An Inspirational Story: Amy Sonnichsen’s Agent Journey

I wanted to follow up the last blog post and give Amy a chance to share her agent story with everyone! Thank you, Amy, for agreeing to guest post! Check out her blog here at The Green Bathtub.

My writing journey has felt a lot like rock climbing. I could see a ledge above me, a ledge I wanted to be on, but it was tough. The rock face was smooth, there were few handles, no room for error. I had to make several attempts before I reached that first ledge labeled REPRESENTATION. Had to fall hard a few times. Now that I’m on the ledge, I get a few moments to enjoy the view, but there are still more ledges above me. It’s time to start climbing again.

My first novel was a fun process (*cough*). I’d been writing on and off my whole life, but this was the first time I wrote “seriously.” Seriously for me meant working feverishly on the novel for two weeks, taking three months off, straggling back to it for a few days, then taking another long break. This is not the best way to produce a novel, by the way.

By the time I finally wrote THE END on the first draft, I had nothing but 300 pages of rambling mess. I tried to tame it on my own, but all I got in return was a headache.

That’s when I made a choice. Did I really want to do this? YES. Was I willing to put my money where my mouth was? YES.

I figured I had two options: go back to school with some sort of MFA program through which I could take classes mostly online (because I was living overseas) OR hire a freelance editor to help me.

I chose the freelance editor and I do not regret it. I learned how to format my manuscript, about word-count, about show-don’t-tell, about the dangers of backstory and too many adjectives. She also recommended I join a critique group, which is how I met S.J. and several other very talented aspiring writers (*hi ladies*). When she felt the book was ready, she referred me to a friend of hers who had just started agenting–Emmanuelle Alspaugh.

After I sent my query to Emmanuelle, I received a polite, personalized rejection. She didn’t connect with the character. (I think every writer on the planet has received a rejection like this, have we not?)

I queried twelve agents with that first manuscript. Out of those twelve, I received one partial request.

After the partial came back a rejection, I gave up on that book.

Some might say I gave up too quickly, but honestly, I had this feeling in my gut that what I had in my hands was a quintessential first book with all the first book problems. I had hired the freelance editor to LEARN, not to get published, so I didn’t regret that decision. And I didn’t regret querying it, either. I learned a lot from that process, too.

I started writing the second book, also not with the goal of “getting published,” but with the goal to learn, to improve. I wanted more partial requests than the first book. A full request wouldn’t be bad, either.

I received several partial requests for that one, and one full request. I’d reached my goal. I queried over thirty agents with that book before I gave up on it. I realized it would take a complete makeover to rescue this book, and I didn’t feel passionate about it to do that.

Besides, I had another idea.

And a plan. I wanted to be a better writer, yes? So I needed to write more. I gave myself a challenge: to write a short story every week for a year. These short stories quickly turned into “flash fiction.” I didn’t actually reach my goal of fifty-two stories, but I did write over thirty. Considering that I was surprised with an unplanned pregnancy a month after I started the challenge, I decided to go easy on myself and not call it a complete and utter failure. *grin*

During book two’s querying process, I started book three (the other idea which had distracted me from wanting to revise book two). I received some awesome feedback on this book in its early stages from some new critique partners (*waves*) and some friends who wanted to help me out. Don’t get me wrong, it was uncomfortable, surgical-style feedback, designed to push me to the next level. But that made it all the more awesome.

In summer, 2010, I attended my first SCBWI conference. I was sure I was almost ready to query when I headed out there. I signed up for a professional critique. Author Cynthea Liu was assigned my first ten pages and she ripped into my synopsis. Seriously, it was most helpful 20 minutes of my writing life. She told me I had too much going on; I had to focus my plot.

I headed back home NOT ready to query.

The rest of that summer I rewrote my book. Completely. I split it in two, took out all my sub-plots, killed off and created characters, recreated some of them. After that rewrite, I rewrote it again.

Then I started editing, sending it out to my awesome critique partners (*hi, ladies!*), and editing some more.

In the spring, I started querying.

Emmanuelle (Alspaugh) Morgen was one of the first agents I queried. I remembered the high praise she’d received from the freelance editor I’d worked with all those years ago. I was pretty sure my submission was doomed, however, when she requested a full and I wrote back and spelled her first name wrong. *duh*

I noticed right away that the reaction from agents was different with this book than with my other ones. Sure, I still got a ton of rejections, but I started getting a lot of requests, too. And usually they were full requests.

Then I entered the May Secret Agent contest. And won.

My goal was to get more than one full request (an improvement on book two), but I quickly had five or six fulls out. I was ecstatic. This was progress and progress was my goal.

Months went by. I kept querying because I figured if the agents with my fulls were REALLY interested I would have heard something sooner. The little hopes I’d allowed myself to hope began to fade.

Then one morning several weeks ago I opened my email. I saw that it was from Emmanuelle and I knew she had my full. I steeled myself for a rejection, because you always hear about “the call.” I wasn’t looking for “the email that heralds the call.”

My first thought when I looked at the email was supreme disappointment. I remembered the personalized rejection she’d given me with my first project, so I’d been expecting a longer rejection letter for the full. But this email was only two lines long.

Then I read it: She loved my book. Would I have time to set up a phone call?

The rest is all boring, hyperactive stress and a lot of grand jetes across my living room.

In the end, I signed with Emmanuelle. I mailed the contract yesterday. I’m working diligently on edits she recommended.

My next goal is the ledge above me—the one labeled PUBLICATION. There might be some hard falls in store for me. Doubtless, there will be more rejections. Still, that climb up from SLUSHPILE to REPRESENTED was a tough one. It prepared me well for what’s ahead. I wouldn’t trade that kind of education for anything.

Thank you for the guest post, Amy! CONGRATULATIONS!