Screenwriting : Mentoring Call with Executive, Jenna Block by Dianne Greenlay

I wish I had the funds to talk to Jenna again, just for the pleasure of it. She is so down-to-earth and welcoming, full of encouragement, but most of all, so knowledgeable. My phone call with her was extremely helpful and I feel that she really nailed it in identifying my pitch problem and then was able to offer me concrete things to do to correct it. She immediately helped me to narrow my focus to be on TV pitches, as my novel, Quintspinner, is "epic" in scope, has a large "world" built, and has several characters (making episode spin-offs possible), and since it's a novel series, she pointed out that there would be enough story there for more than one season, all of which is attractive to the TV producers, (and she also stressed that a completed series is an important thing to have, so I am hard at work finishing up writing the third book in my series and I've not only set a deadline for myself, I'm nearly done). She also encouraged me to try writing a pilot screenplay based on the opening "act" of my first book. I'm presently reading John Robert Marlow's book on adapting a book, and he echoes several of the points that Jenna made to me, so I know I'm on the right track. All-in-all, I really enjoyed my mentoring call, but more importantly, it has made my pathway so much more clear to me and given me much-needed motivation. I can't thank you and Jenna enough for having made this possible. I would encourage any would-be pitch submitters to consider doing a mentoring call. Joey has provided us with a lengthy list of fantastic execs willing to do these calls - sorry I don't have the link to the list at my fingertips, but I've seen it and know that Joey could provide it to anyone interested. Thanks to Joey for providing us with this amazing opportunity!