Holy Career Launcher, blog readers! This year has been fantastic, and will only get better.

I’ve had to sit on this news for a couple of days for the official announcement to go out, but I have gotten the high sign and now I am using this, my little patch of the internet, to shout to the world about my first novel sale!

Behold, the official announcement (from Publisher’s Marketplace):

Michael Underwood’s GEEKOMANCY, discovered at the Book Country website and pitched as Buffy The Vampire Slayer meets Clerks, to Adam Wilson at Pocket Star, in a two-book deal, in a nice deal, for publication in 2012, by Sara Megibow of Nelson Literary Agency (World).

This has all happened over several weeks, but it feels both shorter and longer.  Back at the end of January, Adam Wilson, of Pocket Books, sent me an email saying he’d read an excerpt of GEEKOMANCY on Book Country and saw from my blog that I had a completed draft, so could he see it?

At that point, I was reminded of Ghostbusters.  If someone asks if you’re a god, you say yes.  If an editor asks to see your manuscript, you say yes.  There may be actual reasons to say no to an editor, but I didn’t have any good ones.  I sent the manuscript along with a note that I was still in revisions and could send a more polished version later, if he preferred.  Adam said he’d read the as-is version, and in a little over a week, he wrote back and wanted to schedule a phone call.

This is my first book deal, but I’ve been in and around publishing long enough to know that if an editor wants to talk to you on the phone, it’s probably a really really good thing.  I’d had a novel go all the way to editorial meeting and get shot down, and I didn’t even get a phone call for that.

Sure enough, Adam had loved the book and wanted to buy it, as well as sequels, if I was interested.  I knew that having an offer in hand, I could then go and search for an agent and get responses on the double, and since I am a very firm believer in the benefits of having a literary agent, I asked Adam for time to do just that.  He graciously agreed, and I began what I dubbed the Lightning Round Agent Search.  I queried over a dozen agents, some recommended by my dad’s friends at Random House, some recommended by other publishing-biz friends.  I spent about two weeks sending out manuscripts and collecting rejection letters as well as talking with the agents who were interested.  The result of that search is spelled out in my last post, signing with Sara Megibow of Nelson Literary Agency.

And then…more waiting.  Sara and Adam hashed out the details, and here we are.

Finally, because I made a promise, I give you a dramatic interpretation of my emotional mindscape when the deal was sealed:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7cJg9BqH62g