The Great Appointment

I promised you all I would explain why I'm taking a break from Fourteen Cossacks this month. Well, I got my conformation email today, so here is the post I promised.

As many of you know (and for those of you who don't) I have been working on a novel, titled Free, for the last year in hopes of getting it published. (To read about anything to do with Free and see some samples from the book, you can click HERE) It currently stands at 95,000 words and 260 pages. It's about fourteen-year-old Cynthia Worley, a girl living in enemy occupied America who has no idea what freedom is or why it matters. Free is one of many books I've written, but it's the only one I've ever spent this much time on. Two weeks ago I finished the third edit on it and I'm working on finalizing all the pieces that need to be done.

Why all this work? Today I got an email from a conference I'm attending. It read like this:

We have scheduled your appointment for the Inland Northwest Writers Conference on March 20th & 21st as follows:

Friday 4:00 - 5:00 - Kathleen Kerr

We look forward to seeing you there!

In other words, this email means that I have an appointment with editor Kathleen Kerr from Harvest House Publishers to present Free and try to get the gal to want to read it and publish it. There will be three other people also present, and we each get fifteen minutes to present our book, why it should be published and why it would benefit the company.

Basically this means I'm attempting to sign on with Harvest House Publishers as an author, and this appointment is my fifteen minutes to try and get Free out in the world!

It's excited! It's amazing! I'm so blessed that God has helped me see this project to the end! It's scary! It's terrifying! It's nerve-wrecking!

I could really use your prayer these next three weeks as I finish writing my synopsis (super boring and really hard) and polishing my book pitch. Worse comes to worse, they won't read it and say thanks for trying. Probably the worst thing though would be if the gal showed interest, asked me to send in my manuscript, seemed to really like it, and then I don't get a contract. *Sigh* that is probably what's going to happen. It's really hard for Wanna-Be-Novelists to get into the professional publishing world.

So that's what's going on in my writing life right now. I'm so excited to share this with you all! Any and all prayers are appreciated as the twenty-first of March comes closer. I know the closer it gets the more I'm going to freak out. Luckily, the Homeschool Conference happening the week before, and dear Mrs. Susan Marlow who wrote the Circle C Adventures will be there, so I'll get to distract myself by getting to see her there. :) I think that will help me not panic over this appointment. I had no idea I was going to be doing it with three other people until today. Augh!

God is good! Whatever way this goes, I will praise Him. If I get a contract, I will praise Him. If I don't, I will praise Him. (Plus, if I don't get a contract than I can self-publish Free and make it exactly the way I want! :P)

We'll see where this goes. I'll write to you all after the appointment and tell you how it went. Hopefully I don't freeze up when I'm asked a question. I tried to cover all my bases so I won't mess up, but we'll see!

The original cover of Free. I've changed it since then, but I think this book cover gives a sense of mystery to the entire story! B-)