Two Below Average Horses and One Unicorn—Or, How I Got My Agent!

And six offers total.

Trigger warnings: Chronic illness, disability, mental health, suicidality.

It’s four in the morning. I’m seated in the dark of my childhood bedroom, the only light a cold glow from the screen of my hard earned HP Envy—bought with wages from weekends spent selling fountain pens and glitter glue at the local stationery shop. Down the hallway, my father sleeps soundly. The house is still, save for the rhythm of keystrokes as I write fanfiction: Teen Wolf, Sherlock, Twilight, The Last of Us, BioShock—strange worlds spilling out of me, far bigger than the four walls I called mine.

That was the first time I ever finished something that resembled a book. A story with a beginning, a middle, and an end, that was entirely my own.

Now I’m 28. I’m still writing about creatures and strangelings. Only this time, I have an agent.

So, how did we get here?

You’re likely here for the unicorn. But first, allow me a small detour to a classroom and a woman named Mrs Richards. She was my college (high school, for the Americans) English teacher, and the first to tell me I could submit creative writing in her class.

I’d always been an arts girl—drama, photography, media studies, art history, English—the full set. I wrote compulsively, painted messily, and performed with gusto. But until Mrs Richards, every English teacher I’d had said they “weren’t comfortable” assessing creative work, and so I was never allowed to submit it.

Mrs Richards changed everything. She told me to write, and write, and write. She encouraged me to enter competitions, allowed me to pair creative responses with academic ones, and for the first time, I believed writing could be something real—not just a dream scribbled in the margins of my notebooks.

Around the same time, I began showing my work to my father. Ever the supportive parent, he read it all and told me he was proud. He also did what dads tend to do: “That’s brilliant, sweetheart. But you’ll need a job that pays.”

So I went to university for art, then for writing but only ever with teaching in mind. I told myself writing was lovely, but unrealistic. I shelved the ambition, believing it wasn’t for people like me.

Then came illness.

At nineteen, my health began to sharply decline. By twenty two, working full time was no longer possible. I left my job and found myself stranded. I was ambitious but inert, stuck in what can only be described as a depression nest. The world moved on. I did not.

One day, I picked up my laptop and started writing again. As ever, I returned to fanfiction, my old friend. The first piece I tackled was a Last of Us AU, featuring an original character of my own invention. It was scrappy and clumsy but it brought me joy.

The first novel I completed a few years later had lived in my head since I was sixteen. A sprawling high fantasy, grand in scope and far too unruly for my current skillset. But I finished it. 130,000 words of pride and triumph. I thought it was brilliant. I was wrong.

Looking back, the book had issues. I’d rushed it out, queried too soon, crafted a feeble pitch, and skipped the polish it needed. I was naïve, starry eyed, and convinced I’d penned a masterpiece.

Here were the final stats for that novel, which I’ll call BTF:

• 80 queries sent

• 61 rejections

• 4 positive replies

• 15 outstanding

• 1 full submission that remains unresponded to

The trenches were brutal. I’d never been good with rejection—who is? I joined Twitter, took part in pitch events, made writer friends. I learned the terrain. I saw what it might take to get somewhere in this strange, opaque world.

While BTF expired, I began a second novel: BR.

BR was different. Where BTF had been grand fantasy in third person, BR was intimate, gothic, hungry—and filled with vampires. This time, I took my time. I asked for help. I revised. I sent my first queries from a hospital bed, during a three month stay. That, in itself, felt like victory.

Sadly, BR came just before the vampire revival. The second season of Interview with the Vampire had yet to air, and Sinners was still a whisper in the wind. The market wasn’t quite ready.

Here were the final stats:

• 140 queries sent

• 103 rejections

• 10 positive responses

• 22 outstanding

• 2 fulls that remains unresponded to

Two perfectly average horses. Not bad, not brilliant. Enough to make me doubt myself. I was exhausted—medically, mentally, emotionally. I wasn’t sure I had it in me to go again.

Then, during the worst fibromyalgia flare up I’d ever had in December 2024, I read Pandora by Anne Rice. I was rereading the Vampire Chronicles from the top, and Pandora cracked something open in me. She was strange, sorrowful, powerful—and I adored her.

At the same time, I lost a friend. And my health was declining again. The grief was awful and I needed somewhere to put it.

Enter Mariota.

From February to late March, I wrote every day. Eight hours a day, sometimes more. I averaged 5,000 to 15,000 words a day. It was madness. It was possession. Mariota’s voice overtook mine. Her story became mine. I wrote in the dark, cocooned in blankets, barely sleeping, wild with it.

She was brilliant. Terrifying. Alive.

I finished her in March. I printed her. Edited her by hand. Did it again. And again. I bled over every sentence. I shared her with trusted friends. I built the strongest query package I’d ever made.

And then…I shelved her.

That flare up became unbearable. Twenty times worse than anything I’d known. I fell into a depression so deep I genuinely believed I wouldn’t come out. I was ready to leave entirely, if you know what I mean.

But something in me (fury, maybe??) decided to try one last time.

On 22nd April, I sent my first batch of queries. Just five. I posted an agents’ guide online for fun.

Within six hours, I had three agent likes!!

And then a full request only seven hours after posting!!!

On the 29th of April, barely a week after I’d hit send, she emailed with an offer and followed up with a call just hours later to speak it aloud.

What she said stayed with me:

I have finished Mariota, and while it only took me several days to read, I feel I’ve lived several lives. This book is beyond incredible, and I truly cried more than once while reading it. This world you’ve created is so imaginative, yet so perfectly grounded by the historical ties. It was refreshing reading about these vast portions of history that rarely have a space in historical fiction. You have such a way with words, where the prose just ebbed and flowed on the pages, as if I could feel the push and pull of each one.

I sat there stunned. For the first time in years, someone wasn’t just seeing the work. They were feeling it. Living inside it. And they wanted to fight for it.

A week ago, I had nearly given up. And now, I was being offered the one thing I had always hoped for.

The unicorn had arrived! They weren’t lying when they said all it takes is one.

Once my first offer was official, I did the daunting bit: I drafted my offer of representation notifications and sent them out to every agent I’d queried, along with those who already held fulls. I also contacted a few agents who still had my earlier manuscripts, tucked away in their inboxes. Within the hour, two fresh requests landed in my inbox. Then two more the next day. And the day after that. For nearly a week, the requests kept coming—a frenzy of interest that felt, quite honestly, like sharks in the water.

We’d set a two week deadline for the 7th May and what followed was not the calm elation I’d once imagined, but pure, stomach churning overwhelm. Everyone tells you that receiving multiple offers is exhilarating. And it is. But by the time the second offer came in and I’d booked that next call, I felt like vomiting. Not from nerves, but guilt. Guilt that I would have to choose.

The second offer came via email, mentioning a Saturday call. She’d been a dream agent of mine for quite some time—thoughtful, sharp, and passionate. Just like the first agent, she truly got the book. I pencilled her in, heart racing.

Then came the third offer, and it arrived in style.

I hadn’t queried this agent. In fact, her inbox was officially closed!! But she’d seen my pitch online and messaged me directly on Twitter:

"Um, 100% aware you have an agent offer, but (if I have a chance, considering whoever has offered ;), I’d love to take a look at the full if you’re up for sending it my way! The pitch sounds friggin incredible!"

Naturally, I sent it over. She was travelling at the time, en route to a conference, and read Mariota in the sky, somewhere above the States. As the plane touched down, I received a second message:

"AAAAAHHHH! Just landed for the conference and finished your book as the plane touched down. Obsessed. Will email when I’m at the hotel and have wifi!"

True to her word, she did—gushing, effusive, joyous! We were both online, buzzing, and she said: “Let’s talk now?”

And so it happened. I found myself on a call with Jenna Satterthwaite. It was 11 p.m. for her, 3p.m. for me, she was in her hotel room, pyjama clad, having just landed and neither of us could wait.

We talked for what felt like hours. Jenna spoke about Mariota with such clarity, such happiness. She already had a vision for where the book might go—publishers, imprints, editors—and she spoke with the kind of confidence that only comes from a love for the work and for the job itself. She had the proof to back it up, and the passion to make it infectious.

I felt honoured. Giddy!!! And it was only just beginning.

I spoke to two of Jenna’s authors, both of whom had nothing short of glowing praise.

"Her enthusiasm is unmatched which, honestly, makes her an absolutely wonderful advocate for someone's novel."

"Jenna is wonderful! (She's also possibly superhuman.)"

"Jenna would straight up challenge someone to a duel if that’s what you needed. She's so sweet, but do wrong by one of her authors and it's pistols at dawn."

It felt like I’d struck gold. The kind of agent you dream about. She was in your corner, kind to the core, and wildly enthusiastic about your work.

As I mulled everything over, three more offers came in. And yet, none of them felt quite right. There were visions I didn’t share, or impressive sales records without the spark. The truth was, I couldn’t stop thinking about Jenna. Declining offers was extremely hard, I won’t lie. I felt so guilty!

But the night before my deadline I bit the bullet.

I sent the email, heart in my throat, and wrote the words I’d dreamt of saying for years:
I would love to accept your offer of representation!!

And just like that, I wasn’t alone anymore.

Final Stats:

• 55 queries sent

• 35 rejections

• 20 full requests

• 4 queries still outstanding

• 3 fulls still in the void

• 6 offers of representation

And one YES.

If I have one piece of advice as someone who has crawled through the bleakest stretches of the querying trenches, who has had hope rise and then splinter, who has come close to giving up more times than I can count, it’s this:

Don’t give up.

I know. It’s clichéd. I used to hate hearing it too. But it’s true.

If you truly want to write, if there’s a fire in you to build worlds, to craft stories, to share something aching and alive, whether you dream of being the next Brandon Sanderson or simply want to have a life telling tales, then you must hold on. Even when it’s thankless. Even when it hurts.

You have to be persistent. You have to be annoying. You have to back yourself, again and again, until the world catches up.

If I hadn’t made that agent’s guide, if I hadn’t gone on about Mariota on Twitter, Bluesky, to my friends, to anyone who’d listen—if I hadn’t believed in her, and in myself, despite everything—I wouldn’t be here.

You need to be a little delusional. You need to look rejection in the eye and say, “No. I know who I am. I’m a writer. And this will happen for me.”

Then you take that conviction and drag it back into the trenches.

It’s okay to feel broken when a book doesn’t land. It’s okay to grieve. It’s okay to rest. But don’t quit. Please don’t quit. Keep writing. Keep going. Find your champion. Write the book of your heart and find the person who’ll fight for it as much as you do.

Of course, I wouldn’t be here without my beloved Charlie and Moo, who held me through every triumph and every collapse, who cheered for me, read draft after draft without complaint, and let me share snippets, spiral about querying, and talk at them until I felt sane again. I love you both beyond the edges of the universe.

To my dad and stepmum, thank you for believing in this, even when I didn’t. Despite the weight of illness shadowing much of my life, you never stopped calling, never stopped asking about the queries, never stopped supporting every single book I wrote right up until the moment someone finally said yes.

To Kate Duarte (@authorkduarte) and Sophie (@firehoesdiaz), and to the many kind, brilliant people I’ve met through the writing sphere, your support made all the difference. You reminded me why I write. You made me want to keep going. I’m so grateful to be in this with you.

And that is how I found my agent.

Keep your eyes peeled for Mariota—my sorrow drenched, selfish, utterly beloved lesbian revenant.