GUYS!! I'm TRILLED to announce that another member of my team from The Writer's Voice 2015 has signed with an agent! Congratulations, Ellie Moreton and Christa Heschke! Now her INSPIRATIONAL success story, in Ellie's own words:
"Hello! Thank you, Mónica,
for hosting my story on your blog! To everyone entering contests—good luck!
Never give up! The people you meet during these contests will be worth their
weight in gold in the friendships that you’ll make.
When I applied to be in The
Writer’s Voice 2015, it was my first major big contest. I didn’t think I’d even
get through the raffle, but when I did, I went crazy going through each and
every one of the other contestant’s submissions. There were two other YA
Fantasies that I felt were similar to mine, and I had a sinking suspicion that they
were my competition for coaches.
When the first round of
choosing posted, I was not a first choice. The other two fantasies were, as I
had expected. But there were still slots open! I tried not to let it get to me,
but it’s hard! Even though I was querying at the time, you can never really get
used to rejections and silence. It’s hard not to get yourself down or play the
comparison game. But in the end, I was
chosen! The wonderful Mónica and Stephanie chose ME!
I was so excited and
totally ready to make my first 250 words, and query bright and shiny! I worked
hard and plowed through edits. Mónica and Stephanie were amazing mentors and
showered me with praise on my editing, all while pointing out things that could
still be improved. I was pumped for the agent round.
When the agent day came…
and even a secret agent popped in… I was left with nothing. Nada. Not a single
request. Crickets chirping. My wonderful
team mates where getting requests, and we were all screaming through twitter
and facebook in celebration.
In the end. I didn’t get single
request, but it was all worth it. Team FTW 2015 has a facebook group that we
share encouragements and news still, and that’s worth so much to me. The
friendships I made during the time.
I continued to query with
my shiny new query letter, thanks to Mónica and Stephanie, and on November 4th,
I signed with my lovely agent, Christa Heschke, at the McIntosh & Otis
Agency!
You may not get picked
first, or even second. You might not get picked at all for some things. But the
only way you’ll NEVER get chosen is if you stop trying. Never give up, keep on
improving, that one in a million chance could be right around the corner, and
all those friends you made along the way will be cheering you on."
