Lease On Love Author Falon Ballard On Enduring the Wait of Submission

If there's one thing that many aspiring writers have few clues about, it's the submission process. There are good reasons for that; authors aren't exactly encouraged to talk in detail about our own submission experiences, and - just like agent hunting - everyone's story is different. I managed to cobble together a few non-specific questions that some debut authors have agreed to answer (bless them). And so I bring you the submission interview series - Submission Hell - It's True. Yes, it's the SHIT.

Today’s guest for the SHIT is Falon Ballard, author of Lease on Love, a warmly funny and delightfully sharp debut rom-com about a down-on-her-luck young woman who turns an innocent mix-up between a dating app and a roommate app into a new chance at love.

How much did you know about the submission process before you were out on subs yourself?

Honestly, I didn’t know much! Because I was a Pitch Wars mentee, my mentors gave me a brief rundown, but the overall impression I had about going on sub before going on sub was that it’s really, really stressful going on sub (and it was!). 

Did anything about the process surprise you?

The first time I went on submission, I was surprised by how long it took before we started getting responses. Granted, the first time I went on submission was the first week of March in 2020 so the world was definitely not functioning as “normal”. The second time I went on submission, I was surprised by how fast it went. Overall, my two experiences really show that you gotta expect the unexpected. 

Did you research the editors you knew had your ms? Do you recommend doing that? 

The first time on sub I researched most of them. Some I knew from Twitter, some I knew from reading their authors’ books, some I stalked a fair amount. I don’t think it hurt to research them, but I will say that I did not research editors my second time around. So maybe my subconscious does not recommend editor research!

What was the average amount of time it took to hear back from editors?

It could not be more varied! Some took more than six months, some never responded at all. And then with my second submission, we got our first response in I think three days.

What do you think is the best way for an author out on submission to deal with the anxiety?

I know this is the cliché advice, but write the wait! While my first book was dying its slow death on sub during the beginning months of the pandemic, I was writing what will become my first published book. In a lot of ways, knowing I had something else in the works that I really loved made those rejections for submission one much easier to handle.

If you had any rejections, how did you deal with that emotionally? How did this kind of rejection compare to query rejections?

I actually think submission rejections were easier to handle than query rejections. Most of the ones I received came with really positive feedback. A lot of editors had nice to things to say about my writing, they just didn’t love the premise of the book. A few asked to see my next work. So there was a lot of good tidbits I was able to focus on in those rejections. That didn’t make it easy, obviously, but I tried to find little ways to treat myself on rejection days. Even if it was something simple like buying a new book, “rewarding” myself for those rejections made it easier. Also, having an agent who really believes in me and my work was priceless during the submission rejection process because she would pump me up before sending them to me! 

If you got feedback on a rejection, how did you process it? How do you compare processing an editor’s feedback as compared to a beta reader’s?

Most of the feedback I received in my rejections was not something I could easily implement. It was a lot of “I love you voice and your style, I just don’t like this premise/character/set up”. So unless I was going to rewrite the whole book and change the concept, there wasn’t much I could do. But it did give me a boost of confidence knowing that editors were responding to my voice and style and I definitely used that boost to help me write my next book. I think with beta readers, the feedback is a lot more specific and easier to apply to your manuscript. 

When you got your YES! how did that feel? How did you find out – email, telephone, smoke signal?

Well, as with all good news in my life, my first reaction was to burst into tears! I was in the car with my son, we had just gone through the Starbucks drive thru and I had pulled into a parking spot to disinfect our cups and hand sanitize (#PandemicLife). I saw that my agent emailed and I swiped it open without a second thought—we’d just sent submissions out so I wasn’t expecting any news. I had to read her email like three times before it sunk in and then I immediately started crying and totally freaked my kid out because he thought something was wrong. That Starbucks is my good luck charm—I was sitting in the drive thru of the same Starbucks a year earlier when I got my first agent offer email!

Did you have to wait a period of time before sharing your big news, because of details being ironed out? Was that difficult?

I had a relatively short wait, just a couple of weeks I think, and it still felt interminable! I’ve had friends who have had to wait months to announce and I don’t know how they did it! It was hard to wait because I was so excited and already working on edits, but I was able to do a lot of screeching and flailing with my husband and best friends so that made it easier!

Author Heather Frese On Getting Close... But Not Quite When On Submission

If there's one thing that many aspiring writers have few clues about, it's the submission process. There are good reasons for that; authors aren't exactly encouraged to talk in detail about our own submission experiences, and - just like agent hunting - everyone's story is different. I managed to cobble together a few non-specific questions that some debut authors have agreed to answer (bless them). And so I bring you the submission interview series - Submission Hell - It's True. Yes, it's the SHIT.

Today’s guest for the SHIT is Heather Frese author of The Baddest Girl on The Planet, Heather Frese's fiction, essays, and poetry have appeared in Michigan Quarterly Review, The Los Angeles Review, Front Porch, The Barely South Review, Switchback, and elsewhere, earning notable mention in the Pushcart Prize Anthology and Best American Essays. She received her master's degree from Ohio University and her M.F.A. from West Virginia University

How much did you know about the submission process before you were out on subs yourself?

I thought I’d done a lot of research and really understood how the submission process worked. I went to panels at AWP about getting an agent for a novel and figured it would be fairly straightforward. I did get an agent, revised with him, and he sent the book to the big publishing houses. I got several close calls, but nothing stuck. As the initial manuscript submission process happened, I was going through a ton of life changes, getting married and moving and getting pregnant caring for a newborn, and I lost a lot of steam getting another novel ready for him to send out. I asked him if I could keep submitting The Baddest Girl on the Planet myself to small presses and contests and he said that was fine, so I switched to focusing on that, which is how the book eventually found a home.

Did anything about the process surprise you?

I was surprised by how much I didn’t know was going on when the book was going to big presses, and I was surprised by how long everything took.

Did you research the editors you knew had your ms? Do you recommend doing that?

When I had an agent sending it out, I didn’t research the editors. But when I was sending it myself to small presses and contests, I researched a lot and really targeted presses I thought would be a good fit. I’d definitely recommend researching contests to see if your book seems like it would be a good fit.

What was the average amount of time it took to hear back from editors?

Gosh, when it was out with the big houses, I think it was several weeks? A month? I can’t really remember. Contests took up to a year to hear back.

What do you think is the best way for an author out on submission to deal with the anxiety?

I dealt with it by moving about once a year and getting pregnant three times, which I do not recommend as a strategy, but it sure did keep my mind off of book things. I hear the best thing to do is work on a new project. I guess my new projects were babies, so maybe I adhered to that advice in a skewed way.

If you had any rejections, how did you deal with that emotionally? How did this kind of rejection compare to query rejections?

I went into it expecting the rejections, so the standard “no, thank you” sort of rolled off my back. What was harder to process were the close calls, the editors that really liked the book, just not quite enough to publish it for whatever reason. I had one time I was a semi-finalist in a contest and then didn’t advance to the finals, and that was hard. I’m not sure how I dealt with it. Just sort of processed through feeling like crap and then sending out again.

If you got feedback on a rejection, how did you process it? How do you compare processing an editor’s feedback as compared to a beta reader’s?

I did take it a bit more to heart when I got an editor’s feedback, particularly one who said they lost sympathy for the character at one point in the novel. I got enough close-but-no-cigar feedback to balance it out, though, and I also figured going in that the structure of my book was unusual and might not work editors looking for mass appeal, so in that way I sort of dealt with it as I would from a beta reader, taking what was useful from the feedback and leaving the rest.

When you got your YES! how did that feel? How did you find out – email, telephone, smoke signal?

The YES was completely surreal. So surreal. I was in Dallas visiting my husband’s family over Christmas break when I got a voicemail from an editor. I didn’t quite catch the name of the press in the voicemail. At that point I was on baby number three and hadn’t submitted in more than a year, so I was wracking my brain to remember where the book was out, which press or contest. My husband had dropped off me and the kids at a McDonald’s and gone to the store, and I decided I couldn’t wait any longer to return the editor’s call. With the baby strapped to my chest and the older two encased in the play area, I phoned Robin Muira and realized the press was Blair. We chatted for a bit and she asked if the manuscript was still available, and said I was a finalist for the Lee Smith Novel Prize.

It was at that point that the older two starting shouting from the play area that I needed to watch them go down the slide, and could they have some chicken nuggets? We’re hungry! Mommy! You’re not watching me go down the slide! Robin asked if I had experience working with editors and would I be open to revisions and possibly rewriting a chapter, which I was completely fine with, and Mommy, watch me, Mommy, I’m hungry! I managed to take a page of notes about the contest prize details and Robin asked if I had any questions. I asked when the winner would be announced. She did a little sotto voce consult with her officemates and then said, “We’ll just tell you now. You won.” It was this intense euphoria realizing that a lifelong dream was going to come true, mingled with the everyday banality of childcare and chicken nuggets.  

Did you have to wait a period of time before sharing your big news, because of details being ironed out? Was that difficult?

I did! I was able to tell my inner-est inner circle right away as long as I swore them to secrecy, so that helped, but there were a couple weeks between finding out and being allowed to share with everyone. It felt similar to finding out about having a baby but waiting until the first trimester passed before sharing the news—like knowing you’re about to experience this huge, life-changing event, but sheltering the news in your hands for a bit before offering it up to the world.

Elizabeth Gonzalez James On Being Rejected... By Pretty Much Everyone

If there's one thing that many aspiring writers have few clues about, it's the submission process. There are good reasons for that; authors aren't exactly encouraged to talk in detail about our own submission experiences, and - just like agent hunting - everyone's story is different. I managed to cobble together a few non-specific questions that some debut authors have agreed to answer (bless them). And so I bring you the submission interview series - Submission Hell - It's True. Yes, it's the SHIT.

Today’s guest for the SHIT is Elizabeth Gonzalez James, author of Mona At Sea. Before becoming a writer Elizabeth was a waitress, a pollster, an Avon lady, and an opera singer. Her short story, Cosmic Blues, was a finalist in Glimmer Train’s 2016 Short Story Award for New Writers, and her stories and essays have received multiple Pushcart Prize and Best of the Net nominations. She’s an alum of Bread Loaf Writers’ Conference, Tin House Writers Workshop, and Lit Camp. She is a regular contributor to Ploughshares Blog. Her first novel, MONA AT SEA, was a finalist in the 2019 SFWP Literary Awards judged by Carmen Maria Machado, and is forthcoming, June 2021, from Santa Fe Writers Project. Originally from South Texas, Elizabeth now lives with her family in Oakland, California. 

How much did you know about the submission process before you were out on subs yourself?

I should give a little bit of background info first: I went on submission with my novel in 2015 and it was turned down everywhere – something like 40 editors. We got close at a few places but, for one reason or another, things fell through. In 2016 my agent emailed to say that she had run out of places to submit the manuscript, and I was obviously crushed. I put the manuscript in a drawer, occasionally sending it out here and there to small presses. In 2019 I submitted it on a whim to the SFWP Literary Awards, thinking I might get an honorable mention or something. To my utter shock I was named a finalist, and was offered a publishing contract. So my period of submission was 4 years and my path to publication was anything but easy or straight.

Before I went on submission I’d read a few blogs on what to expect, and they all said that I would need to be patient and that I should start working on the next book right away, so I did just that. What I did not know was how common it is for books to fail to find a publisher. And I had no idea my book would take so long to find a publisher. Probably a good thing or I might have quit! 

Did anything about the process surprise you?

Mona at Sea is a dark comedy about an acerbic and troubled young woman. A lot of the feedback my agent and I got from editors back in 2015 was that they didn’t know how to market the book. I was surprised by that, both because I felt like there should be space in literature for a character like Mona, but also because I didn’t realize how much hinged on a book’s marketability. I had wanted to believe that a great story was enough, and perhaps it still is sometimes, but publishing is a business and publishers have to understand how to sell your book. Since 2015 however, I think a lot has changed. Fleabag, which features a similar character to mine, was enormously popular, and I think the public is more receptive now to stories about fierce, funny young women. 

Did you research the editors you knew had your ms? Do you recommend doing that?

Yeah I did some Googling. I don’t think it particularly helped, though. I think all it did was allow me to have the illusion that I was doing something productive and somehow helping further my book’s chances in the world.

What was the average amount of time it took to hear back from editors?

It was all over the place. Some editors got back in a few weeks while others held onto the MS for months, being noncommittal. Small press editors were all over the map, too. There were some presses that got back to me in a few months and others that never got back to me ever.

What do you think is the best way for an author out on submission to deal with the anxiety? 

It’s hard because of course all you want to do is obsess about it. The only thing you can do, though, is try to keep yourself occupied. Start your next book. Write short stories. Mentor someone. Volunteer. Try to keep your wine and Cheeto consumption to the bare minimum. I started writing essays and short stories and submitting them, and that was great because I was learning how to do different kinds of writing while also feeling out the market for submitting shorter pieces, which is a whole other kind of submissions hell! 

If you had any rejections, how did you deal with that emotionally? How did this kind of rejection compare to query rejections?

Oy vey, all I had were rejections! Fortunately my agent didn’t tell me about every single one, so I only heard about them in batches, or when an editor had complimentary feedback. I definitely cried, and I felt really bad about myself and my writing. When my agent said we’d come to the end of the road I went out to a bar with my husband and got drunk and ate a bunch of candy and threw myself a big pity party. But you know what? Never at any point did I consider giving up. I told myself that I’d gotten so close with my first book, my very first try, and that it would be foolish not to try again. So I wrote a second book, and meanwhile I kept sending out Mona at Sea. Eventually I got to a place where the rejections didn’t hurt as much. Your biggest fear when you’re on submission is that no one will pick up your book. Well, that happened to me. I fell flat on my face. And I didn’t die. The sun still came up the next morning. And I’m actually thankful for the experience because I now know that I can handle rejection. I’m strong enough to handle anything.  

If you got feedback on a rejection, how did you process it? How do you compare processing an editor’s feedback as compared to a beta reader’s?

I did get feedback from one editor who we thought was going to make an offer on the MS. She wanted some things changed and so I went back and made all the changes she wanted, and then her publishing house re-orged and no longer offered literary fiction. The stakes are higher when an editor gives you feedback, because all day long they’re sitting at their desk making manuscripts better. The criticisms cut deeper and the praise lifts you up higher.  

When you got your YES! how did that feel? How did you find out – email, telephone, smoke signal? 

I got an email from my publisher, just a couple of lines, that he loved my book, and was it still available. I couldn’t believe it. I thought it was a scam. I thought no way did this guy want to publish my book. At that point I’d talked myself into rewriting the entire novel from scratch, and so I actually put him off for a few months and had to slowly, slowly talk myself into signing a contract with him. So the YES! wasn’t like a fist pump in the air, but more like a room slowly filling with beautiful perfume.

Did you have to wait a period of time before sharing your big news, because of details being ironed out? Was that difficult?

Yes, I had to wait a while to publicly announce it, though I was grateful to have a little time. I was filled with utter terror after signing my contract, and so I wasn’t chomping at the bit to blast it on social media. I came around eventually though and the response I got from my writing friends on social media was very sweet and welcoming. I’m very grateful for all the kinship I‘ve found online.