I’m HERE today!
June 9, 2008
April 10, 2008
I knew she was a winner!
Rants and Ramblings, the blog of (my!!!) agent Rachelle Gardner, is one of seven agent blogs listed in June’s Writer’s Digest list of 101 Best Websites for Writers.
Considering about a bazillion (okay, maybe only half a bazillion)agents have blogs, and Rachelle’s is just a wee bit over five months old in blogger land, this recognition is awesome.
You can also find Rachelle at Seek First His Kingdom, her personal blog where she muses about “faith, kids, marriage, books, and life.” And, I pray, one day you’ll find her name in the acknowledgements in my published novel!
March 18, 2008
Oprah hasn’t called yet, but maybe one day. . .
Here is the timeline of the journey to publication:
1. You have an idea.
2. You begin to write a book.
3. After the first two chapters, you are so smitten with your own genius, you pause to jot down the names of actors who will [consider themselves lucky to] portray your characters.
4. After chapter two and a half, you decide it’s time to dust the fireplace, crochet the twelve bedspreads you’ve been buying yarn to complete for the past ten years, and start a scrapbook for each of your children, your yet-to-be-born grandchildren, and the family pet(s).
5. You continue writing [or gazing at the monitor] and decide that repeatedly poking yourself in the eye with a hot stick would be welcome relief from the blinking, pulsating, taunting, annoying cursor.
6. You light fires in August and clean out the fireplace again.
7. You remember you’re writing Christian fiction, so you duct tape your mouth closed.
8. You read about a twelve-year-old who wrote her first novel in six days whose agent just sold international rights, movie rights, and rights that haven’t been invented yet. You look for the stick to poke in her your eye that you’re going to light in the clean fireplace.
9. You consider a feeding tube and a catheter so you won’t have to walk away from your desk.
10. You reach the middle of the book. You wonder if the same people who told Sanjaya his hair was an asset are the people who told you that you could write.
11. You tug on God’s sleeve and ask Him if He wouldn’t mind, pretty please, pretty please with a cherry the size of unsaved nation on top, you promise you’ll be a good girl, clean up the room of your soul, be nice to His people, if He’d just this one time, you promise never to ask again, it’s just an itsy-bitsy favor. . . could He send a host of heavenly angels to descend upon your computer and finish this novel.
12. The angels must be flying stand-by. They don’t appear, but a new flavor of Blue Bell does. You eat a half-gallon for each thigh.
13. You hear about the lady who didn’t leave the bathroom for two years and was stuck to the potty seat. You’re sure they didn’t mention she was balancing a laptop on her knees and was waiting for inspiration.
14. You have to finish the novel because your legs are permanently bent at the knees, and you’ll need the advance to pay the orthopedic doctor.
15. You send off three chapters to an agent. You feel like you sent a photo of your left arm, right foot and the back of your head to Match.Com and asked for a date with Prince Charming.
16. Step #15.
17. Step #15.
18. A dream agent asks for the full manuscript. You pray. You go to the post office. You pray. You hand the postal clerk the package and walk away like you just left your first-born at day care.
19. You pray.
20. Repeat step #19 for a few weeks.
21. The dream agent calls. You pray you’re not dreaming.
22. You scrape yourself off every wall you’ve bounced off of for days because YOU HAVE AN AGENT!!!!!!!!!!
23. You do the happy dance for God and because of God and with God and thank God.
24. Your agent takes over and you are oh, so grateful that she’ll be representing you to publishing houses.
25. You continue to write because you know the light at the end of the tunnel is not the headlamp of an oncoming train.
26. People ask when the book’s coming out. You tell them you don’t have a clue. You smile because you know, one day, you will have a clue. But until then. . . you write, you pray, you write.
February 7, 2008
The dream, the call. What’s God got to do with it? Everything!
I’m starting the happy story from long ago and faraway. What I’ve come to understand during these past years that I’ve allowed God to whisper and or shout in my ear is I don’t always “get it” until I’ve already “gotten it.”
So many times those seemingly random events in our lives are all part of God’s plan. And following God’s plan, at least for me, is like listening to that chick who guides me through my navigation system. Only, with God, it’s just His voice, and no map for double checking. I have to trust I’m being led in the right place.
Several years ago, my husband bought me a laptop and, ever so romantically said, “Here, now go write something.” And, being the ever obedient wife, I did. Months later.
I’d started reading Kristen Billerbeck’s Ashley Stockingdale books because (are you ready for this?) I liked the covers. A voracious reader, I’d never picked up Christian fiction; I expected it to be, well, boring and preachy and unrealistic. Wrong. Wrong. Wrong. Then, because I didn’t know any better, I actually had the chutzpah to email her with these incredibly B-A-D one page notions (think giving someone three raw eggs and telling them it’s an omelet) of a book. And Kristen, God bless her unselfish and kind soul, responded. Instead of recommending I repeatedly pound myself on the head with my laptop, she offered gentle suggestions. A writer who had absolutely no idea who I was had emailed me. Amazing.
It was all I needed. After endless internet cruising, I somehow found Cheryl Wyatt. Through Cheryl, I found ACFW. Cheryl had formed a critique group, and I jumped in. Her encouragement kept me going (it still does).
Through ACFW, at some point, I found Jessica Ferguson. At the time, we lived about three hours away from one another. Katrina changed that. Because most of the business my husband worked for was then floating somewhere in the Gulf of Mexico, we moved. As God would have it, we found jobs in the same city Jess lived it. She and I became fast friends. Jess told me I needed to go to the ACFW Conference. I’d never been to a writing conference in my life, but I trusted her. So, we made hotel reservations, I registered, and we made plans to drive there together. In the meantime, I’d submit and get rejections. Submit, reject. Blahblahblah.
Less than a month before conference, my family moved back to our pre-Katrina home. It seemed as if everything conspired against my being able to follow through with attending the conference. The night before I was to leave, I was in a puddle on the floor of my classroom trying to understand why my printer had Alzheimer’s and couldn’t remember to put ink on the business cards I was attempting to make.I couldn’t make them at home because I didn’t have a computer there yet, plus I still didn’t have internet. On the way to my daughter’s house in Houston, the night before I was to meet Jess the next morning so we could drive to Dallas, an accident delayed me almost two hours. My husband had an out-of-town trip the same weekend, so I had to make arrangements to pick up Sarah on the way back, which meant I wouldn’t arrive home until after midnight on Sunday and had to be at school on Monday.
But I made it. And it made me.
A writer I met there, someone I truly admired, told me she liked my writing. I almost fell out of my chair. Months later, she referred me to an agent friend of hers. In writer-land, this is a VBD (very big deal); even in Louisiana, more important than getting tickets to the LSU Championship Game. Since it’s difficult to hug via email, I sent my chapters along with profuse thanks. So, the Friday before Christmas, I left school with my work in the cyber-hands of the writer who’d just given me a fab-o Christmas gift.
Christmas Eve, because I still don’t have internet, I ask my daughter to check my email. “Somebody named Rachelle sent you something,” she said. I debated whether or not she should open it, but too late. Erin had already started to read it to me. Rachelle wanted the full manuscript. Merry, Merry Christmas.
With an out-of-town trip in the works, I managed to get it all together and send it off. After having wandered like Moses in the desert of rejection-land, I attempted to remain calm.Until last Wednesday. That’s when my third period class walked in to see me crying as I stared at my computer screen.Rachelle Gardner of WordServe Literary wanted to schedule a phone call.
We did. She called. . . really. . .just like she said she would! We chatted, discovered some amazing commonalities, and when she asked if I was still looking for representation, I managed to not scream.So, I have an agent. 
Even when I click my heels together three times, I still have an agent, and it’s still Rachelle.
My epiphany? When I look back on the road I traveled, I am awed by the thin thread that connects these events.
Our God truly is an awesome God.
[Stay tuned tomorrow for Part 2!]
