Okay, So Here's What Happened....

There's a website out there called "Guided to Literary Agents" which is associated with a publication of the same name. The editor of said publication maintains a blog online. One feature of his blog is posting New Agent Alerts, letting all of us sad aspiring writers know there is someone else out there we can send our desperate query letters to. Not so long ago there was a new agent alert. I did a little research on her, saw she'd actually been a junior agent for several months and was working for a highly recommended agency and thought, why not.

Saturday night I'm sitting here at the Mac workin' on school stuff when my e-mail submarine-chimes at me. I see it's a query reply from this new agent and thought, "Wow, that was a much faster rejection turn around than usual," and opened the message.

Thank you for querying me. I'm interested in your idea and would like to request the full manuscript. You can email it to me or mail it to me at the address below.

I skimmed the message and thought something wasn't right. It didn't sound the same as the others. I read it again and... well, I won't describe too much, but let's say it involved flashes of panic, happy dances, and some really, really loud music (Queen's song "Innuendo" was first on the playlist). To think that I had actually gotten to this level, even one time? Seriously, I'm still kind of blown away by it. I really don't think I can overstate this. I expected to be sending out at least another 40 letters and spending hundreds of hours of research before that deciding where to send my letters before this was going to happen, if ever. Yeah, I mean that. If ever. I had never believed there was a guarantee that an agent was going to ask to see it. I was hopeful, and proud of the work I had done, but I know how ugly the probability is.

There were specific submission guidelines I was asked to follow, so I needed to do some preparation and formatting to get things ready; importing the manuscript into MS Word, writing up a thin little half-page biography, proofreading the entire thing again in under 24 hours, and then opening and closing and saving and resaving the file compulsively until I reached the point I literally couldn't see straight anymore on Sunday night - or, more accurately, Monday morning. I sent it off and told myself Whatever will be will be (also from Queen's "Innuendo," and yes, I know that's not where the phrase originated).

Early Monday morning I received a confirmation from my possible future agent:

Thank you so much! I just wanted to confirm that I received FOLLOWING INFINITY and downloaded it. I'm so excited to read it!

I'm digging myself out of a deluge right now and I'm moving on the slow side so it might be up to 60 days on this. I'm sorry to make you wait, I know it's torment.

And that's where we are. A potential sixty days to wait for either moving one HUGE step closer to achieving a lifelong dream or getting kicked back to Square One. And that's not pessimism; I'm just being realistic. There are dozens of legitimate reasons she still might pass after reading it, and I know that's how it is. I'd love if it wasn't, but now it's just a matter of wait and see. And honestly, the feeling of stepping into the unknown is kind of nerve-wracking. Imagine being so much closer to achieving that lifelong dream -- stepping closer to something that has been an abstract fantasy for so long... the idea of actually reaching the goal has an element of terrifying to it.

Except Monday is almost over now. 59 more days to go.