Submission is the process where an agent sends their author’s manuscript out to editors at publishing houses. Though some authors are lucky, it can take a very long time to get responses. In a lot of ways it’s exciting, but also terrifying, and more than anything, slow.
I signed with my agent in April, speed-ran my edits and started out on sub at the end of May with my first book, a YA fantasy. Our first round of editors was small, and I was aware from the outset that summer would be a slow time for publishing anyway. It took 3 weeks to get my first response, and I still haven’t heard from all of that batch.
As an author, submission is a lot of waiting. I don’t get updates from my agent unless I ask for them (or unless they’re positive!) so I can go weeks at a time without hearing anything. So, what am I doing in the meantime?
The best advice is always to start working on the next thing—something totally unrelated to the book on sub. I’ve been working on one adult fantasy book (lesbian rivals-to-lovers in a fantasy Catholic church), and one middle grade fantasy (young girl thrown into the fairy criminal underworld). For both projects, I’m going back and forth with my agent, which has been super fun! Though my agent is an editorial agent at heart, he didn’t get to edit my first book much as it was already pretty polished, but with these new projects, he’s seeing them at a much earlier stage and getting a lot more involved in their creation. Being able to just email someone and ask questions, or hop on a zoom to brainstorm, has been one of the best parts of being an agented author!
The next best advice is to think about submission as little as possible. Some days, I forget about it all together. In a sort of pessimistic way, I’m assuming this book isn’t the book that will get picked up by editors. This is a little bit silly, as we’ve only done one round of editors and there’s definitely still hope, but I find it easiest for my mental health to keep my expectations low—and if it does get picked up, that will be a pleasant surprise!
Finally, I’ve been spending a lot of time reading, and trying actively to read outside my usual genres/age ranges. I’ve really enjoyed dipping into the world of middle grade, to help me draft my project in that range; equally, I’ve been pushing myself to not only read SFF fiction, and have ended up really enjoying reading out of my comfort zone. I just finished Close to Home by Michael Magee, recommended by a friend, and adored it; I also read Julia Armfield’s short story collection salt slow, which whilst speculative, was very different to the sort of spec fic I write, and made me think a lot about the expansiveness of the genre.
Amidst all this, my life has been busy outside of my writing! I’ve moved into a new flat, spent a lot of time with friends, been in a strange sort of depressive episode (related to being on submission? who knows!), watching Grey’s Anatomy, etc, etc. So that helps probably with the waiting aspect, though I can’t in good faith recommend the depression part of it (Grey’s is great though!)
All that is to say, it’s amazing to have an agent and be out on sub, but it’s still only one step in a much longer process! My fingers are crossed and I’m enjoying writing still and that’s the main thing. Watch this space for updates I guess :)
