BOOK UPDATE

I’ve been receiving a lot of questions lately, asking when my book will be published. And so I’m going to try my best to answer you.

In December I received an offer for a book deal from a publishing house. Yes! A book deal!!! So why haven’t I announced it? After several months of due diligence and soul searching I decided to pass. My intuition told me from the start it wasn’t the one.

Since then I’ve completed another full read editing round and a word count reduction round. I’ve tested my memoir with several beta readers and next week I’ll deliver the manuscript to one more reader.

After dropping the publishing house, writing a 29 page book proposal in January, having bronchitis most of February; I began querying again in March. So far I’ve received the following: 1 referral from a literary agent to a publishing house, 1 review before an editorial board, 1 literary agent request for a book proposal, 1 literary agent request for a full manuscript, and 1 request for a book proposal from another publishing house. Oh, and rejections letters – those bad boys get put in the corner of my office.

The querying process has been uniquely enlightening. After writing my mandatory one page query. A description of the book, its hook and my bio – three paragraphs contained on one little page, I thought I was done. Nope. I discovered that, for memoir, I had to write a book proposal (think thesis for a book) which includes an overview, author info, marketing plan, mission statement, special features, reader benefit and chapter outline. I’ve learned so much and am most grateful for the entire process of stepping in and out of my comfort zone to have my work judged and critiqued. But this has been a complete turn about for me. And at times I’ve laughed to myself, remembering how I had to learn patience with Preston, and now again with his life story. When I was writing my book I never waited much at all. It was more of a meditative experience where I found myself returning to a past world. Then channeling it onto paper. The words always seemed to be waiting for me each morning as I walked into my office with a cup of tea in hand. So much so that some days the words were so anxious they found me before I even got out of bed.

And now here I am. In this world of pushing back restlessness, of being rejected and requested all in one day, and practicing diligence in sending out query letters, proposals and manuscripts. And waiting….

Tomorrow I’ll begin my second round of querying agents and publishers. Most publishing houses take up to three months to review a proposal, then can take another three months to read the full manuscript. And soon I hope to hear from the requests in the first round.

That’s my answer folks! It’s really not an answer but more of a proclamation of patience and perseverance. Thanks for being patient with me. Believe me when I say I’m as anxious as you are for the book to meet the world.