It really did. I got a book deal.
I know anyone who reads this would expect me to be screaming right now, but tbh it's already been a month since it happened. I just haven't been thinking about blogging for a long time.
I did post about it on tumblr though, because I obviously needed to share it somewhere. This is how it went:
Bizarre, right?
I just got an e-mail. And it was 6 AM ON A SUNDAY MORNING. Things like these really do tend to happen when you least expect them, huh?
Besides, EVERY writer I've ever heard talking about their publishing journey, at least in my country, said that an e-mail or a letter ALWAYS means rejection. It's a phone call if they want you. These writers have already had a long career though, so, things are different these days, I guess?
So, 2021 is going to begin with editing my DEBUT NOVEL (it's just so bizarre), and also a short story that is going to be published in an anthology this year. (Luckily the short story is already on its last editing round, because I have to admit it would be hard to give it my full attention now that this huge thing is happening.)
I did fully expect this to happen at SOME point, because I've got most things I've wanted in life through willpower, hard work and persistence. But there's also so much that is out of your hands, and I didn't expect this to happen yet. In a couple of years, maybe, if things went really well. But this came out of nowhere. I wrote the novel in question in 2017, and I had already sent it to ten publishers (no agents here), and I hadn't touched it for a year or so, while I was writing other things. However, something made me do another editing round in September, and then I sent it to four more publishers. And I thought, if none of them want it, then this novel is just not ready.
Turns out TWO of them did. The other one came after I had already signed a contract with the first one. (No regrets, though.) Telling a publisher "thx I already have another" has got to be the most bizarre thing I've ever done in my life.
So, let's review.
I wrote my first novel when I was 14-15 and the first time I sent a manuscript to a publisher was 2014, so depending on how you count it took me either 12 years or 7 years to get to this point.
The novel was the fifth one I'd written (well, the fifth one that I'd completed, anyway), and I had already written two more before it found a publisher.
It was the third novel I had sent to publishers, and it got ten rejections if you count the ones that never replied. For all of my manuscripts, I got more than 30 rejections before I got a book deal.
To be honest, I'm not sure what is average. I know writers who got their first or second novel published, and I know writers who've written a lot more than I have, but haven't got a book deal yet, so it's hard to say. I don't know of any official statistics.
This is really only a starting point, but it's still a big milestone since most of us work a ton before getting here.
I guess I'm just saying we should all just keep doing our thing, since you really never know when it's going to get you somewhere? Don't give up. I was literally thinking "This is the LAST time I'm sending this novel out". And here we are.
