Plotting to Win by Tara Chevrestt Page A

them.
    “Regardless, what I do is take data people send me, reports, if you will, and I list the facts on my website. Sometimes, I even investigate on my own and contact the publisher about the complaints made against them. In the end, what goes on my site is my opinion, and it says as much right there for all to see.”
    He bobbed up on his heels, once, twice. “Now, your first assignment was to email a literary agent, right?”
    “Yes,” Victor volunteered.
    “Yea,” Tiffani and Dez chimed.
    When everyone had quieted, Peters made a hmm sound and rubbed his whiskered chin. “Well, let’s say you lost patience with the agent route or after a year of rejections, you decided it wasn’t going to work out. Or, perhaps your book is only 20,000 words. Not many agents pick up stories that length, but there are some good ones out there. You then decide to just submit to an e-book publisher.” He glanced around slowly, making sure he had their attention. “How do you find a good one?”
    “And that is your challenge today.” Ophelia stepped forward, smoothly taking back the spotlight. “For the sake of today’s show, Mr. Peters has made his website unavailable. You are on your own. In today’s challenge, you have three hours to find an e-book publisher and hypothetically submit your manuscript to them. You can only choose one. You will write your chosen publisher a query, attach everything as requested, and save it in your email drafts. Upon the end of the challenge, Mr. Peters will inform us who chose well and who did not. Together, the four of us will pick the winner.”
    “But … without Mr. Peters’s site, how will we know if the publisher has bad marks against them or not?” Victor voiced, alarmed. He was fully aware of the type of stuff that went on. He read the site. Could he remember the details? Never planning on submitting to an e-book publisher before, he hadn’t paid much attention to the publisher names, he’d merely laughed at the stupidity of some authors for the scrapes they found themselves in.
    Now it could be him — hypothetically.
    “There are other ways.” Peters smiled at him and winked. “Do your research.”
    Victor stifled a groan.
    “The Right Writer,” Felicity murmured next to his shoulder, so softly he thought he was imagining it at first.
    “What?”
    “Your time starts … now,” Ophelia announced.
    Shit .

Chapter Seven
    Felicity chewed her bottom lip, nearly drawing blood in her aggression, as she viewed the list of e-book publishers in front of her. She’d lucked out, if one could call it that after what had been revealed to her today. There were thousands of romance e-book publishers. Most of them appeared to take little else. Though an alarming amount seemed to prefer more hard core content, such as Tiffani’s style of writing.
    That bitch.
    It had been a struggle not to shout out right then and there “She stole my story!”
    But to make an accusation such as that on national TV, without proof … before she could do anything, she had to make sure her notebook was still in her backpack. Tiffani had learned her idea from somewhere, and Felicity wasn’t in the habit of sharing with the other woman.
    One thing was certain though. Nice girl Felicity was going bye-bye. If the others were going to play dirty …
    With a sigh, she stretched on her daybed and rubbed her eyes, just for a moment. She’d never been a crier and she wasn’t going to start now. The best revenge would be to win. First things first though: find a good e-book publisher.
    At least she had a plan of attack. Poor Victor had looked a bit bewildered.
    She’d select one, check out their website, look up their Amazon rankings, and then see if any dirt had been revealed by authors on The Right Writer, a website where authors posted good and bad about their experiences with such companies.
    The big question was which one should she look at first? Just going down this list could take all day, and she had