About a year ago, my agent and I tried to sell a 65k fairytale-pun-ie mystery.
We didn’t even get a request for a full.
Ouch, right?
*Admittedly (or so I don’t start crying at the lack of requests), it wasn’t a project either of us was pushing. It went out to a handful of editors at best.
Following the less than world on fire responses, I decided to indie pub it. It wasn’t a decision I made lightly. Not every book I write needs to be in the world. Which is the greatest lesson I have ever learned (Self-publishing a bad book can haunt your career). This novel, though, does need to see the electronic reader light.
At least I believe so.
*please leave me my delusions.
Since I was slammed with other projects until the last month, this project sat on my hard drive gathering dust-kilobytes. I brushed it off last month, did a run through revision, and then a copy edit (for an indie book I do a much deeper copy edit as it’s as close to final as I can get it). I hired on a cover designer.
And BOOM…
Last week, my agent emails with a full request.
This week, an offer.
Suddenly I find myself with two options for publication. This is where the universe came in — I was all ready to indie pub it, and now I had this other option with a small press. The offer made me realize that I don’t have as much time to invest as the indie pubbing needs (due to another project’s sudden appearance). It would suffer because of it.
Things fell into place for a reason. I needed to take the hard look at what I could accomplish, and the universe knew it, taking some of the pressure off releasing the fairytale book in order for me to focus on a bigger project.
Thanks universe.
Do you find your projects fall into place like this? What is the universe telling you about your writing at this moment?
I WISH my projects fell into place like this! Congrats to you, you wonderful girl. I can’t wait for another fairytale pun-ie – when can I have it? See you at Gold!
Yes, this happens. When my publisher dropped its mystery line, I had a manuscript ready to submit. Luckily it just happened to be a historical mystery…and even more luckily, my publisher had created a new line called Frontier Fiction. Now that I’m writing only contemporary mysteries, I’ll have to find a new publisher. I have faith that when my manuscripts are ready, and I start sending out queries again, something amazing will happen.
Don’t you just love hindsight and the lessons she gives? Congratulations, Julie.
LOVE your faith, Pat!