When I sit down at night in my favorite chair in the den with my iPad, I spend just a few minutes looking at Facebook. Then I start googling: agents interested in Southern fiction, agents interested in cozy mysteries, agents looking for new clients.

What am I going to do with Ms. Dee Ann once it’s revised as Murder in Narrow Creek?  I have spent too many hours—make that years —not to see this book in print.  I feel like Scarlett O’Hara shaking her fist at the heavens, vowing, “As God is my witness, as God is my witness, they’re not going to lick me.  I’m going to live through this and when it’s all over, I’ll never be hungry again.”

Sorry, I got a little carried away there. I’m neither hungry nor reduced to sewing a dress from the drapes, but like Scarlett, I’m up against the Yankees too.  Since the hub of American publishing is New York City, it seems most of the agents are also there.  My queries to these people have been for naught.  The polite ones at least respond “no.”  Most don’t even reply.

I know it’s hard to get published. I’ve read all the gloomy statistics during my Internet searches.  The possibility of a book by a first-time author being selected for publication by one of the big four publishers, who are all head-quartered in New York, is super-duper slim.

But I didn’t think it would be so hard to find an agent. Someone to represent me.  Someone to be my advocate.  Someone who knows how the world of publishing works and would try to sell my book for me.  It’s been a very discouraging experience.

But the more I think about it, is traditional publishing the way to go? Maybe I need to start googling “self-publishing.”

“As God is my witness, they’re not going to lick me.” My book will be published somehow!