Don’t worry, said book deal will not put a damper on my potty mouth, I just probably shouldn’t put a swear word in the title of my blog post. But yeah, that being said, holy shit I just signed my first book deal!
The experience has been overwhelming to say the least, and honestly, I’m not totally sure what parts of the process I’m not allowed to reveal, but I did want to give you all a basic rundown, in case you’re interested in how these things played out. I’ll just blur out some of the specifics ;o)
Okay, so if you’ve followed along on my publishing journey at all, you know the basic steps. In November of 2019 I was selected for Pitch Wars and got to work with my amazing mentors Alexa Martin and Suzanne Park. I signed with my incredible agent Kimberly Whalen shortly after the Pitch Wars showcase in February of 2020. My Pitch Wars book went out on submission on March 4, 2020. So yeah, if you’re working out those dates in your head, you might have realized how much the timing of the world was not working in my favor. Literally a day or two after going out on sub (as we say in the biz), the entire country shut down. And while the publishing industry didn’t completely shut down, it definitely slowed waaaaaayyy down. And so I remained in that on sub limbo for many, many months.
Luckily, to help keep my mind off of being on sub, I decided to sit down and work on a brand new manuscript. And once I had the spark of Lease on Love, it clicked something inside my brain. It was the fastest I have ever drafted a book, and writing it became a bright spot in those really tough early months of the pandemic. I sent my plucky little draft off to beta readers and my agent, started revisions, and before I knew it, I had another book ready to go on submission.
Now, by the time we were ready to take this one out, I had been rejected or ghosted by all of the editors who had my first book. Which was, you know, not great for my confidence. I had some low moments (and am eternally grateful to the writing friends who lifted me up in those low moments), but once the new book was actually on its way out to editors, I felt okay. It was actually a really weird feeling because on the one hand, I felt like my entire career was pinned to the success of this book selling (it’s not), but on the other hand, I also was not as emotionally attached. I spent three years working on my first book, compared to about six months on this one. So I had a feeling the rejections wouldn’t sting quite as badly this time around. I also made a deal with myself that I could buy a new book with every rejection, so that also helped.
But lo and behold, I didn’t even need to make a bargain with myself, because about a week after sending my second book baby out to the world, I received an email from my agent containing the best possible news–an editor was interested and wanted to set up a phone call. After freaking out and crying in the Starbucks parking lot (coincidentally, the same place I was when I received my first agent email wanting to set up “the call”, almost exactly one year earlier), I tried to contain my excitement and temper my expectations. Editor calls are great, but they aren’t a firm offer. So I went into that first call nervous as hell (turned out, I didn’t need to be because editors are people and they are lovely). And then I got word that more editors wanted calls. And so I had more nervous as hell calls (they didn’t get easier).
And here’s the part where I’ll skimp on the details. At the end of the most bananas week of my life, my little book baby found the absolute most perfect home with the fabulous Gaby Mongelli and Putnam Books. And I am writing this over a week after accepting and it still feels surreal. My journey to get to this point has been long and full of rejection and heartache and new friends and imposter syndrome and support and now I’m going to have an actual book out in the world. To say that this is a dream come true isn’t doing it justice because there were so many times in my life when I couldn’t even see this dream as a possibility. But here we are!
I’m so thrilled and scared and excited and nervous, but I hope you will follow along with me as I traverse the mountain that is publishing a book. I will of course keep you posted on all the details, and thank you for sticking with me this far!