We Have An Agent! Part 1: The Call

Holy crap, I can't believe I'm actually writing this post!!!

SQUEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE....aaand my "e" key fell off.

Then how did we type that last sentence with our "e" key gone, you ask?

*ahem* ANYHOO...

So, Bryce and I always thought the moments following "The Email" would be filled with ugly crying, followed by hysterical shrieking, followed by more ugly crying. Instead, it was more like this:

Agent #1 said she read LITTLE MISS EVIL and "LOVED it!!!". Normally, she'd be making a phone call to offer representation but she was in the middle of a hectic move across the country. REALLY? OUR MS? She dropped everything to read our MS?

The initial reply started with YES YES A THOUSAND TIMES YES and then gibberish caused by us mashing the keyboard with our happy seal flippers, but then we remembered we'd given the other agents until the next week to read, so we couldn't accept her offer on the spot, even though we really really wanted to.


And then, literally an hour later, Agent #2 calls. She loves LITTLE MISS EVIL! And she even quotes her favorite lines by heart! In a single day, we had gone from zero to TWO agents now fighting over us!

But we're not done. Oh, no. The day after, a THIRD agent throws HER hat in the ring too! Agent #3 and us actually had a history together, as she'd requested our last MS and knew what terrible terrible writers we were in the beginning. Talking to her was like talking to an old friend, and she was blown away by how far we've come. We knew this was going to be a really, REALLY difficult decision.


Finally, the day of our call with Agent #1 rolls around and I bound out of bed at 6:30 in the morning, nearly knocking Bryce out of bed. Agent #1 gushes about how much she loves LME,  and even says she internet stalked US before the call. I was glad she couldn't see us through the phone 'cause my epic Muppet flailing almost knocked Bryce unconscious for the second time that day.

Exactly like this.

Dragging ourselves to work after that was probably one of the hardest things ever. I spent the rest of the day in a daze, waiting for 8pm to roll around so we could pick our agent. (Seriously, did I just write that?)

While waiting and cursing the linear passage of time, a FOURTH Agent (the very first agent to request LME) emails us. She wanted edits, so at first we thought it was an R&R, but by the time she wrote back and clarified she was, in fact, offering us representation, we'd already decided Agent #1 was THE ONE. With Agent #1's infectious enthusiasm for LME, her kick-ass negotiation skills, and her stellar client recommendations, how could we not? We still can't believe she dropped everything to read our story, and for that we will always be grateful.

Once home from work, we found ourselves in the surreal situation of being on the other side of the rejection fence. For the first time in EVER, we now had to tell the other agents we wouldn't be going with them.

So...without further ado, we are beyond excited to announce we are now officially agented by the amazing Jamie Drowley of the Inklings Agency!!!

Thank you so much, Jamie, for believing in us and making our dream finally come true!

And thank you to our CPs. Every single one of you is ridiculously talented, and without you we would've never made it this far. Amanda Foody, Stacy Stokes, Lindsey Sprague, Rosey Kaes, Abby Cavanaugh, Karma Brown, and Paul Adams. We're all going to make it and it will be GLORIOUS.

Oh and stats! Everyone loves stats! Here are our final LME stats below.

LITTLE MISS EVIL
42 queries
18 requests
4 offers of representation

These numbers represent a 43% request rate and a 10% offer rate.

Yeah, we know. It's INSANE. We're still in shock looking at the final tally. We're still in shock from having an agent. Basically, we've been in shock for a straight week now.

And we want to emphasize something. With a request rate that high, it looks like LME just SAILED through the querying process.

It didn't.

This journey has been the hardest, rockiest, heart-attackiest thing we've ever had to do. Buuuut that's a story for another day.

Stay tuned for Part 2: The Story of How We Had 3 Heart Attacks in One Day