My debut novel is pink. I wrote story about a girl who’s obsessed with forensic science and Dexter–who has an super villain alter ego based on a type of poison–who just happens to want boobs. And it’s pink. Why? Because I didn’t self-publish. My book ended up in the hands of a romance imprint and my darkly sarcastic narrative ended up in pink. I absolutely adore it, mind you, but it isn’t what I imagined for E.

Despite all my prideful individuality and need for nonconformity, I need validation. I knew when I started writing that I’d never let this book see the light of day if I couldn’t land an agent and a publisher. Every author I’ve met around here published their own book and our experiences are vastly different. I’m always getting asked about my cover design, sales numbers, and if I’ll have any books on hand to distribute. I have no idea. I did get to weigh in on the mock-up of the cover art, but that’s the extent of my involvement in the process. I opened an email on my phone while sitting in a waiting room and got my first glimpse of a flesh-and-blood E, and I cried. I burst into tears in front of strangers and openly wept at how perfect she is. But I don’t know how many copies have been sold and I sure as hell won’t be buying a bunch of copies for resale. That’s all out of my hands.

Rewind a little more. Another day, another email, sitting in my car this time. I read an email from the editor with notes about changes I needed to make to my book. It didn’t seem so bad in the beginning. A few little things about time changes and the romantic subplot. No big deal. Then I opened One Drive and saw literally hundreds of notes waiting for me in the margin. I rewrote the entire timeline, completely changed relationships between characters, even altered E’s character arc. Months later, I had a much better novel. I’m glad none of you will ever read that mess and think less of me for it. I’m a little bitter about some scenes that ended up on the cutting room floor, but the editor was ultimately right about them and I learned a lot about writing in the process.

Okay, fast forward back to today. My next project is on submission right now, and I’m trying not to get too excited about the enthusiastic response we’ve seen so far. My agent pitched the book to six different editors from major publishing houses. Five of them answered the next day. All five answers were manuscript requests. Not a single rejection. I have to stay level-headed about this. The reality is that an unholy amount of stories are pitched every day and a stunningly high level of interest is no guarantee that it’ll get purchased and end up in print. And I need that validation. I still won’t decide my work is worthy of publication unless someone else makes it official.

A major factor in my hesitation is that pink cover on The Saline Solution. E’s story is a quick-moving narrative about a girl who quips her way to earning a buttload of cash for a boob job. She’s confident and funny and knows what she wants. She’s all the things I wish I’d been when I was in high school. The rest of the cast consists of her functional family, her healthy friendships, her long-term boyfriend, and her secret love interest. Dead Girl is completely different. Clair is an only child with a single parent. She pushed everyone away to protect them from her depression, and the only static relationship in her life is her friend, Brian. Her story bounces back and forth between her desperate last days before dying and the emptiness that came after. Where E tells you the story of how she got the twins, Clair agonizes inwardly over the pain of being forced to live through death. E is all the things I wanted to be, and Clair is everything I was. I took an enormous risk and wrote something deeply personal. Now we wait and see what happens.

And somewhere halfway between E and Clair, there’s a girl named Maggie. She was the first character I fleshed out on paper and I’m working on bringing her back to life for my third book. Man, I really hope you get to meet her too.