The NV dream is over

To cap off what's been a crappy week for me, I didn't make it onto the coveted New Voices List (a.k.a. The List). For those of you who haven't heard of The List, it's a shortlist of entrants who the eds want to follow up with after the end of the competition. Congratulations to those who made it, including my fabulous CP Sarah Brabazon who is thoroughly deserving.

For the rest of us poor sods, what does this mean? Well, the way I see it, we have a number of choices:
1. Give up the writing gig altogether. Don't know about you, but not writing makes me cranky and difficult to live with. So this is not an option for me.
2. Decide that M&B isn't really for you. I like reading them, so I'll continue trying to write them thank-you-very-much.
3. Write The Damn Book - whether it's the entry in the competition (re-writing Chapter 1 'cos it obviously didn't work for one reason or another) or another brand-spanking new story - and sub it to M&B regardless.

I think I'll take number 3 thanks. I mean, I feel despondent right now and need to give myself a day to throw a pity party for one. But, as some encouraging published M&B authors have pointed out on various forums, you don't need a competition to get that publishing contract. These authors can attest to that.

So if you didn't make The List, have an apple and pear martini (my shout) and pick yourself up, dust yourself off, then keep on writing.

As for me, my plan is to write the suckopsis (can't remember who first came up with this term but I hope you don't mind if I've acquired it) and e-mail it along with my first chapter to one of my fave authors from who I was lucky enough to win a critique. Then maybe I can find out what's wrong with this damn chapter once and for all, though I have my suspicions. Then I'm going to put this story aside and do NaNoWriMo with a fresh new story, blocking out the 'shoulds' and 'should-nots' which I've found has crippled my writing so much over the past year.

What about everyone else? What's your plan now that your NV dream is over?