Book Development

I emailed a number of query letters for my book to a handful of literary agents and a few publishers this past Saturday night.  I’ve been through this process many, many times over the past few years when I was trying to get my children’s book published, so this process of submitting is nothing new for me. I hate to admit it, but I was so incredibly discouraged with my children’s book going nowhere for so long that I eventually lost steam with the project and temporarily put it aside. I’ll come back to it some day, when my motivation returns.  So with this book, I braced myself for the wave of rejections that I knew would come, and prepared myself.

I checked my phone Sunday morning and there it was in my inbox:  a request for my manuscript from a respected, established literary agent. I nearly had a heart attack.

Now I get to play the waiting game, which apparently could last anywhere from several weeks to several months. It’s very nerve wracking as the disappointment potential here is exponentially higher than if I hadn’t gotten a manuscript request in the first place. I’ll be absolutely heartbroken to have gotten this far only to be rejected-but-this is a major foot in the door, and if nothing else it means that my query letter is doing what it is supposed to do.

I hate waiting, so I’ve already begun to brainstorm ideas for another book, based on my new advice column for visual artists, “Ask the Professor“.

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