Q&A: Publication Questions

Thanks to everyone who emailed me questions! You saved me from sitting here, staring at a blank screen, wondering what I should share. (Although I STILL wondered that.) I know y'all don't love really long posts, so I kept this one to mostly publication stuff. Tomorrow I'll talk a little about the agent questions I got (because I had never really figured out what to share about that before, either). I got some query-related questions, too, but we're going to have a query writing extravaganza next week! Okay, maybe not an extravaganza, but we'll talk, okay?

When will Through the Bomb's Breath be on shelves? / Is there a launch date?
2013, more than likely fall.

How many words is your MS?
60,000. -ish.

Have you been sent more revisions from Random House?
Nope. Nothing will happen until January. Then I’ll get my editorial letter, and jump right into revision mode. (And have I mentioned how much I love revisions? (You read that without any sarcasm, right? I really do love revisions.))

What does pre-empt mean? / Did it go to auction? / Didn’t that happen fast?
I’d actually love to answer this one, because before I went through this, I'd THOUGHT I'd understood what a pre-empt was. It turns out I really didn’t.

Yes, it did go quickly. I had originally guessed that we wouldn't even go on submission with TTBB until January, but Sara felt that right now was the right time for it. Still, though, I hunkered down for the long haul, because these things take forever, right? I was taken completely by surprise at their speed. Sara told me on a Monday that Random House was interested, after being on submission less than a week. By Tuesday morning, Sara called me at work and told me that the editor, Shana, wanted my query and synopsis of book two that day if possible. I got off work at lunchtime and went home and worked like crazy, every muscle in my body tensed. (Apparently when I need to focus tons and work fast, I tense EVERYWHERE. Seriously. When I finished, I was exhausted in every muscle from the top of my head to the ends of my toes.) I got the synopsis to her that night, but the query wasn’t in a good enough state yet, and my exhausted brain couldn’t see a way to fix it. Sara told me that the three page one was good for that night, and the query could wait until morning. I emailed her the query at 7:03 Wednesday morning. At 7:20 am, she emailed to say that both were in the hands of Random House. At 9:00 am, she called me with their offer. By 9:09, I had nearly passed out from shock and excitement.

So why the speed? Random House’s offer was a pre-empt, which took it off the table for everyone else. They offered the pre-empt so quickly to prevent it from going to auction. (I had thought  pre-empts only happened when an auction was scheduled.) Would an auction have been fun? Of course. I mean who wouldn’t love an auction? When Sara told me about the offer, she said that we could turn down Random House’s offer and push it to auction if I wanted to, but that I should talk to Shana before deciding. She was convinced that my mind would be made up if I did. But really, it was already made up. I could tell by the way Sara talked about Shana that she thought it was an amazing match up, and every single part of me felt that turning them down was the exact wrong thing to do.

So when I got off work at noon, Shana called. Sara was so right! I was pretty much convinced at “Hello.” Shana had so much excitement for TTBB, wanted to push it great directions, and was someone I could talk to like I talk to you guys. She’s unstressful, amazing, positive, helpful, and I knew instantly that I would love every minute of working with her. Was it hard to turn down an auction? Not one tiny little bit. It was the easiest decision in the world to make. I mean I had already struck gold with RH! Plus, I couldn’t imagine another editor ANYWHERE who would be as perfect of a fit as Shana is. I love her. I love Random House. And to have a publishing house love my book enough to push it with that kind of speed? Yeah. There was no way I was going to turn that down.

The announcement said it was a two-book deal. Will the second book be the M.I.S. HAVEN you've been so cryptic about in your "What I'm Working On" page, or will it be TTBB 2?
Hahaha! Cryptic. I actually didn't mean to be cryptic. Writing the summary for that page is a lot like writing a query. It's just a little bit possible I may have been procrastinating... But to answer your question, it is THROUGH THE BOMB’S BREATH number 2. It’s a trilogy. Although I love M.I.S. Haven, it will have to go on hold for a little while. Instead, I'm going to go have a blast writing a book I have been dying to write.

Any questions I missed? Just ask me in the comments.