Over the next few days, a burden presses on me. One that began with the bizarre whiplash of meeting literary agent Karen Ball. (See the whole Agent Story)

Odd that I would go into a conference thinking about the two agents I’d sent my dog book to, and then come out with a totally new plan.

I need to finish the novel. I need to send it to Karen.

The dog book will have to wait, and so will Mr. NY Times Agent. As much as I like him, I know I have to go to Karen first. I know it as sure as I know God made mountains.

The beauty part is that I really like Karen too. Actually, she’s one of those people everybody likes. You simply can’t not like her.

I send her an email, telling her I’m going to finish the novel before going back to the dog book, and does she want to see the first few chapters?

She does.

We email back and forth, and I’m delighted to see how much we have in common.

And she loves the chapters.

One thing leads to another, and the day comes when she offers representation. I’m still stunned.

Of course I say yes because I know this is where God has sent me.

But what will happen from here? God knows.

On the way home from the conference, I ride with my forehead against the window. I’m frozen, like the moment in time where Karen Ball, editor/author/agent extraordinaire, tells me I have an actual gift.

The night is black, with no lights below. I know we’re going over some barren section of the Rocky Mountains. No people, no trees, and maybe even no animals. But the mountains are there just the same. For God.

His creation, fashioned for his glory. Who can say to him, “What are you doing?” (Job 9:12).

So I just sit. And listen.

One thing is very clear. I will write, and I will keep writing, and I will never stop writing.

I need not keep asking that question. When my writing days are over, God will tell me so.

I feel shaken by his presence.

Sifted. Comforted. Awed.

(Read more Agent Story)

We left my conference story at the point where I’m supposed to introduce myself to a complete stranger (Ms. Super Agent), tell what happened at my critique session, and ask for a fifteen minute appointment with this woman who’s been a fiction editor for years and years, authored books which got endorsements from people like Karen Kingsbury and Francine Rivers, and is now an agent at a well-respected agency.

Uh, no, I’m not intimidated at all.

Ahem.

I don’t see Karen at dinner, nor after. But I do see Steve Laube, head wrangler at The Steve Laube Agency, where Karen is an agent. Since I know him, and he’s given me advice on projects in the past, I tell him the story of my critique session and ask if he’d be offended if I go to Karen. He proceeds to tell me how great she’d be for me if I were going to write fiction.

Okey dokey. No worries about Steve being offended. For all I know, he’s trying to get rid of me in a nice way. He certainly knows Karen will shoot me down if my writing doesn’t cha cha across her funny bone.

One piece of data I have about Karen—She loves words. So do I. But I don’t know if she’ll love my words.

I finally track her down, tell her the story without looking too stupid (mostly), and she gives me an appointment time for the last night of the conference. I have two whole days to stew. Yay.

Meanwhile, there’s still another agent there—Mr. NY Times Agent—who’s interested in my nonfiction dog book. I fill him in on what’s going on, because suddenly I feel like I might just become a legitimate fiction writer as well as a nonfiction writer. Is that cool with him?

He says he’s okay with it, but acknowledges that his skills and interest lean more toward nonfiction. Then, because he’s a sincerely great guy, he tells me how amazing Karen would be for someone who writes fiction. Yoda, I think he called her.

Later, the gal who critiqued my novel finds me and asks if I’ve talked to Karen yet. I tell her we’ve got a meeting set up, and she proceeds to tell me what a great agent Karen would be for me.

All righty then. God is clubbing me on the head. (He knows I need that type of instruction).

I finally meet with Karen. It’s late, we’re both tired, but she gives me her full attention. I’m honored, and I try not to ramble or forget what I’m saying halfway through a word.

Then she starts reading my novel.

She laughs.

Or possibly her asthma is kicking in.

No. It’s laughter. Good sign.

She really busts out at my very favorite line seven pages in. There’s a click of rightness in my soul. She gets me.

Then she looks up at me and says, “Okay, I love it. Now let me see the nonfiction.”

That goes just as well, and she asks about the manuscript status of each.

“The dog book is written,” I say. “But it needs a serious revision. The novel is more than half done. The trouble is, I don’t know which one to finish first.” Naturally, agents want a completed manuscript before they’ll consider whether to offer representation.

I also tell her about Mr. NY Times Agent. He knows about her, after all.

“Well, I’m very interested in you,” she says. “Email me and keep me posted.”

We walk outside to go our separate ways.

“You know,” I say,  “I’m really encouraged. I keep asking God for signs to make sure he wants me to stay on this writing path. I guess this is a sign.”

She looks me right in the eye. “Humor is hard. Few people can do it well. You have a gift.”

That moment freezes in time for me. It’s like a message from God.

(Read more Agent Story)

While I’m at the writers conference where I get interest from a fabulous agent about my nonfiction dog book proposal, I also take the opportunity to get feedback on my novel. After all, that’s fun writing too.

My previous contest results for the novel tell me the first chapter isn’t half bad, but so what? I’ve gotta make every chapter sing to the sweet symphony of story. So I go to a walk-in critique with a gal who’d been very encouraging about my writing at the previous year’s conference, and I tell her the storyline. She gives it not only her approval, but some cool tweaks to make it better. Yay!

Then she reads a few pages of the chapter and starts laughing (in a good way). She keeps on reading and chuckling, and every now and again, points out something I can improve.

I’m loving this, but other people are waiting for their turn. I feel a little bad about taking up so much time. I tell the gal it’s fine, she doesn’t have to read it all, but she just says, “No, no. I’m enjoying this.”

All righty then.

She reads more, then finally stops and says nice things to me, but no words could top the compliment of her reading as much of that chapter as she did. I’ve got a big woohoo inside, but I cork it. It’s never cool to shriek weirdly in front of a whole room of people.

I thank her (probably my eyeballs are bulging with that suppressed yippee) and gather my things. Then she asks if I’ve shown it to any editors or agents yet.

“Well, no,” I say. “I didn’t know if it was ready.”

“It’s ready,” she says. “Show it to Karen Ball.”

I blink. Karen Ball? Editor, author, and now an agent with The Steve Laube agency? “I heard she wasn’t taking any new clients.” It’s a conference grapevine thing.

“I didn’t hear that. She wouldn’t be here if she wasn’t taking new clients.”

Huh. This feels like a knuckleball or something. I know of Karen, but I don’t know her personally. “I have a pretty good relationship with Steve. Won’t he feel slighted if I send this to another agent in his agency instead of him?”

“I know Karen, and I really think she’d like this. I would be willing to tell her I’ve sent you.” She says the last sentence slowly, like I’m five.

Ah. Someone is kind enough to give me a coveted referral to an amazing agent, and I argue. Obviously I really am simpleminded. “I’ll definitely talk to her,” I say, because my new super power is stupid-impervious, where I’m incapable of acting on idiotic impulses. “Thank you.”

I walk away still shaking my head. Karen Ball? Never saw that coming.

And what about that grapevine rumor that she isn’t taking clients?

(Read more Agent Story)

So I’ve been taking the latest rejection of my nonfiction manuscript as a redirection, and I’m having a jolly time writing humorous fiction. I sit on my couch and giggle. Really, I have to be careful I don’t make myself spew coffee from my nose.

I know, I know. I’m clearly too easily entertained. Or possibly simpleminded.

Just because the book tickles me, doesn’t mean the rest of the world will think it’s any better than toilet paper.

Seeing as how I’m devoting a huge amount of time to this novel, I figure I better get some feedback. I enter the first few pages in a contest and, glory be, I make the finals.

Better yet, my judges admit to laughing. So there. I’m not a half-baked, cackling moron after all. Well, not totally.

I take my feedback, tidy up the first chapter, and send it off to another contest. This one bigger yet. Then I wait.

In the meantime, I don’t forget about my dog book, I just let it sit while I write the novel.

A few months later, I go to a writers conference. This gives me a chance to get my nonfiction book proposal—I’m titling it Surviving Henry: Trial by Dog—into the hands of two other agents through a pre-conference submission system.

You know the routine—send, pray, wait. This time my prayer is that God will give me specific guidance on what I need to be writing, and as always, I ask him to tell me whether to keep going down the writing path.

When I get to the conference and get my submissions back from the agents, one says it’s great writing but she doesn’t know where she can sell it. Then she says I ought to write fiction. Hmm, where have I heard that before?

The other agent, who likes to represent nonfiction, loves my dog-book proposal and wants to discuss it with me. (Ha. Take that, Cat Guy!) Though I’ve never met this agent before, he seems like a neat guy, and I’m immediately comfortable with him. And he just happens to be the agent for a current NY Times bestseller. Yowza.

We have a great chat.

We might just be heading for that agent/client relationship.

Stay tuned.

(Read more Agent Story)

So a really good thing happened. I got rejected again.

I should clarify. My manuscript got rejected, not me personally.

It’s been the best thing that’s happened so far for my writing career.

I’d worked hard on my manuscript. I had a good relationship with the agent I planned to send it to. He was expecting my proposal. This time it felt so close, so right.

I stuck my envelope in the mail, and then spent eight long weeks praying—no, begging—for God to make the agent reject me if we weren’t supposed to work together.

Odd, I know. Maybe backwards, too. I mean, I truly wanted to work with that agent. I have the highest respect for him. But the agent of God’s plan was what I wanted, not my plan.

Eight weeks later, the agent sent me the most encouraging rejection letter you ever want to read and suggested I pursue other agents since my proposal was not quite connecting with him. He said he still thought I had something with the book, but he didn’t know quite what to tell me to do to change it.

I took that as God’s answer, disappointing as that was.

Later it occurred to me that my prayer didn’t have the most intelligent word choice. I mean, what if I got rejected because the book sucked, instead of because it was the wrong agent?

Or maybe it was because the agent I sent my dog book to was a confirmed cat guy?

In any case, I decided to let that manuscript sit, then come at it with a fresh revision in a few weeks and send it out to different agents. In the meantime, I worked on some articles.

Then one day a funny first line for a novel randomly popped into my head. It intrigued me so much I had to write the next line. And the next. Before I knew it, I had a whole scene, then a chapter.

Funny fiction from Erin. Who knew?

Well, actually, a gal whom I consider a mentor knew. She’d encouraged me several times to write comedic fiction, but honestly, I didn’t think I was all that creative. My humor is born out of stupid, true things that happen to me. I couldn’t make up stuff like that.

Or so I thought. Until my latest rejection.

Make that redirection.

And guess what? Writing funny fiction is a total blast.

(Read more Agent Story)