I knew well in advance that I wanted to be a member of The Debutante Ball, and not only because it fulfilled some portion of my Southern soul that I failed to do justice to as a teenager.
I’m a nerd who loves blogging, so the project excited me as soon as I learned about it. I followed the 2017 Debs, some of whom I also knew through 17 Scribes, since, at that point in time, I thought I was going to be a late-2017 debut myself. Obviously that went slightly off-track, but in a way that was, in reflection, all to the best.
I could probably say a lot of deep and thoughtful things about how the process of blogging my debut year has helped me process and given me perspective, but really? What I will take away from this year is a set of friendships forged in fire.
Seriously. I love these ladies. Lara, Kimmery, Julie, and Kaitlyn are all incredible, and I’m honored to have stood beside them this year. We’ve already determined that our Slack channel is going to stay open and available to us after we hand over the baton in August, because we have reached a point where we need each other. The Debs are my go-to support system, because we have all been in this trench together. I’m in some other close-knit writing groups, but even those are too large and open for the intimate travails of publishing life that we share with each other. It’s like our very own little Hogwarts dormitory, and it’s like Vegas at the same time — what we say there, stays there.
So what I got out of this year? Four amazing friends.
Are you a female or non-binary author with a release coming out between September 2018 and August 2019? Apply to join the Class of 2019!
