It’s Time to Query Unrelenting

EDIT: Unrelenting has found a home with Not a Pipe Publishing! Click here to learn more.

In two days, I will begin querying agents for a contemporary fantasy/suspense manuscript for adult readers called Unrelenting.

In the story, Bridget’s sister is missing and everyone has given up hope. Everyone except Bridget.

Determined to take matters into her own hands, she begins a desperate search for answers among the misty streets of Cleveland, Ohio.

What she finds points to something far more ominous than a missing person’s case. Bridget is caught up in an unpredictable world of ancient magic and sinister secrets, hidden in plain sight.

To find her sister, Bridget must adapt to this new reality, team up with an unlikely companion, and forge an uneasy truce with supernatural beings called Grigori before it’s too late.

You can read more about the book and sign up for email updates at https://thegrigoribooks.com/. And you can follow announcements on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook.

I co-wrote this novel with my best friend and co-business-owner, Jessi Honard. It’s one of my proudest accomplishments to date. Here’s how the process has gone down so far.

Original concept + draft

Six years ago, Jessi and I had the seed of an idea. What if angels lived among us? And what if they weren’t all that angelic?

We did some research and came across the Grigori. The Book of Enoch tells the story of how many of these angels, also known as Watchers, fell to Earth. We discovered the artwork of Peter Mohrbacher. We couldn’t keep the idea from growing into more.

So we started drafting a story.

As we wrote the first draft, we realized the story needed to change a lot. So we moved on to the second draft. Then the third. Etcetera.

The final drafts

By about the seventh draft, we were ready for beta reader feedback. We had ten incredibly generous readers who gave us wonderful food for thought.

We spent the next year implementing those changes, learning, and honing our craft more and more. We started studying storytelling and novel structure more intensely than we ever had before.

We attended the (HIGHLY RECOMMENDED!) Writing Excuses Retreat in 2019, learning from masters like Mary Robinette Kowal, Dan Wells, Patrick Rothfuss, Brandon Sanderson, K. Tempest Bradford, Howard Tayler, Cory Doctorow, Piper Drake, Dongwon Song, and more.

We kept refining and refining until we wrapped up the ninth draft.

Preparing to query

The writing, revising, and editing process took us six years.

The next step was reaffirming our game plan. These days, writers are fortunate to have different paths to publication. Jessi and I are seasoned marketers, so we could probably have some success self-publishing.

But from the beginning, we’ve always envisioned this novel going the traditional route. It just felt right to us.

So we recommitted to that game plan, and taking the question up with those who know the industry much better than we do! That means querying book agents, who could then put our manuscript in front of a publisher.

But it’s not as simple as reaching out to a bunch of agents.

First we had to land on some comp titles (which was NOT easy).

Then we had to research agents to see if they’re open to queries and a good potential fit for the manuscript. We’ve looked into their manuscript wish lists and the authors they currently represent to narrow our search.

Then we hired an author who is also a professional query letter and book manuscript consultant to review our query letter and first ten pages. The feedback on the pages was GLOWING. But we have some work to do on the query letter.

This week, we’re finalizing the letter and submitting our first agent query.

What’s next

I don’t know.

I know the process of finding an agent will take some time. Months. Years.

And then we still have to get the book sold to a publisher and wait for that process to come to fruition before we can hold the book in our hands.

But I’m so proud of what we’ve done.

Honestly, finishing a manuscript I’m so proud of, in collaboration with my best friend, has already made me feel like a success.

Everything else is a whole pile of cherries on top.