  2. If the query letter makes me want to read the material, I will read the included pages. That’s right–I may actually not read them at all. Just like an agent. I’m thinking most of my potential mentees will at least write a query letter well enough to make me want to read the pages, but there are some who don’t. I will make notes on the writing.
  3. I will prepare a letter that outlines each submitter’s strengths and weaknesses. This may sound weird, but the MORE criticism an author gets from me, the BETTER they probably already are. If there’s a lot to fix in the query and pages, I will not be interested, and I will consider the time investment too costly. So if I crap all over an author, they’re probably almost there, because I think they’re close enough to be worth the spanking.
  4. I will privately rank each submission. As I read through them, I will put them in a list, putting the ones I like best at the top and the ones I like least at the bottom. At the end, I’ll have a quantitative list of every potential mentee from best to worst (in my opinion). The top three will be my mentee and alternates.
  5. Before I’ve decided for sure on my top three, I may request additional pages from a small portion of my applicants. I request pages very, very rarely. I will almost definitely request more material from fewer than ten participants, and it will probably be fewer than five. But I will definitely request those three chapters from anyone I’m considering as an alternate or mentee. I probably will NOT be requesting synopses or outlines. Your requests from me will be late. Probably not for a few days. Don’t lose hope. You will not find out whether you are one of my picks until Brenda announces them on December 11, but if you get a pages request from me, you will know you’re on a very short list.
  6. Authors who have applied to me are invited to stay in touch throughout and after the contest.  Even for those I do not choose, I may be available in the future to critique submission materials and even full books, but only if we develop a rapport and they don’t respond to feedback by throwing hissy fits. (I’m afraid this has happened to me.) I acquired a very sweet critique partner in my last contest mentoring experience and I edited her entire book even though doing so wasn’t part of the contest. One of my other picks from last year is agented (though it didn’t happen through our contest), and another has gone on to self-publish (and seems very popular!). I really hope I don’t lose a bunch of Twitter followers because of people being sad or mad that I didn’t choose them–that has also happened–but if you stay in touch with  me, I’ll be happy to give you all the help I can once the contest and my publishing preparations aren’t taking up the lion’s share of my time.

I LOVE new writer friends, and if an entrant has an active blog that’s at least partially about writing, I may be interested in following them and adding them to my blogroll if we have some positive interaction! Let me know, y’all!

Sold: So You Think You’re Asexual

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My nonfiction book SOLD!

I’m thrilled to announce that my nonfiction book SO YOU THINK YOU’RE ASEXUAL: An Introduction to the Invisible Orientation has sold to Skyhorse Publishing/Carrel Books!

Publishers Marketplace announcement

[Publishers Marketplace Announcement]

Please check out a more in-depth explanation of the process on my blog, and sign up for my newsletter if you want to be sure to get news on the book’s progress! Read more about the book here.

We’re expecting a Fall 2014 release date.

Feel free to watch my video about it:

Pitch Wars Contest: Mentor Wish Lists Announced

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I’m a Pitch Wars mentor in Brenda Drake’s contest this year.

More than forty mentors have volunteered to accept applications from aspiring authors. We have posted our wish lists and mine is posted over on my blog (if you didn’t know, my Blogspot author blog is chattier and more active; this site primarily posts the biggest news and milestones).

Authors who are trying to get an agent will read our bios, find mentors who are accepting what they write, and apply to us on December 2. We’ll pick an author (and a couple alternates) and help them refine their pitches and spit-shine their manuscripts.

I hope I get to meet some amazing authors, and I’m anticipating some great opportunities for whoever becomes my mentee. 🙂

Pitch Wars 2013: I’m a Mentor!

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I decided to apply to be a mentor in Pitch Wars for the first time this year, and I got accepted to be part of the group! It’s a contest hosted by the illustrious Brenda Drake, designed to connect un-agented writers with mentors. Authors apply, cross their fingers to get selected, and end up getting their pitches and full manuscripts shined up for perusal by agents. Yay! I’m here as a mentor this year to guide one special author through all the hoops, as well as providing cheerleading and moral support. Sound great? That’s because it is!
If you want to apply to a mentor or four, head to Brenda’s Blog and read the full rules, signup directions, and important dates!

About Me: Accepting Adult and New Adult Applications!

The main action is happening on my more active author blog but I will definitely share the highlights here.

Interview: DiversifYA

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An interview with me was posted on the DiversifYA blog today. DiversifYA is all about providing resources for authors to make their young-adult fiction diverse and sharing perspectives about what it’s like to live with different experiences.

I submitted a suggestion last month volunteering myself as an asexual interviewee, and Marieke Nijkamp accepted my offer and sent me her questions. Marieke told me she’s gray asexual herself (an orientation that usually suggests being somewhere between asexual and non-asexual), and she discussed it in a roundtable shortly before my interview posted, so that was a nice connection!

Anyway, here is my interview: DiversifYA: Julie Sondra Decker.

 

Interview: Digital Journal

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I’ve appeared in Digital Journal now, hot on the heels of the Daily Mail article, and I’m afraid it’s full of misleading information and mistakes. It’s pulled heavily from the Daily Mail article from earlier today, but then it adds embellishments and outright factual inaccuracies. I wasn’t asked or told about appearing in this. A friend found it and posted it on my Facebook.

“An asexual activist speaks out”

Problems with it:

  1. The full title is “‘I don’t need to be raped’ an Asexual activist speaks out.” (Capitalization and punctuation intact.) I don’t understand the media’s fascination with sticking “rape” in the headline. Would someone say they do “need to be raped”?
  2. I’m repeatedly called “Julia” in the article. My name is Julie. It’s not short for Julia.
  3. A quote: “Anthony F. Bogaert of Brock University states that he believes one percent of the world population is bisexual.” I don’t know where “bisexual” came from. This article is on asexuality. So is Bogaert’s work. And the next part of the sentence says “and according to Julie Sondra Decker of Tampa, Florida she is one of them.” So according to this article, I’m bisexual.
  4. They claim I never had an intimate relationship with a man or a woman, but I dated in high school. It’s part of how I found out I didn’t like it. The fact that I dated in high school is public in my body of work.
  5. None of my family members ever dragged me to a doctor like this article implies. My mother did ask about it during an examination she asked me to get before going to college. The suggestion that this was an attempted intervention is exaggerated.
  6. The article claims I have a psychology degree. This built on the misconception in The Daily Mail and gave me an imaginary degree. I majored in education. I studied psychology. I don’t have a psychology degree and have never claimed to.
  7. “While asexual’s [sic] never pursue a sexual relationship, some do have romantic relationships.”–Untrue. The author should watch the video embedded in this article, because I debunk that assumption. Some asexual people do pursue sexual relationships despite lack of sexual attraction.

It’s full of really egregious typos too. I’m sorry to see this–something with this many errors and misleading statements does more harm than good.

Copycat articles are appearing in magazines whose languages I don’t speak: “Elle n’a jamais fait l’amour et ne le fera sans doute jamais” in French magazine 7sur7 and “Aseksuaalne naine: meeste arvates tuleks mind ära vägistada” in Estonian magazine Elu24. Copycat articles also appeared in Nigeria News (“I Have Never, and Will Never Have Sex“) Joint Arena (“I have never had sex and I never will“) and The Hollywood Gossip: (“Julie Sondra Decker Discusses Being Asexual“).

 

Interview: The Daily Mail

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I received a few quick interview questions from someone at The Daily Mail today, mentioning without detail that they were doing “a piece” on me, so I answered the questions briefly. However, most of the article that got published a few hours later did not come from those questions. I had a few problems with the content as well.

You can read the Daily Mail article here:

“Asexual woman on how she never has, and never will, have sex.”

Problems with it:

  1. That title: Very poorly written. Take out the appositive phrase “and never will,” and you have a sentence that says “Asexual woman on how she never has have sex.” In the title? Ouch.
  2. Also the title: I have never stated that I “will never have sex.” I don’t think I will, because I don’t think I’ll ever be attracted to anyone that way, but I don’t make dogmatic statements like that.
  3. Also the title again: On the page, the full title is “‘Men say I need a good raping’: Asexual woman, 35, on how she never has, and never will, have sex.” I’m very put off by their need to put the word “rape” in this title.
  4. The photo: Grabbed from my Facebook photos without asking me to provide a photo or asking for the credit. The photo is of me in my bathing suit. It is nine years old. (It was featured on my Facebook because I was writing a novel even while on vacation. I guess they used it to get a good thumbnail for the views?)
  5. I’m repeatedly referred to as “the blonde” which sounds weird to me.
  6. A bunch of the quotes were mined from the Salon article published about me in 2005, a Huffington Post article, and one of my YouTube videos.
  7. It contradicts itself by saying I started calling myself “nonsexual” at 15 (changing to “asexual” later when the community settled on the term), then later saying I called myself “asexual” at 15.
  8. The statements about my family are false. My mom joked about how I’m probably a closet lesbian, because I cuddled with my girl friends in high school, and though she asked me to get a personal exam before going to college and asked the doctor about my lack of interest being a sign of pathology, she did not drag me around to doctors trying to see what was wrong with me.
  9. I don’t have a degree in psychology. I have a degree in elementary education. I took enough classes in psych to have a minor, though.

Some of the quotes from me are just fine, and overall the article may be a little unfocused but still has some interesting stuff despite its inaccuracies and weird choices. Throughout this week I’ve been finding out I’m in the media without being told by the authors, though. I found this one when someone commented on my YouTube that they’d seen me in The Daily Mail and I had to Google it.

 

Appearance: The Huffington Post

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The Huffington Post is celebrating Asexual Awareness Week and now I’ve appeared in an article again. This time, instead of being a nameless contributor to the collaborative video they featured, the article focuses entirely on me and embeds my “Asexuality: An Overview” video.

Please read it:

“‘Asexuality: An Overview’ By Julie Decker Explains A Frequently Misunderstood Identity”

The embedded video was a new addition to their material, but the rest of the article was recycled somewhat from June’s comprehensive Huffington Post article.

Appearance: The Huffington Post

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The Huffington Post has decided to celebrate Asexual Awareness Week. They kicked off by featuring a video by the new asexuality YouTube channel, Everything’s A-Okay.

And I happen to be one of the asexual people who contributed to the video! The brief text part of the article it appears in also includes one quote from the video, and it happens to be something I said, though it was uncredited in the article.

Please check out “‘Everything’s A-Okay’ — Celebrating Asexual Awareness Week.”