Welcome to The VERB!

First, let me apologize for last month's dead link. My list server went loco on that one, and I still don't know what happened. I wanted to send out an "Oops!" afterward, but couldn't manage to do that either. In the end, they gave me a free month because of the mess, so I be happy.

If this happens again—and seeing that we live in an imperfect world, it probably will—try copying the entire link and pasting it into your browser. If you look up at the window marked Address right now you should see this: http://www.readingwriters.com/TheVERBhotp.htm The "hotp" near the end stands for hot off the press and it will always take you to the current issue. Another option is to add this page to your Favorites list and refer to it if the link doesn't work. 

On another note, my son took me, as a belated birthday present, to Body Worlds 3, the Anatomic Exhibition of the Human Body. Yes, we're ghouls. I inherited the trait from my dad and have apparently passed it on to my son. If it's frightening or freaky, we want to see it!

We spent two hours at the Science Center that day, and with each passing minute, I grew increasingly alarmed at the level of my ignorance. I did not know exactly how the organs were arranged in the torso. (Is that the stomach?) I did not know that muscles were really bundles of fiber. (Get outta town!) I did not know that human skin could be tanned and thrown over the arm of its owner. (Okay, that was a tad gross.) And I couldn't help but notice, as I stepped back from the dramatically-posed bodies, that without the skin, a muscled skeleton looks eerily similar to Spiderman.

Like most people, I seldom if ever think about what's going on inside my body. Unless I'm deathly ill. I take for granted my heart will beat, my lungs will expand and contract, and all the other organs will do their jobs without any lip from me. And I thought that, short of becoming a surgeon or a coroner in the near future, the chances of seeing inside the human body looked pretty slim. But thanks to the groundbreaking method of Plastination, I saw firsthand what King David had no way of seeing long ago when he wrote, "I laud you because in a fear-inspiring way, I am wonderfully made."

Excellent birthday present, son. I'll never forget it.

HORN-TOOTIN' TIME
Feel free to send in writing news you'd like to share with our readers.

No toots to blow this month, and the horn player is sad. To cheer him up, we've asked him to toot some fun blogs.

Literary agent Jonathan Lyons recently divulged a query success story. This is a rare case, but it does happen.

Literary agent Nathan Bransford recently hosted a query letter "mad lib" game. The submissions, posted in the comments section, are a hoot.

Literary agent Janet Reid is mulling the idea of posting a weekly query letter on her blog with edits, comments and revisions. Where are you in the query process? Take her poll.

And now, without further ado . . . turn the page.

Elizabeth Guy
Editor
 

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This issue 
was published 
under the musical 
influence of

CORINNE BAILEY RAE
Corinne Bailey Rae