This is a compelling look at the aftermath of a tour of duty in a war zone. The nervous awkwardness his family feels around him makes sense—he left them as a high school graduate and returns as a war-hardened Marine. While the relationship between him and Harper is meant to be the story’s focus, it is Travis’s relationship with his mom that gives depth to his character. His annoyance at her nervous chatter as they leave the airport evolves into real appreciation for her vigilance during his tour of duty and seething anger at his father for his disrespectful treatment of his mom.

And it got me thinking about other great familiar relationships in YA. So often parents or siblings are just foils for the main characters, someone for them to act out against, or argue with, or fight with, that it’s a real breath of fresh air to find a relationship between family members that feels loving. I think Scarlett and Spencer Martin in Maureen Johnson‘s Suite Scarlett and Scarlett Fever are another great example, and to call out a non-client, the entire Casson family in any of Hilary McKay’s Series about them, including Indigo’s Star and Saffy’s Angel. What are some of your favorite family relationships in YA or MG?

Basma, email me at daphne.unfeasible@gmail.com with your snail mail address, and I’ll get the galley right off to you!

Amazing. You will smile and sob and when you finish, you will walk away a better you. READ THIS BOOK NOW.

Then, from Kirkus:

An affecting look at the experience of one teen soldier’s experience on leave from Afghanistan.

Travis is trying hard to pretend everything is normal, but there’s nothing normal about this little chunk of life at his former home in Florida. His girlfriend is now sleeping with his little brother, a smug, self-interested bastard. His friends don’t understand why he can’t just slide back into his stupid pre-Afghanistan life. His mother worries nonstop. The only thing that’s normal is that his father, an ex–football player who bullied Travis mercilessly into playing the game, still seems to hate his guts. At least when he was with his unit, they all understood how their shared hellish experience has affected them. An unlikely encounter with Harper, a girl he humiliated in middle school, gives him a sense that, maybe, a normal life might be something he can shoot for. Travis’ present-tense narration puts readers directly into his uneasy psyche; he only gradually reveals to himself as well as readers the extent of the damage he has taken in the desert. If the growing relationship between Travis and Harper seems too good to last and the sudden stiffening of his mother’s spine unlikely, readers will be so invested in Travis’ poor, shattered soul they will forgive narrative convenience.

At its heart, this too-timely novel is purely honest.

And finally, a very nice review from the Horn Book’s upcoming May/June issue:

Travis Stephenson’s life has become a “quilt of horror,” a patchwork of nightmares, hallucinations, and flashbacks after just one year in Afghanistan. He had joined the Marines to escape his disapproving, belittling father, but now the war has followed Travis back home. His parents are splitting up, his girlfriend has dumped him for his brother Ryan, and he’ll always be a “disrespectful little punk” to his father. Doller’s debut novel effectively captures the haunted and hallucinatory feeling of a damaged soldier returning home, a nineteen-year-old who says he’s “having trouble even picturing a future with me in it.” Travis is a likable guide to his personal hell, and the characters in his orbit are well drawn and believable. His voice is strong, even when his belief in himself is not. When Travis reunites with Harper Gray, a girl who has hated him since he started an ugly rumor in middle school that ruined her reputation, he is drawn to her, “all green eyes and tousled hair,” and the tentative relationship that ensues may just ensure some kind of a new normal for Travis. Her support and shy love, including nudging him to see a therapist, may help Travis to feel a bit more whole and stop feeling like a “Travis Stephenson-shaped space that needs to be filled in.”

Trish and I are super excited to introduce Travis to the world this summer, but I’m thrilled to give one lucky reader and early opportunity to meet and fall in love with him.

Trish’s tumblr is filled with gorgeous photos of boys and girls, and couples she’s tagged “Together.” I’d love to help her add to it! Add a link in the comments to an image you think would fit well with the others on her blog, and I’ll pick one to receive a galley of Something Like Normal. Can’t wait to see what you come up with!

Hooray for new books!

And editors? I’ve got some fantastic new submissions just waiting to go out to you. Stay tuned!

In the meantime, in honor of those three manuscripts, let’s answer three questions, shall we?

Deserae asked, “I have been wondering, though, what you do look for in those first three pages. Voice, seems to me to be a given, but are there specific turn ons and turn offs that hit you, specifically?”

I actually answered part of this question back in the archives in October. Specific turn-offs include:

1. The main character waking up.
2. The MC looking into a mirror to describe themselves.
3. The narrator telling me how ordinary the MC is.
4. An opening line that references the weather.
5. A prologue with characters that aren’t our MCs.

Turn-ons are harder to describe — it’s that old trope, “I’ll know it when I see it.” But in general, anything that makes me eager to know what happens next, beyond those three pages, is a very good thing.

Alwyn asked, “Do you think it’s a faux pas to start a query letter with the same first line as the MS? (Assuming the first line is a general statement/quote and not a line of dialogue or description etc.)”

No, especially not if your opening line is a killer hook. Because that’s what your query letter is for — not just to wow the agent with your writing, but to hook them and entice them to read more. A serious faux pas would be opening with a rhetorical question — no one likes those.

Ella asked, “How important is it to define the genre of a novel? I am struggling to define my MG novel. It definitely has elements of fantasy, but it can also be categorized as action adventure. Can I define my novel as fantasy/adventure?”

Honestly, I have a hard time thinking of fantasy novels that don’t have an element of adventure. If you’re querying, I think the best thing to do is look at your novel in term of the big-picture genres: romance, mystery, science fiction, fantasy. There’s tons of sub-genres within each, but genre as a term is really useful at this stage in painting your novel in broad strokes. I think I once advised to keep the hyphenation of classification to a minimum, anyway. Don’t pitch a “middle grade action adventure fantasy with realistic elements,” just call it urban fantasy, or whatever. Keep it simple.

And thanks to the Fug Girls for the image of Emma Stone’s shoes, above. I’m looking forward to reading their YA novel SPOILED!

But what about since then? A search of my query mailbox shows 2,130 queries received and responded to since July, with another hundred or so that went right to my spam folder. I requested 41 partials, which is a better average than the first half of the year, but does include material from a conference, as well as just emails. And I asked for three full manuscripts.

So who did I say yes to? Well, I signed Erin Danehy in July, with a YA urban fantasy. And I may have more news to share next week, on something I’ve been asking for all year. We’ll see.

But roughly, you’re looking at .04% odds. And… wow. That’s tough. It’s stark, seeing those numbers. But you know what? I’m still looking. Ok, not right now — any queries received after midnight tonight will be deleted unread. But I have no doubt that next spring, when I reopen to queries, I will be starving for something great to read, and I have no doubt you guys can bring it.

What other stats can I share that may be of interest? I closed new domestic deals for Josie Bloss, Matthew Cody, Trish Doller, Stephanie Perkins, and Ransom Riggs, plus several more that I’m excited to officially announce soon. I finalized foreign deals for rights in Chinese (both simplified and complex characters), Croatian, Germany, Hungarian, Indonesian, Portuguese (in Brazil), and Australia and the UK, and closed on a film option for Matthew Cody‘s Powerless.

We got some great reviews, including several stars, and a lot of love from the internets for for our books and our authors — I couldn’t be prouder. Tom Sniegoski‘s Fallen series hit the New York Times bestseller list, and over a million nerdfighters heard John Green praise Anna and the French Kiss by Stephanie Perkins.

What else? Sara Beitia‘s debut The Last Good Place of Lily Odilon came out to much praise, Kater Cheek‘s weekly webcomic brought chicken-related laughs, S. Terrell French‘s Operation Redwood continued to win awards, Sara Raasch got a tattoo and finished college, Susan Steward went to the Kennedy Space Center as part of NASA’s TweetUp program, Daniel Blau Rogge moved back to NYC, and Amy Spalding rocked the improv stage at LA’s Upright Citizens Brigade Theatre.

And what can we look forward to? LOTS!!

January brings the release of XVI by Julia Karr, Small Persons with Wings by Ellen Booraem, and the US release of Pink by Lili Wilkinson. Looking beyond that, Spring sees the long-awaited release of The Last Little Blue Envelope by Maureen Johnson, the sequel to 13 Little Blue Envelopes, and Miss Peregrine’s Home for Peculiar Children by Ransom Riggs, while Summer brings us Carrie Harris‘ debut Bad Taste in Boys. Fall takes us to London for The Faerie Ring by Kiki Hamilton and The Name of the Star by Maureen Johnson, the first in her new series, and gives us Lola and the Boy Next Door by Stephanie Perkins, Faking Faith by Josie Bloss, and The Dead Gentleman by Matthew Cody.

Plus, my own long-expected debut of BabyUn.

I can’t wait to have even more things to celebrate! In the meantime, I hope you all have a very happy, healthy, and book-filled holiday season. I’ll check in here occasionally with more news as I have it to share. Merry merry!!!

Trish Doller’s THE NEW NORMAL, about a young Marine home from Afghanistan, dealing with PTSD and trying to find his place in a life that no longer fits, to Michelle Nagler at Bloomsbury, at auction, in a nice deal, by Kate Schafer Testerman at kt literary (World English).

Some of you may recall Trish’s guest blog from my earlier vacation this year where she talked about having that first deal for your debut novel get cancelled, and the pressure that can place on an author for the next book. Well, I will admit now that I, too, felt a little of that pressure, which is why it was so gratifying, as an agent and as a huge fan of Trish’s, to not only have strong interest in THE NEW NORMAL from several editors, but ultimately, to close the deal after an auction.

This is when being an agent feels AMAZING.

I can’t wait until the whole world meets Travis, the incredible hero of THE NEW NORMAL. You’re going to fall in love.

But there’s got to be some good news we can share, right? (Besides the arrival of my new boots from Duo, which I ordered in London, pictured above.)

Well, I’ve been pitching new novels by Amy Spalding and Trish Doller, both of which I love to pieces. And I’m always optimistic about being able to share more good news about those in due course!

I’m also only a day away from meeting Carlos Rosas, one of the two founders of Nia, and continuing my study of that with training towards my Green Belt.

What about you? What good news do you have to share with the world? Let the comment section ring!

In additional to just the normal stuff of getting caught up after a week away, I’m also prepping for my trip to the Bologna Book Fair later this month, where I’ll be meeting with dozens of foreign editors and talking about my authors and my books. Things are going to be busy busy busy around here for the next few weeks! I’m thinking of another round of guest posts while I’m in Italy — what do you think? Do you want to hear more from my authors (and maybe a few additional guest bloggers) or do you want me to just set up some scheduled posts of my own? Let me know in the comments!

And speaking of European trips, have you seen the gorgeous cover to Stephanie Perkins’ debut novel Anna and the French Kiss? Love!

Except, it doesn’t always work like that.

Sometimes that first book never finds a publisher. Sometimes the project dies along the route to publication, and you and your agent have to go back to square one–which is what happened with my first book. My deal died in the pipeline and we had to go back out on submission, which hasn’t proved as successful as the first time around.

So what do I do now? Well, I write another book. Only this time it’s not so easy.

With book one, I had no clue about “the market” and whether or not my book would fit. I just wrote the story that was buzzing around my brain and it turned out to be a pretty good one. But now–having had a brief taste of what it’s like–I’m keenly aware that my next book should be something editors will want. Oh, I still believe I have to write a story that calls to my heart, but I have lots of ideas. The trick now is to find the one that can keep its head above water in a market swamped with zombies, angels, demons, werewolves, and vampires. Yeah. No pressure there.

It also seems like I’ve got a lot of other people in my head while working on book two that I didn’t have with book one. Writing partners who are so much better than I am. An agent who is certainly going to dump me if I don’t finish this project immediately. And that imaginary editor who will reject the entire book if I make the main character’s dad a cheater instead of a chronic gambler. Instead of being motivating, it can be sometimes paralyzing.

And finally, when I first sold my book, I joined a group called The Tenners, whose books are scheduled for publication in 2010. Now I’m watching their books hit the shelves and while I’m happy for them–no, I really am!–their successes make my disappointment that much stronger. Sometimes it’s enough to make me want to throw in the towel.

I’m not telling you all this because I’m looking for a pity party–although I’d take a cupcake if you’ve got one. I’m just here to serve as a real life reminder that publishing is full of pitfalls.

So what do I do now?

I pick myself up, dust myself off, log off the Internet, and write.

Trish Doller is hard at work on her next novel, and is a fantastic cheerleader for her fellow Tenners. Learn more about her and other kt literary clients here.