Yes, I Have an Agent. No, My Book Isn’t Out Yet. Please Stop Asking :)

I started writing my novel in 2021, so feasibly, it should be out by now right? Or maybe it should have been out right when my course ended? Or when I signed with my agent? Or a year after signing with my agent?

I wish.

I began writing my book on the Faber ‘Write A Novel’ course between Sept 2021-May 2022. By January 2023, I had a rudimentary draft and my first agent offer by February 2023, signing with a second agent by March 2023.

It is now March 2025, and I physically recoil and cringe when friends ask me ‘How’s your book?’

If you want to be an author – a traditionally published author, the skill I suggest you cultivate is patience.

I hate to supply you with cliche advice, I hate to press home a boring message. But man, I’ve been forced to learn patience over these four years.

Alone Not Lonely by Bisola Michal 2024

Before I delve a little further into my thoughts on this, I want to do a quick rundown for my non-publishing family and friends, to share some of the key early stages of publishing a book. Also – just for fun – I’m going to rate the difficulty out of 5 * for the stages I’ve experienced so far, which is of course not an objective measure.

1. Write a book for the first time – may take many years. Usually a pretty solitary, involved process - you probably didn’t see me much during this time.

   Difficulty: *****

   Dates: Oct 2021 to Dec 2022 for me.

2. Send your book out to literary agents in a process known as querying. (very, very hard - someone has to read you book, like it AND crucially, also see the potential to make money from it, thus they agree to stake their time into making this happen for you. I technically didn’t query as my course sent out an anthology and I had some agents reach out to me directly - not THAT common, but feasible.

   Difficulty: ***

   Dates: Jan 2023-Mar 2023 was meeting agents and deciding who to sign with.

3. Many agents will then spend some time revising a draft with you, until they feel it’s ready to be pitched to publishers. I was stuck in this process with my former agent from March 2023 until she dropped me in September 2024. I began talking to a new agent in October 2024, and signed with her in December 2024. I’m technically still in this phase with her, but we have plans ahead so I’m optimistic we’ll be moving forward soon.

   Difficulty: *****

   Dates: March 2023 to CURRENTLY for me. Two years FFS, mad. Patience.

4. Your agent sends your book out on submission to publishing houses.

5. It gets an offer? Amazing! Your agent negotiates things on your behalf and you sign a deal.

6. The novel gets published probably 1-2 years after signing. This process has many editorial stages which I won’t go into for this article.

So you see, it’s a massive, multi-year process, fraught with scary waiting periods and stages totally out of my hands. When I first began writing, I thought landing an agent was the insurmountable first hurdle that I’d be stuck behind for a year or two, I was mentally prepared for it. But the Faber course made that my easiest step due to their anthology being shared widely with agents - which I’ll always be grateful for and consider my second biggest perk of the program - #1 being the network formed.

So instead I’ve been stuck in what some people call the agent revision vortex. (NB: a revision = she writes editorial notes, I go off for a few months and rewrite.) Meaning with my previous agent we did at least three revisions together, it might be four? I lost count, and lost confidence, which you can read me in the thick of contemplating here:

So I’ve recently been working with a new agent and things are looking good, but a lot of this is out of my hands. One thing I’m sure of - working as a freelance editor has deepened my creativity, sharpened my editorial eye and made me a better writer, so I’m keeping my head down, working and peeking onwards and upwards with hope.

I know you’re all excited for me, but please practise patience with me.

Breathe in, breathe out.

Now excuse me, I’m going to go send this post to my dad …