Genre: Creative Nonfiction

In Cheryl Strayed's new memoir, Wild (Knopf, 2012), the author recounts her months-long hike along the Pacific Crest Trail, a journey that she took entirely alone after life as she'd known it had fallen apart. "It was a world I'd never been to and yet had known was there all along," she says, "one I'd staggered to in sorrow and confusion and fear and hope. A world I thought would both make me into the woman I knew I could become and turn me back into the girl I'd once been." Write about a time when you got a little wild—when you embarked upon something new and challenging, maybe something frightening, or maybe even a little dangerous. Write about the wilderness itself, but also about what brought you there, and who you had become by the time you walked back out of the woods.

Think back to the closet of your youth, and write an essay about what was inside. Let the contents of the closet become a metaphor for who you were as a child, who you might have wished to be, and who you have become.

Deadline Hollywood reports that former ICM agent Nick Harris has partnered with financing specialist Jason Traub (also his brother-in-law) to form The Story Foundation, a company that aims to "create intellectual properties that start as books with ancillary life in film, TV and other multi-platform opportunities." Harris says he plans to offer authors a higher cut of any TV and movie deals based on their books, depending on how involved they were in generating the original idea. The company will focus on young adult and "high concept commercial ideas," as Harris put it. So...what exactly are "high concept commercial ideas"? We asked literary agent Julie Barer for a quick translation. Here's what she says: "I think a 'high concept' idea is one that is easily described in one or two sentences, appeals to a broad audience (meaning both male and female readers, young and old) and is both immediately recognizable and yet sounds original and fresh. It means the story has a 'hook' that will instantly draw people in, and will be easy to pitch to media, booksellers, and the general public. It usually means the focus is more about the plot and the narrative drive/tension than about the beauty of the line-by-line writing, but it doesn't have to be." 

On a related note, Barer's Twitter feed offers news about publishing and upcoming events, and is worth a follow. In fact, we've added the Twitter feeds of all those agents included in our Literary Agents database. Take a look! But remember: It's definitely not a good idea to query an agent via social media.