*confetti*
*excitement*
*dancing*
You guys, this author classes. It. UP.
First reason I love Brodi Ashton - She's a freaking INSPIRATION. A reminder to never, ever give up. Here's her summary of her publishing journey, divided into prefaced sections by me:
Brodi queried something like a hundred agents to secure rep for her first book, finally found an agent, yay! And then it didn't work out.
1. Wrote a book.
2. Edited that book.
3. Queried agents
4. Received about a hundred rejections.
5. And one offer of representation.
6. Revised the book with the agent.
7. Submitted the book to publishers... and...
8. Got rejected by every single one.
9. Wrote another book.
10. Revised that book.
11. Sent book to agent, who didn't love the book.
12. Parted ways with agent.
So what did she do? Girlfriend pulled herself up by her bootstraps, took her new awesome book, and found herself another agent. After another hundred queries.
13. Queried agents again.
14. Received almost a hundred rejections again.
15. But also received 9 offers of representation.
16. Signed with my agent.
17. Revised my book.
And guess what that agent was able to do with the kickass book she wrote for him to sell. No, just guess.
He sold it. Within two days. At auction. (Like a mofo.)
18. Submitted the book to publishers.
19. Accepted pre-empt from HarperCollins after only 48 hours on submission.
So, in summary, Ms. Ashton's here to teach us: You think that rejection's the end of the world? It's not. Your book failed on submission, and you don't know what to do? Well, you're a writer. Write another book. Your agent doesn't like your new book? Find another one. Earn your own darn book deal, because no one else is going to do it for you.
She's awesome like that.
But inspiration alone does not a classy author make.
She also Pays it Forward.
First of all, Brodi is open and honest about her publication path with the writing community. Her blog's one place to start to find out about it all. Beyond that, she spreads her special brand of "never-give-up" type of love to the aspiring, unagented, and unpublished everywhere.
She spoke on this episode of the Appendix podcast about persistence, and she's all over Twitter with the cheerleading and encouragement. If you ask her a question, she'll answer. If you mention her or her book or her awesome book trailer, she'll have a conversation with you about it. If you're frustrated and she catches your tweet, she'll jump in waving pompons.
I've even heard of her doing critiques of queries and first pages for the unagented, (nope! Not me...) even though she SO doesn't have to do that. She's so in touch with the raw feelings of being in drafting, or revising, or querying-land, even though her ship sailed from there awhile ago, and doesn't mind commiserating with writing commoners. (Not that she would call us that....)
So, for all these reasons and more....let's give away a copy of Brodi's debut novel, EVERNEATH, which releases on January 24!
Here's a summary from Amazon:Last spring, Nikki Beckett vanished, sucked into an underworld known as the Everneath. Now she’s returned—to her old life, her family, her boyfriend—before she’s banished back to the underworld . . . this time forever. She has six months before the Everneath comes to claim her, six months for good-byes she can’t find the words for, six months to find redemption, if it exists.
Nikki longs to spend these precious months forgetting the Everneath and trying to reconnect with her boyfriend, Jack, the person most devastated by her disappearance—and the one person she loves more than anything. But there’s just one problem: Cole, the smoldering immortal who enticed her to the Everneath in the first place, has followed Nikki home. Cole wants to take over the throne in the underworld and is convinced Nikki is the key to making it happen. And he’ll do whatever it takes to bring her back, this time as his queen.
As Nikki’s time on the Surface draws to a close and her relationships begin slipping from her grasp, she is forced to make the hardest decision of her life: find a way to cheat fate and remain on the Surface with Jack or return to the Everneath and become Cole’s queen.
Um....WOW.
So, who wants to spread the word about an ultra-classy author by winning a copy of her debut?
(Yeah. I know you do.)
To enter for the giveaway, leave me a comment below saying something sweet about Brodi or EVERNEATH or any other author you think is classy.
Want an extra entry? Tweet about it and link up below.
Want an extra extra entry? Be a follower of this here blog. New or not, I love you all. (But tell me if you are, because I can't keep track of my three little in-person responsibilities, let alone all 135 of you who were following before this went live.)
Good luck! You guys rule.
