The Book Is About Persistence. So Was This.

Yesterday, after four months of querying, I received an offer of representation for The Mess That Made Them, a narrative nonfiction book about artists, outliers, and cultural figures who created something lasting not because they were chosen, but because they kept going when everything told them to stop.

I started sending queries in January. Here's what it took to get to this point:

• 208 queries

• 10 full manuscript requests

• 1 partial

• 25 proposals

• 2 phone calls

• 78 rejections

I’m sharing this not because I think these numbers are impressive, but because I remember reading other writers' posts like this when I was discouraged and wondering if it ever gets better. I needed to see that persistence was not just a theme, it was the path.

I give agents a hard time sometimes (guilty), but the truth is, two of the rejections I received earlier in the process came with notes that fundamentally changed the manuscript. They helped me turn what I now recognize was an encyclopedia draft into an actual book. The version that’s getting offers wouldn’t exist without their push, even though they passed. I owe them more than I expected.

And if I’m being honest, six months ago, I knew I could write this book, but I wasn’t sure it would be any good.

Getting an offer today, and having three other agents request time to consider offering as well, is already beyond anything I imagined. Maybe it’s silly, but I want to celebrate this moment. Not with fanfare. Just with honesty.

Because I didn’t get here by being the best writer in the room. I got here by not giving up.

Or to put it another way:

1. Wrote a nonfiction book about persistence.

2. Persisted to find an agent who believed in it.

3. Was relieved to discover the book was, in fact, nonfiction.

The numbers matter less than what they represent: every rejection was a chance to refine the project. Every full request was a vote of interest in something that once lived only in my head. Every draft brought it closer to what it needed to be.

Starting around 1990, my parents tried, repeatedly, to get me to see myself as someone who could have a career as a writer. They saw something I couldn’t. Neither of them lived to see this day. But I know without question that they would’ve been proud.

So if you’re querying, revising, hesitating, or hanging on by a thread, here’s what I can tell you: persistence isn’t just a virtue. It’s a strategy. The whole book is about that. Turns out, the process of trying to publish it is too.

Thanks for being part of it.

—Ryan