DEBUT AUTHOR SERIES
Last month, I wrote about how I got my agent (read it here). It’s only fair I share what happened next—how the book deal came about.
I need to preface this by saying there are some parts about the wheeling & dealing I can’t talk about. Legal binding contracts are annoying like that.
However, I will share an honest take on what it feels like to be “on sub” (lingo for submitting your manuscript to publishers) and some things to expect.
In the last post I finished with getting a YES from an agent, so let's start from there.
Soon after, I officially sign the Agent Agreement among the flurry of a school day morning. No Champagne for me.
The next day my agent and I meet online and she kindly walks me through the submission process—expectations, timeframes, publishers she’ll pitch to, etc.
It’s common for agents to send manuscripts out in rounds. Since the Australian publishing industry is tiny, there’ll only be two rounds. The odds are not in my favour.
The agent says my manuscript is in good shape and ready to be sent. I’m delighted and petrified by this news. What if I’ve missed something? I force myself to leave it as is. If I open that damn document, I won’t be able to control the perfectionist gremlin that lives inside my brain.
I’m asked to provide a tagline (snappy oneliner to entice readers. The hook, essentially.), elevator pitch (a one-sentence summary of an 80k word story—cool, no probs), synopsis and author bio. Naturally, I spend three hours crafting the tagline.
I hand in my homework on the weekend and on the Monday my agent emails the pitch to a handful of publishers (aka - Round oners). She describes my rom-com as fresh, feisty and smart. I likey. I’m not Cc’d into the correspondence (thank goodness), but I am provided with confirmation updates.
My agent instructs me to hang tight and she’ll touch base with them in a month or so.
Now we wait.
And wait.
And wait.
It’s been one hour and forty-three minutes and still no offer. I’m fiiine.
Day after day, I stare at my laptop screen, willing my fingers to move. I’m supposed to be editing the next Great Australian Rom-Com. Words do not come. My head is foggier than the top of a mountain. Sleep is a thing of the past. Food is tasteless. Even cheese. I go through the motions of everyday life with a bowling ball-sized knot in my stomach.
I haven’t told anyone I’m on sub (or that I have an agent), so there’s no one to send spiralling voice memos to. You’re welcome, friends.
Then it gets to three weeks (which doesn’t sound long, but I assure you time is moving at a dog-year pace), and my agent forwards me an email from Harper-FRIGGEN-Collins. Nobody panic.
I abandon the laundry (like I need an excuse), walk in circles, and read the email to my pug, Mr Giuseppe. He doesn’t smile, but I know he’s happy on the inside.
The publisher loves my protagonist, and that she has a proper arc outside of the romance. Yes! Month-long character profiling pays off. She gushes about the love interest (readers, you’re in for a treat with my emotionally intelligent hunk o' spunk). And then right at the end of the email, she mentions wanting to take it to an acquisitions meeting but …
But what?
Buts aren’t good.
But she’d like to meet beforehand and run some of her big-picture stuff by me.
My agent assures me this is normal and advises me to be myself. Well, myself is a neurotic, introvert on the cusp of menopause. Sure. I can do that.
Before I go on, I must confess something. You know when you were a teenager, and you’d scribble ‘I heart Taylor Hanson’ in your diary? I’d been doing the same. Except it wasn’t a diary, it was a pretty journal from Kmart, and it wasn’t Taylor, it was HarperCollins. This was my dream.
With that in mind, am I freaking out? Two thousand percent.
How do I (over)prepare?
Reread my manuscript in case I’m quizzed.
Write an extensive list of all the writing workshops and courses I’ve completed to prove I’m qualified-ish.
Rehearse interview-style questions.
I also reflect on what I’m willing to change about my story to get a book deal. One half of me is fully prepared to write the story backwards in Italian if that’s what it takes. I don’t know a word of Italian, by the way. Then there’s the other part of me (creative integrity, if you will) that knows I’m okay with changing most things except one aspect. Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that.
The publisher, my agent, and I catch up online. She doesn’t quiz me about my story, nor ask for credentials or fire off ridiculous questions like ‘What’s your biggest weakness?’
Instead, she tells me all the things she loves about my story. I lean towards the camera. Please go on. Her favourite scene is my favourite scene. This woman has exceptional taste. We have a forty-five-minute conversation about my story. What in the? The publisher shares her editorial vision and I’m not only on board with it, but creatively excited by it.
We also discuss changing the title. I knew it was coming; my agent had flagged it the first time we met. I’m A-Okay about changing it. Prefer it, actually. I agree to send her a list of alternatives.
I’m grateful my agent is sitting in because she asks the practical questions I'm too scared to ask.
At the end, the publisher says she’ll pitch my manuscript at the next acquisitions meeting. She’s also quick to add that while she’ll fight for it, that doesn’t mean it’ll get through. I read between the lines: rom-coms are popular (at the moment), but they’re not huge moneymakers and at the end of the day, publishing is a business. Got it.
I’m buzzing afterwards, but also in that weird space of not wanting to get my hopes up. I’ve listened to enough author podcasts to know that deals fall over at the acquisitions point all the time. There are a range of factors out of my control.
A week later my agent sends me an email titled DON’T PANIC! Yes, in capslock. Want to know why?
I’ll fill you in next month.
Stay tuned for Part 2.
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