A great season for A Season to Dance
From unagented 67,500-word women's fiction to agented 75,300-word contemporary romance
Of course, when my 92-year-old grandmother died on the first day of the conference I'd been preparing for and dreaming of for a year and a half (3 weeks before my trip to Brazil to see her, mind you), I had to ask, "Why?"
I figured it out. I know why. Without her death, I would have come back from the 2014 American Christian Fiction Writers conference in St. Louis practically empty handed. I would have then prayed for God to let me put the book project on the back burner for at least 6 months to mend my broken heart and to figure out the way ahead. That would have been very sad.
But because my grandmother died late on that last Thursday of September, on Friday morning the editor I met with prayed with me and said she liked my pitch. She asked me to send her the full proposal.
That afternoon, I watched my grandma's funeral online from my hotel room. In Brazil these things happen within 24 hours of the death. Not a good day for me.
But with the ACFW worship events there and the prayers sent my way, I woke up well on Saturday and booked tons of extra pitches, all with agents. The editor I'd met with Friday encouraged me to do that. Every single agent liked the pitch, but didn't think there would be interest from editors. "Ballet stories are hard to sell in the Christian market," they said. But before saying no, most agents asked about editor interest. When I mentioned the Friday editor appointment and said they wanted to see my proposal, those agents decided they wanted to see my proposal, too.
I could not have orchestrated that. God did it. His will--His way. Right?
Once at home, before submitting the requested materials, I "stumbled upon" two ballet Christian books just published in September. Two weeks after the conference, I added the ballet titles to my proposal's comparative titles and submitted it to all the St. Louis contacts. Two days later Les Stobbe offered to represent me.
Thank you, Lord.