Flabbergasted-verb-to overcome with surprise and bewilderment; astound.

I have oh so much to update you on. No, I have not been neglecting my blog. I have been swept up in the rapid current that is my life at the moment. Gee, where do I begin? Allow me to paraphrase: 
             1.)  I came up with a new story idea that has grown and expanded so much that it will now surpass all my previous story ideas to become my next project.
              2.)  I sent off query letters to 2 of the 3 agents I mentioned before.
              3.)  I received a response from one of those agents two days later. She's requested the first fifty pages of my manuscript!!

Whew!!

I'll start with dessert first; #3. For fear of retribution, I will not use the agent's real name. We'll call her "Agent A". I met Agent A at the Willamette writer's conference last August. After participating in one of her audience-involved exercises, she was impressed with my pitch and permitted me to send a query. 
I must say, it was harder to send off a query than I anticipated. I prepared the query as close to perfection as I could. I pulled up Agent A's email address and attached the query. Being the thorough perfectionist that I am, I read the letter over again....and again. I moved the cursor over the send button and froze. 
My chest tightened. I began Lamaze breathing. Even in the November chill of my house, bullets of sweat colonized on my brow. There is no "unsending" this, Jennifer. I warned myself. Are you sure - are you certain that this is absolutely perfect?  
I blew out a short breath and licked my lips, finding them as dry as a Savannah creek bed in the summer. You have one chance; one chance to impress. Don't make an ass out of yourself. Don't look like an idiot. 
Reading it once more for good measure, I willed my stubborn index finger to do what it was told. 
*Click*
The insignificant sound resonated in my ears. It was gone. It was done; surfing the internet waves to it's destination. Out of my hands. Out of my control.
What was next? 
Waiting....waiting....waiting.
I fully expected to wait weeks or even months before receiving that cold and lifeless rejection letter. I was prepared to play the waiting game and roll with the rejection punches. Still I checked my email a few times each day with the same expectant breathlessness that one experiences when checking the latest winning lottery numbers; half of me expecting to find nothing but spam and half with the childlike hope of what Santa Claus might bring.
A mere two days later, there it was. The sender was the same person I'd sent the query off to. I stared at the subject line, trying to decipher if the email I'd sent had somehow been returned to me as undeliverable (Heaven forbid). 
No, It was FROM Agent A. I opened it, though I don't remember opening it.

 

Dear Ms. Fields,

 

I would be interested in reading a few chapters of your story. Please send the first fifty pages as a response to this message, putting the text directly into the body of the email.

 

A smile took over my face, stretching until it hurt, but I hadn't taken a breath yet. 

Below the simple correspondence,  was a signature that said, This agent is NO LONGER ACCEPTING unsolicited query letters. Unless you have been referred by one of our authors, an agent or publisher, please check our website for another appropriate agent.

 

Do you know what that means??  That means that I got my foot in the door. Thanks to the conference I attended, I was able to query an agent that is otherwise untouchable to the general writing public...and she wants to see more. 

Thankfully, I do not have heart problems or I may have dropped dead right there at my computer desk (which is probably where I'll die anyway.) 

She wants to see more.

She wants to see more.

Two measly days later, she wants to see more. Not weeks or months later; two days!

Cloud nine doesn't cut it. I have surpassed cloud nine for rocketship nine and I'm well on my way to the moon.

Don't get me wrong. I understand that this is a small victory in the quest for representation, but I was fully prepared to rewallpaper my house with rejection letters before I ever received a smidgen of hope or a positive response. I braced myself for the cruel, heartless literary world. To receive a request for more on my first try is astounding. 

Even if Agent A gets back to me in another two days with a rubber stamped rejection letter, I can relax in the fact that I did so well right out of the gate. There is hope. My work at least intrigues people. 

Imagine, if you will, what will happen if Agent A's response is NOT a rejection....

 

In the midst of this glorious turmoil, I have come up with my next project. Over the last four years, I've kept a safety deposit box of sorts, filled with future story ideas written in quick summaries so that I might never forget them. There are 17 novels waiting there for my creation and they're all perfectly intriguing.

The other day I was telling my husband that since the writing bug bit me, my ultimate dream has been to create my own Oz; my own Wonderland. I wanted a place of my own where I was not limited by the confines of this planet and the lifeforms on it. 

No folks, I'm not talking about your run-of-the-mill fantasy or sci-fi novel. Many times those novels have characters whose names you can't pronounce. They take place on other mysterious planets, and they utilize variations of plants and animals that are derived from earthly examples, (i.e. talking trees, unicorns and other tired cliche's.) 

I came up with my Wonderland. As of this moment, I'm calling it "The Swamplands", but I may change it to "Tinker Swamp." It's a YA novel about kids getting trapped in a parallel universe. Kids have been disappearing from this small Michigan town for over forty years. The townsfolk believe that Old Man Helvig (aka The Tinkerman) is using kids for his crazy science experiments and murdering them. Helvig has joined the group of six boys in this strange land. When brainy Johanna and her friend Virginia get trapped in 1947, Johanna joins forces with The Tinkerman to find a way back home. They don't realize that they are not alone in this world. Besides the strange and dangerous creatures that roam the swamp, there are those that will do anything to keep the gateway closed.

I smell a book series. Move over Harry Potter! Here I come. :)

More later