The Story

Felicity Stripped Bare is the first ms I wrote a couple of years ago. Initially it was aimed at BLAZE because I knew I liked to read/write pretty hot romances, plus I thought, erroneously, that writing a shorter length book would be easier for a first time writer. ::cue hysterical laugher:: . After the page count grew well beyond BLAZE guidelines, I turned my ambitions to HQN (cause that’s what new writers do, one imprint is just as good as another, right? ::cue more hysterical laughter::

HQN did request the full of DENIAL (the original title) but after waiting 8 mos, I got the dreaded form R. *sob* I tweaked it a bit--cut a couple of minor characters and had a secondary character assume their purpose in the plot, cut about 50 pages, and tightened the pacing while fleshing out the subplot and changed the title to something a little less generic--then began querying agents (12 in my first and only go round). I got seven requests (mostly partials, but one notable request for the full from a big name agent) out of that. But... no contract. *sob*.

So I shoved it under the bed and worked on other stuff. Or not work. I was really living the 'Struggling' part of "Writer" for awhile there because of a lot of stuff going on in real life. Also, maybe I was paying a little too much attention to working about the marketing/business aspect of writing, and indulging in too much second guessing stuff and not enough just writing and getting carried away with the magic of writing. As a reader, I know that I can forgive a myriad of writing sins, from major plot holes to minor grammar issues, if I love the character and story. Why did I forget that when faced with a blank page? Thing is, I could never completely stop writing (or trying), it made me just too miserable.

Anywho, I have a few shall we say 'persistent' friends, most particularly Chaoscat/Samantha Storm who nagged, erm, 'encouraged' me to send the ms back out. About 2 months ago I did, when Raine offered to mention me/my ms to her editor (Samhain was closed to submissions at the time, except by invitation). The editor, Jennifer Miller, and my editor now (squeeing!!), was interested (thank sweet suntanning jesus). I submitted on May 21st, a month later, June 20th, I got a reply: she loved the story, but she wanted some changes before she could consider offering a contract. She sent along a list of things she'd liked me to look at, "if I was interested" and "if I wanted to resubmit."

"If"? What for is this 'if' you refer to? ::twirling finger by temple::

It took about 2-3 weeks to complete the revisions, then I emailed the new ms off, July 15th, and *exactly* a month later on Aug 15th (a couple of days ago) I got the contract offer!

There's my story. Never feel you have to go it alone. And protect the work.

The End.