Category: Writer’s Life

A Wonderful Launch for Jaguars and Other Game

Thank you! Thank you! Thank you to everyone who came out to the launch of Jaguars and Other Game. We had a wonderful night at Buteco in Grant Park with Brazilian salgados and caipirinhas. We raffled off some Haviannas, Garoto candy and coffee fresh off the plane form Brazil curtesy of my husband. The amazing Kendra, of Bookish in East Atlanta, completely sold out of books. My dear friend and I had a blast doing a Q&A. Nothing makes two former high school thespians happier than being handed microphones and people’s undivided attention.

It was a wonderful evening and I can now officially say I’m a published author. Jaguars and Other Game is available wherever books are sold! Your local indie bookstore, Barnes&Noble, and of course Amazon. I’ll let the pictures tell the rest of the story this time. I’ve got no more words except a final thank you!

December 9, 2022
Jaguars and Other Game is out today!

It’s official! Jaguars and Other Game, my debut historical fiction, is out today! I’ve been writing and working toward the goal of being a published author for more than a decade. This is literally a dream come true.

You can buy Jaguars and Other Game wherever books are sold! Your local indie bookstore, Barnes & Noble, Target, directly from my publisher at Orange Blossom and of course from Amazon. EBooks are available from Amazon for only $4.99 so if you want to check it out before you purchase 10 paperbacks for everyone in your bookclub or if you happen to live in Brazil (Oi, gente! Tenho saudades para minha familía e meus amigos no Brasil!) you can buy a digital copy!

Over the many years-long journey to getting published, I’ve learned the idea of solitary author working alone in his cabin with kind only for his dog is a myth. No author works alone. It takes a team to make a book. A good one anyway. Many people have helped create Jaguars and Other Game, from early beta readers to my agent to my editor to the cover designer to every member of my launch team who scoured the manuscript for typos and early reviewers who helped spread the word. If anyone outside my immediate family buys this book, it’s due to all the help I’ve received during the process.

Of course I’m thankful for my husband and daughter who never complained about my hours spent working behind a screen with very little to show for it. This is what I was working towards, and I hope it’s only the first of many books to come.

If you have the chance to read Jaguars and Other Game, please leave a review on Goodreads or Amazon! Word of mouth and reader reviews are the lifeblood of independent publishers. And there are so many ways to support authors without spending money. Ask your library to purchase a copy of their book. Share posts about the book on social media. Follow the author on social media and sign up for their newsletter. And of course, leave ratings and reviews for the book.

I’m so proud of Jaguars! Thank you to everyone who helped make it into the dazzling adventure and romping good story it is and thank you to my readers for your support and spreading the word.

November 22, 2022
Pre-Order Jaguars and Other Game! A Rousing Historical Adventure!

It’s finally happening! After more than a decade of writing, I can finally answer the dreaded “Oh, you write novels? Where can I buy your book?”

At your local bookstore! That’s where! Jaguars and Other Game, my gender-flipped, Three-Musketeers-style adventure set in 1809 Rio de Janeiro, is available for pre-order from any local bookstore. (Shout out to my indie, Charis Books!) Or if you prefer, buy digital copies from Amazon or Barnes&Noble! Grab a signed first edition directly from Orange Blossom Publishing!

I have inwardly cringed at the “Can I buy your book?” for years. Writers constantly share memes “If you write, you’re a writer,” but let’s be honest. If you constantly talk aloud to yourself without an audience, you’re not an actor. You’re the person at the coffee shop no one sits near. And a writer without readers is a prolific diary keeper with delusions of grandeur. An author requires an audience.

Of course, we’re always warned to be careful what you wish for. Once your book is out in the world, it’s fair game for readers to interpret, critique, review and judge. Despite desperately wanting people to read my book, I was also terrified of people reading my book. I carried around a knot in my stomach from the moment my publisher uploaded Jaguars for early reviews on NetGalley until the first review came in 48 hours later. 5 stars. From a stranger. This person was under no familial obligation or threat of causing a super awkward PTA meeting. They could trash my book without consequence to themselves, and they gave my book 5 stars.

I know you’re not supposed to read reviews. It’s the one piece of advice all authors give to debuts. Don’t read your reviews. But…who actually does that? Who possesses the stone-cold, borderline sociopathic indifference to others’ opinions required to avoid reviews? When you take your kid to a doctor, you don’t leave the check-up without hearing some feedback. This is my book baby. I love it, but maybe I’m delusional. Honestly, after line edits I have no perspective whatsoever where Jaguars is concerned. I need a second opinion. I want to know what readers think.

Currently, they think it’s a 4.9 out of 5 stars!

I even got 5 stars from a librarian! *screaming* Take that agent lady who read an early query and said for Americans to read a book set in Portugal it would “have to be exceptional, and this is not it.” (Also, Rio de Janeiro is not in Portugal.)

This is very stream of consciousness post is to say, I’m an author. My debut novel, Jaguars and Other Game, is available for pre-order through your local indie bookstore, Amazon, Barnes&Noble and directly from Orange Blossom Publishing. You can get signed first editions from Orange Blossom. Check-out early reviews on Goodreads then order your own copy and see for yourself. Jaguars and Other Game comes out on November 22! I hope you love it!

October 17, 2022
Journey to a Book Deal: By the numbers

“How long did it take you to get a book deal?” I’m rarely asked that question when I have enough time for a complete answer. Or when people really want an honest answer. Nobody at Thanksgiving wants to hear “Well Aunt Hattie, it took me thirteen years from first book idea to book deal, so if you’re think about a memoir, you probably want to get on that.”

Full disclosure, I haven’t actually published a book yet. My launch date is November 22, 2022, and at the rate other debut releases are getting pushed back for production and shipping reasons, I might not have a book before Stacey Abrams is president. So the numbers I’m going to give are subject to change depending on the existence of paper nearer my launch date.

These numbers are also specific to my publishing experience as a fiction writer. Publishing is different for non-fiction. Even within fiction, picture books have different practices and expectations than novels. And none of this is applicable in anyway for self-publishing.

But for what it’s worth here are my numbers.

2009

I had my first idea for a novel and went so far as to write a detailed outline. I wanted it to be a graphic novel. Meaning totally illustrated. Basically a 200 page comic book. That I imagined a publisher would print in color. For my debut novel. Oh starry-eyed, sweet, naïve 2009 Brynn. That girl makes me laugh.

Still I will love this story until I die because it’s the idea that made me a novelist. That idea became the first book I finished in…

2015

Six years form flash of inspiration to complete, edited manuscript. In that time I had a baby, and I’m convinced I would never have developed the self-discipline to finish a manuscript without parenthood. But that’s for another post.

You know what, let’s summarize this or we’ll be here all day.

Book 1 Completed June 2015: 2 editors hired, 3 full revisions, 62 agents rejections, shelved early 2017

Book 2 – Started August 2015 completed March 2017: YA speculative fiction, 5 Beta Readers, 1 editor hired, 3 full revisions, 4 competition submissions, 54 rejections, shelved March 2018

Book 3 – Started June 2016 completed March 2018: YA historical fiction, 4 Beta readers, 1 competition submission, 39 rejections, 1 Revise & Resubmit, 1 rewrite to change from YA to Adult, Signed with agent November 2018

While signing with an agent is a huge deal if you want to traditionally, it is NOT a book deal. Because Book 3 still had to go on submission to editors at publishing houses. That’s a whole new level of rejection!

Book 3 continued: 1 revision with agent, Sent on submission May 2019…

Pause for a global pandemic, an international move and emotional havoc

…Sold to Orange Blossom Publishing Sept., 2021

Book 3 is Jaguars and Other Game. It comes out November 22, 2022.

That’s how long it took me to get a book deal. Was anyone keeping count? That’s a total of 13 years and 155 rejections. I didn’t even include the editor rejections during Jaguars submission. I honestly don’t know that total. I just assumed every editor employed in the U.S. save one, but as everyone in publishing says “One ‘Yes!’ is all it takes!”

Depending on the paper situation I will have an actual book this year. (I’m keeping my fingers crossed.) I just sent Book 4 to my agent, which I started during Nanowrimo 2018. Honestly wasn’t sure I’d ever finish it, but turns out I do have more stories in me.

So Aunt Hattie, if you want to traditionally publish that memoir about growing up on a radish farm with your pet opossum, my advice is to start writing. Be patient. Get a thick skin and working knowledge of em dashes. Write something else. Repeat.

Now I’m off to start drafting Book 5. I really feel like I’m starting to get the hang of this writing thing.

March 25, 2022
My First Author Event!

After more than a decade of writing with the intention of building a career, I’m participating in my first author event! Corner Cup on Mainstreet in Tucker, GA from 10am-2pm Sunday, February 27. I’m going to show up in public as a writer. Not just a writer but An Author. With a novel coming out. I really want to be the cool, chill writer, rocking a blazer and sneakers. But I’ll probably be crying through the event. Or talking way too loudly at a million words a minutes. I have trouble using my indoor voice when I’m excited, and I will be very excited this Sunday.

So if you’re willing to hear me shout about my book, come out to the Corner Cup this Sunday. I’ll be selling copies of two amazing anthologies about living abroad that I contributed to and handing out my very first book swag! A little teaser for Jaguars & Other Game coming out in November 2022.

Before I began writing fiction, I wrote creative non-fiction about my experiences living in Brazil and I’m looking forward to sharing these anthologies and talking to people about how I used writing, specifically humor, to process and adapt to life abroad. In Once Upon an Expat, I talk about gym culture in Vitoria, Espirito Santo and the importance of rock-solid quads and a fabulous unitard. Giving birth prematurely in a foreign country wouldn’t seem fodder for comedy, but I’m believer in laughter as a painkiller. My essay in Knocked Up Abroad Again takes readers through my emergency c-section at 33 weeks and the 28 days my daughter spent in the NICU. Both anthologies are filled with heartfelt and humorous accounts of women from all over the world with the common experience of building a life and family in a new country and culture.

I’m also happy to talk about my experience with traditional publishing, finding an agent then going on submission (for a painfully long 28 months) and ultimately signing with a small indie press. I’ve hired editors and sensitivity readers and networked to find beta readers. I have an extensive collection of rejections from agents and editors and am always up for a good gripe session about how absurdly slow the publishing industry is. A global pandemic was able to play out in the time it took to go on submission. So if you’re looking for a fellow author to talk shop or are thinking about writing your first book, come stop by Corner Cup! I’d love to chat and make more local writer connections.

Also by buying a coffee and bagel, you’ll be supporting local businesses. Corner Cup is locally owned and operated and they give a ton of support to the community by selling the work of local artists. Their baked goods are also locally produced and delicious, (Shout out to Emerald City’s everything bagel!) so you can feel good about buying that chocolate croissant.

If you’re around Tucker this Sunday, I hope to see you. We can talk writing, swap book and pastry recommendations, and I promise to try and use my indoor voice.

February 22, 2022
My First Book Deal!

It finally happened!

Seven years after I finished the first draft of my first novel, I signed with a publisher. I have dreamed of holding a copy of a book I wrote and seeing my name on the cover. My debut novel, Jaguars and Other Game, comes out November 22, 2022 with Orange Blossom Publishing!

Assuming my small publisher stays on track with the other books coming out earlier in the year. And assuming the supply chain is mostly back together. And let’s hope for an in-person launch event but who knows when the next Covid variant will hit. But I live in Georgia so I’m probably on for an in-person event. Florida would be more of guarantee but even then, bookstores are getting good at hosting virtual book launches. But if all stars align, there will be a launch party in-person with physical copies of my book in November.

No matter what happens, I am NOT going to worry about the nature of my book launch. I am going to be happy and celebrate for all of 2022. A professional book person who is a complete stranger to me read my words and said “Yes, this should be printed. It is worth people’s time and money.” So I’m just basking in the glow of a dream achieved.

Ha. I wish. It’s my nature to plan things out thoroughly in advance then lay in bed sick with anxiety when those plans have to change. It’s one of my adorable personality quirks being unable to chill and go with the flow.

Over the years, I’ve heard several published authors say that getting your first book doesn’t lessen the stress. It just replaces the fear of never being published with a hundred other fears. And that’s been true, especially with a small publisher. All the early marketing is on me. There’s no marketing intern in New York making my promotional graphics for social media. I have a hundred more professional to-dos than before the book deal.

2015! My first Decatur Book Festival as an aspiring author. DBF 2023! I’m coming for a local author spot.

But…BUT all the new worries rest on a foundation of “I did it.” I feel as though an enormous weight has been lifted off my soul that not even signing with my agent relieved. I don’t dread the extra work. Even while the stress knot between shoulder blades grows tighter every minute I spend integrating Mailchimp with my webpage, I’m happy to do the work. I’m absolutely thrilled that I NEED to do the work. Because it’s “for my book”! I will make the damn subscription button work no matter how long it take because I have proof that working hard will pay off. The workshops and contests and style books and years of writing will not all be in vain as I dreaded they would for so many years.

No matter what happens. In-person or virtual launch. Five attendees or a hundred. 3 Goodreads reviews from my writing group or dozens of four star reviews from strangers. Ten copies sold or five hundred. No matter what happens, by the end of 2022 I will be a published author. When people ask my daughter “What does your mommy do?” She can say “She’s an author. You can buy her book.”

And I am damn proud of the book I wrote.

Jaguars and Other Game is a historical adventure in the spirit of The Three Musketeers that follows three women as they work together to track down a murderer to save a friend wrongly imprisoned for the crime. There’s romance, diamond smugglers, corrupt officials and a mad queen. It’s a story about found family and the lengths we’ll go to save those we love from injustice. And it will be available through your local bookstore, Amazon or Target on November 22, 2022.

February 7, 2022
Brynn Is Not In Brazil

Hi. So…it’s been a minute. I’d ask how you’ve been the last few years, but I don’t think I could take an honest answer. You’ve either been like me. You’re barely keeping it together and looking in the mirror has been like watching a time elapsed video covering a few decades. Or you’ve managed to thrive and find yourself in adversity in which case, I assume you own a supply chain software company and I don’t want to hear that shit either

But it’s January 2022 and I’m ready to confidently say I feel like myself again, albeit with thinner hair and a thicker waist.

What have I been up to? Not writing blog posts obviously. You’d think a writer would process events through writing but whenever I did sit down to write, it felt like someone had taken a shotgun to my attention span. I got fragments of ideas, slivers of thoughts. Piecing together anything sensible, let alone enjoyable, was painful and tedious.

I’ve over the last 18 months most of my energy has gone to building a life from scratch in Atlanta.

Mercedes Benz Stadium in the ATL. Home to the Falcons, Atlanta United, & mass vaccinations.

That’s right. Brynn is officially NOT in Brazil! We moved to my hometown of Atlanta in June 2020. Yup. 2020. A transcontinental move with a child in the midst of a global pandemic. And my husband stayed behind in Brazil because job and money. As risky life changing decisions go, we were open to international flights and furniture shopping during a pandemic but drew the line at no one in the house earning an income. We saved that for 2021.

I’ll write a whole series of posts on moving from Brazil to the US soon. Getting my daughter registered for school was an odyssey in itself. The Dekalb school system is not set up for an English-speaking, foreign born American citizen with a social security number but only Brazilian school transcripts. The automated messages never tell you what number to push for that.

Moving back to the United States isn’t the only thing that’s happened. We adopted two dogs from a local rescue. I reconnected with friends I hadn’t seen since high school. I started a book club with two of them and joined a writing with another. That group helped me finish a fourth draft of a historical fiction that I started writing for Nanowrimo 2018 and will finally go on submission to editors this year.

And I sold my first book!!!!!! (Maybe I should have led with that?)

After years querying and being on submission, I signed with a small idependent publisher, Orange Blossom Publishing to release my historical fiction, Jaguars and Other Game. It will be my debut novel, launching on November 22, 2022. Just in time for my 40th birthday.

I have high expectations for 2022. I say that despite having been conscious for the last two years. My husband has joined us full time in Atlanta for the next year. We’re together, vaccinated, and I’m going to launch my debut novel.

There’s a lot happening. A lot has happened. I’ll write about everything. Keep checking in for updates on the publishing process and fun announcements like the cover reveal and pre-order campaigns. I’m so excited to share this process with y’all.

January 24, 2022
What I Learned From Querying Literary Agents

The other night my daughter and I died repeatedly in a lava lake. We were playing Yoshi’s Woolly World and trying to get a final daisy that would unlock a secret board but the lava was rising and covering the daisy and…well, we died a lot.

After death number twenty-two give or take five, my daughter said, “Mommy, let’s just quit. We’re never going to get it.”

“That’s only true if we quit,” I cried, frantically pounding the A button.

Which is true. In Yoshi’s Wolly World and in life. Someday becomes never only when we quit.

This is not a sentiment I would have slapped on a poster, covered in glitter, and waved over my head until very recently. I was much more a “Why would I waste my limited time and energy on something that’s basically impossible?” or put more honestly “Why would I try so hard to most likely fail?”

Then I started querying agents for a novel, and I learned failing isn’t the end. Failing is a step.

I remember the queasy feeling I had as I hit send on my first query. This was it. After three years of writing, revising and researching the fiction industry, I was as ready as I could be. I was NOT querying a first draft. I had revised and revised again. I researched agents and made a list tailored to the book I wrote. I sent my query to workshops and had ACTUAL literary agents critique it. I was ready, and with my hand shaking, I clicked send. Then I sent nine more.

They all said no. So did the next ten agents. And the ten after that. All form rejections.

Querying literary agents is a pretty good dry run for living with chronic reflux. Once those queries are out, checking your inbox triggers chest pains, difficulty breathing, and nausea. It didn’t matter if the query was sent six hours ago or six months ago. If I had an open query and that little red circle appeared over my inbox icon, my stomach flipped. My expectations rose.

And then I’d read the rejection. It’s amazing that pixels on a screen can stimulate the physical sensation of being punched in the gut.

The first few rejections hurt but weren’t devastating. I didn’t panic. There are varied tastes. Some agents just won’t be into a vigilante anti-hero no matter how well written. Although someone should have recognized my talent by query 20. Or 25. Certainly by 30. But the form rejections kept coming and feeding the self-doubt. Because I wouldn’t have queried a novel I didn’t think was good. So the agent rejections were a reflection not only my book but on my judgement as a writer, right?

Eventually I went in search of data because that’s what people with social science degrees do. I wanted a number, so I googled “What’s the average number of rejections authors get before signing with an agent?” I found enough numbers that I know my total rejections over three projects isn’t even that high.

But back then, I had no idea where my count would end. Would I be the author who got an agent on her 65th query for her sixth manuscript? Imagining the time and energy it would take to write and revise six novels left me breathless. Could my heart take a shot of adrenaline every time I checked my email for a decade? But giving up after one novel wasn’t even trying and I couldn’t quit without really trying.

So I wrote another book. And I queried it. I got more form rejections. They caused heart palpitations and pain. But…and this was a revelation…not as much pain as that first batch.

I realized as I neared that 100 rejections mark, that the more times I read “no”, the faster my heart rate returned to normal. By the time I was into three digit rejection numbers, the emails caused only a flutter of despair. I could tell my husband and family “Nope. Another pass” with merely a shrug. I seemed to have developed a high tolerance for “no”.

Then project number three got me my first full manuscript request and first rejection of the entire manuscript. That one was bad. My query reflux flared up. I cried. But there were more full requests and I started thinking “At this rate, eventually someone will say yes.” I’d heard “no” 130 times, but somewhere along the line my thinking had shifted from “maybe not ever” to “eventually”.

As long as I didn’t quit. I’d gone from form rejections to personalized rejections to a partial request to multiple full requests. If I kept going, one rejection at time, I’d eventually get to a yes and after four years, I did. After 138 rejections.

So here’s what I hope to pass on my daughter.

There will be some doors that never open no matter how hard a person tries. I will never be and could never have been a professional basketball player or super model. I do not have the body for either. Nor do I have the eyesight for fighter jet pilot. Some things are out of our control.

And not everyone has the luxury of failing repeatedly. They don’t have time and energy to spare on ventures that might not bring any financial return. They don’t have family to support them during the trial and errors or bail them out after the crash and burn.

Failing repeatedly is a priviledge. If you’ve got the safety net, take the leap.

Do not let fear of hearing “no” or shame from having to admit rejection in front of family and friends be the only reasons you don’t try. Hearing “no” gets easier. It’ll always sting, but it will stop defining you. Every failed attempt teaches and makes you better. And you will get better.

So tryout for the team. Audition for the roll. Submit the story. Send off the resume. The regret from never trying will be so much worse than the sting of failing. And if there answer is “no”, well, your life will go on exactly as it did before you tried. It won’t be worse and now you have the chance to learn something and try again.

Take the step. Get a “no”. Reassess and try again. And again. Get 138 “no”s. Get 500 “no”s. You’ve only truly failed once you stop trying.

That’s what I yelled while my Yoshi leapt over rising lava. And eventually we got that damn daisy.

March 1, 2019
My Most Brutal Agent Critique & What It Taught Me About Diverse Stories

It happened. I finally got the brutal agent response I will talk about twenty years from now at book signings. I’m a real writer now. Yay!

I wasn’t expecting an total take down of my novel considering I wasn’t querying. I took an online workshop on historical fiction that included a critique by the agent instructor of a log line, synopsis, and first 2 pages. I’d recently finished the first draft and was eager to get feedback on what needed to be improve. Here’s what I got back.

“Unusual can be good, but in this case, Portugal may feel too foreign to American readers…I don’t know how interested American readers are going to be in this particular era and place. There is no precedent for it. That doesn’t mean you can’t start a new trend, but first it would have to be so spectacular that readers wouldn’t be able to put it down. Unfortunately, that is not the case here.”

Once I recovered from not having my first pages recognized for their genius and obvious money-making potential, I reread the email more critically.

My first thought was “Portugal, a Christian country in Europe full of white people, may feel too foreign for Americans?” I’m still trying to figure out what about US demographics gives the agent this impression. If Portugal is too foreign what countries will Americans read about? Great Britain, obviously. France, yes. Germany? What about Russia? They’re white, but their culture is pretty dissimilar to the US.

I’m assuming the agent was thinking of white Americans. But maybe that’s unfair. The agent could have been thinking about Korean Americans. Portugal is different from Korea in so many ways from language to internet speed. Korean Americans probably have no interest in reading a story set there. I know I personally only read books set in places my DNA came from. Thank God Hogwarts is in England!

Going off that thought, maybe the large percentage of Americans who have DNA from Africa, the Middle East, Asia, North or South America would be interested in reading a story set in one of those places. This would actually be a great thing for my story.

Which leads to my second thought after rereading the email. See if you can spot the source of my confusion.

Log Line:

Three young women form an improbable friendship in order to rescue the boy, find a murderer, and thwart a coup against the Portuguese monarchy. Madness & Diamonds is a girl-power Three Musketeers set in colonial Rio de Janeiro.

My book is not set in Portugal.

Here’s the first line of my synopsis.

Victoria, a servant of The Mad Queen Maria of Portugal, evacuates Lisbon to Rio de Janeiro with the royal family and 10,000 members of the court in advance of Napoleon’s invasion.

To clarify, Brazil is the big green one. Portugal is the orange dot.

The synopsis goes on to mention Rio another nine times. The most generous interpretation of events is that the agent was pressed for time or exhausted or probably both, skimmed my material in a rush and latched on to the first nationality mentioned, Portuguese. Or the agent typed Portugal but was thinking Brazil? I also considered the agent may not know where Rio de Janeiro is. (At Christmas I had to tell a homeschooling mom what continent Brazil is on, so thinking Rio is in Portugal is totally possible.)

Whatever the reason for the confusion, it’s just as well for me because if Portugal is too foreign, I can’t imagine what feedback I’d have gotten on a story set in Brazil.

In fairness, the agent cited one problem with my pages and synopsis: clarity. I absolutely agree based on her feedback that certain aspects of the story need to be made more obvious. I also know that complaining about a bad critique can make me seem petty to unprofessional. All writers get bad critiques. Get over it. And I would have except for one fact.

This agent is a Gatekeeper with a capitol G, and it was abundantly clear from the critique, this agent would never take a risk on a manuscript that was “too foreign.”

Foreign too whom? White, Christian Americans.

I joked about who the agent was envisioning when saying Portugal is too foreign for Americans, but it’s obvious what specific demographic she defines as American. What infuriates me is that the “Americans” this agent is considering will not even represent the vast majority of the population in a few years.

The Census Bureas predicts that by 2020, the majority of kids in the United States will be members of a minority race or ethnic group. Every single person working in children’s publishing in any capacity should know this fact because while the demographics of American children have changed, children’s publishing is still overwhelmingly white. Last year only 28% of children’s books were by and/or about people of color. That percentage is actually big jump from only two years earlier. However there’s still going to have to be a massive increase in stories about POC in the next few years, if children’s fiction in the U.S. is going to reflect the diverse reality of the country’s kids.

But how is children’s publishing going to change if the Gatekeepers think Portugal is too foreign for Americans?

Literature is also a proven way to develop empathy for people different from ourselves. Only 11% of children’s books published in the last 23 years had multicultural content. In today’s globalized world, it is essential children grow up aware of the variety of people that exist in the world. Not to mention the foreign-born population in the U.S. is predicted to reach a record high in 2025, roughly 15% of all people living in the U.S. will have been born in another country. (That statistic doesn’t even include people like my daughter, who is an American born abroad.) Empathy and a global perspective are critical tools for success in today’s world.

I’m going to end with a thank you to the agent who sent this critique. I had read the data and accounts from authors of color and those trying to publish books with diverse characters and settings. I was aware of the challenges these writers and books face but I wasn’t clear on the exact form they take. Now I know, and I’m more determined than ever to finish revising my story set in Brazil. I’m going to get it published. Then I’m going to sell it to Americans. Finally, I’ll send a copy along with the book’s sales numbers to that agent.

Although even then, I won’t have any idea how Americans feel about Portugal.

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April 7, 2017