Okay, so I'm a debut author.  It's as amazing as it is anxiety-provoking:)  I'm at that stage of my debut author process where my ARCs (that's Advanced Review Copies) are about to be unleashed upon the world, meant to be read and reviewed by book bloggers and other varieties of advanced readers. Based on this exercise, the publisher gauges potential interest for the book and can even ask the author (yep, that's me) to revise some aspects of the book.  Meanwhile, I'm due to engage in what's called "1st Pass Pages" stage of the manuscript which means I have to review the book ONCE MORE after it's been laid out, etc. After that, there's the "2nd Pass Pages" stage which is, like, almost IT. I think. I'm learning this as I go - one step at the time.  This is all very exciting... but I thought I'd share some thoughts on how you - yes YOU, dear reader - can help your humble debut author friend/acquaintance/Twitt...

I have posted some stats on my querying process about a year ago when I first signed with my agent Amy Tipton , but now I'll blog about my writing journey from the very start, focusing specifically on the key milestones which were important for me.  (oh, and please forgive me for saying 'journey' - it's so cheesy.)   So here goes... my first query to an agent dates back to the end of 2011 . That's right, 5 years ago! Back then, I knew very little (read: nothing; I knew nothing) about what makes a good/decent book and an excellent query.  Bottom line: that first book I've completed should've never been sent to anyone.  The good part of this story is that I've only sent that book query to one agent. Yup, just the one. Well, I also entered that book into a local Young Adult book contest run by a small Australian publisher. Fortunately, that was the end of my first (very short) foray into querying/contest-partici...