Novelists sometimes say that a novel is really two stories – the story itself, and the story about how it got to the market. I’m starting to see the truth of that statement, after this week’s events. Rather than becoming bitter, I’m choosing to see all of this as part of being a writer. Therefore, I’ll tell you about it in the form of Mesh’s Big Book Deal Adventure going forward.
So once upon a time, there was a writer named Jackson who wrote a book. It was called ‘Mesh,’ and he wanted it to be a traditionally published novel, instead of self-publishing it. That meant querying agents. Lots and lots and lots of agents. He sent out query letters for a long, long time.
After many re-writes of Mesh, he started to get responses from agents that weren’t rejections. Some liked the idea of Roman, Zeke, and the rest of the Snow Foxes. But while they were interested, other things in the world were happening.
“Thank you so much for submitting MESH,” the agent assistant said. “I had sent out the partial report … and immediately fell in love with your MS … I’m in the process of looking for another agency so keep an eye out and maybe in the future I’ll have the opportunity to read your full manuscript.”
“Oh wow,” Jackson replied. “She had to find another job? I wonder what-” his eyes fell across a news update about literary agencies closing down. Someone’s ill-formed social media post set off a firestorm of controversy and in the aftermath, the entire agency staff had been terminated. Now, instead of finding an agent to represent Mesh, the book agents were finding new jobs. Bother, and bother again.
Well, Jackson thought. It could have been worse. I could have signed with this agent, been mid-flight in getting a publishing deal only for Mesh to break apart like the Challenger.
Additionally, the fact than an industry contact ‘loves’ Mesh means that someone else can fall in love with it, too. Like so many other hurdles in life, sometimes the only solution is to press on.
And then Jackson sat down, and began sending out more query letters.
So that’s chapter one of Mesh – the Big Book Deal Adventure. I hope you enjoyed it, we’ll see how many other chapters are written in this saga of daring experience!