From the Trenches: Taryn has an Agent!!!

Hi guys! Some of you probably follow my blog and saw this post on Monday, in which I announced that I am now represented by Vickie Motter, thanks to a contest here. All sorts of yay-ness and the whole story can be found in the aforementioned blog post.

Over here, I just want to talk about the whole teen aspect of the agented thing.

I only queried 15 agents, received 8 full requests, and ended up with more than one offer. Most of the agents who passed said things like "I'm so impressed by the things you've accomplished at your age."

(On the other end of the spectrum, I got one pass from an agent who clearly didn't know my age. She said "YA is definitely your genre...you nail the teen voice...")

But part of being young has nothing to do with writing. When did you write your first full length novel? I was 11. When did you start looking seriously at publishing? I was 16. It's a common saying that you aren't publishable until you've written 1 million words of fiction. Whether it's true or not, I've definitely hit that threshold.

In writer years, I'm mature.

Just because someone else is 28, that doesn't mean they're somehow more deserving of being a serious writer. Writing takes practice, just like anything else.

There are freak stories out there in which someone writes a novel, fixes some typoes, sends it out, gets an agent, and gets a book deal (Michelle Hodkin comes to mind), but most people? Most people are like Natalie Whipple and Beth Revis and the countless other authors who work really really really hard and face many many many setbacks before finally getting to where they are, where we would consider success.

If you're here, reading this blog and learning more about publishing, you're already steps ahead of most adults. Doesn't that feel great?