Lukas Stone 🇦🇺 🏳️‍🌈 👨‍👨‍👦

I forwarded the email to my writing coach, just to sanity check if I was being precious about it and she said it was the most unprofessional email she has seen, and that I "dodged a bullet" by avoiding representation with them. Still hurt though. That's three rejections now 😭💔

Firstly they claimed my submission was 'unsolicitoed' yet their website says they are 'open to submissions' and provides a detailed structure on how/what to submit. Then they made a nasty jibe about the title, which I clearly say is a working title.

Thank you for recording this Kevin! I feel like it was somewhat directed at my position right now 🤣 It brought a smile to my face, especially after receiving a very 'shady' email from an agent about an hour ago!

Ok, let's try and have a more fucking productive day today than yesterday...

Wow, five rejections in a single day is a lot...I'm sorry that you went through that. And thank you for the hugs 😊

Fellow writers/authors. How do you deal with rejection letters? I'm taking last week's double whammy hard. The pool of literary agents in Australia is small, even smaller when you only can target those that take NF and memoir.

#AmQuerying #WritingCommunity #BookSky #QueerWriters

Thanks Seamus, same with you! It has been great to re-connect with some of the OG journo/PR crew here on BlueSky 🙂

Haha! Give the people what they want 🤣

Apparently I can bend space-time as well! I manage 12hrs and 18mins of screen time per day...an impossibility when one has a toddler and running a business 🤣

Thank you so much! I took the time to process it yesterday afternoon and today I'm regrouping with my writing coach to talk about next steps 🤞

Thank you for your kind words 🙏 Perhaps the first rejections hurt the most...especially getting two in two hours. At least they were both about not having capacity, rather than about the content, so I'm holding on to that. I still have one agent reading the manuscript 🤞

Urgh, didn't expect to get two rejection letters in the same day. Absolutely gutted 😭

#AmQuerying #WritingCommunity #BookSky #QueerWriters

ZOMG! Another response from a literary agent asking for a copy of my manuscript 🥳 That's three who are looking at it now. Trying not to get too excited 😬

#AmQuerying #WritingCommunity #BookSky #QueerWriters

Thank you for that! I have given them a follow on all their socials! Shame they don't publish memoir though ☹️

Lukas Stone | Substack Sydney-based storyteller writing about surrogacy, same-sex parenting, breaking generational trauma, and documenting my journey to getting my first book published. Raw, real, occasionally sweary—subscr...

Sure am! I'm: substack.com/@stonestories on Substack and www.instagram.com/pictonpics/ on Instagram

Ah cool! I thought so. I'm a member and I want to do the speed pitching event for NF in June, so I'm thinking of doing some of the 'prep' events/courses before then

Was this an ASA event?

I'm not a slow reader. I'm reading like a writer. BookTok had me feeling like a reading failure. Then I realised I wasn't reading slowly; I was reading like a writer.

I turned the previous post series into a full piece on Substack. If you've ever felt behind on your reading goals, or the pressure to keep up with others on #BookTok, this one's for you!

#WritingCommunity #BookSky #QueerWriters

'Pages over pixels' - I love that 🥰 Thank you 🙏

5) Then last week at the gym I was listening to Luke Bateman's 'In the Good Books' podcast and he said something that really resonated with me: any time reading is valuable. It's not about the volume; it's about the act itself. So, I officially abandoned the pace race 📚

#BookSky

4) I also made a conscious decision at the beginning of 2025 to replace my evening doomscroll with more books after my son goes to bed. Less algorithmic garbage, more actual words. It's been genuinely good for my brain, my depression, my anxiety, just my overall wellbeing.

#BookSky

3) But the thing I really needed to teach myself was: I'm not reading slowly. I'm reading as a writer. I stop mid-paragraph. I re-read sentences just to analyse how they're constructed. I look words up. I fall down research rabbit holes. I'm not consuming a book, I'm dissecting it.

#BookSky

2) Then I did the maths. Full-time job. Four-year-old. Running a household. Trying to get to the gym, drink 3L of water a day. Add in ADHD, which means sustained focus isn't exactly something I can just switch on. The comparison was never fair to begin with.

#BookSky

1) I had to stop and give myself a bit of a reality check recently. I was scrolling #BookTok and someone had just finished book #26 of 2026. Twenty-six! And I was sitting there, three months into one book (granted it was Lonesome Dove, which is epic) feeling like I'm somehow failing at reading.

Congratulations! So well deserved!

Thank you! Now that I've said it out loud on the internet, I fear a rejection letter coming, but for a brief while I was super excited 🤣

I am trying to get my debut memoir published. I also write children's books 😊

ZOMG! ZOMG! I got a response from an agent asking for a full copy of my manuscript 🥳 Trying not to get my hopes up, but I wasn't expecting a reply for weeks!

#AmQuerying #WritingCommunity #BookSky #QueerWriters

spongebob is sitting at a table in a diner with a cup of coffee Alt: Image of Spongebob Squarepants sitting alone at a table in a diner with a cup of coffee.

Checking inbox every 26-seconds waiting for query letter responses has me like...

#AmQuerying #WritingCommunity #BookSky #QueerWriters

My summer of discontent Two dads, a 4-year-old in meltdown mode, and a holiday system that doesn't work. A raw essay on parenting through Australia's broken summer leave equation.

I restarted antidepressants this summer. Not because of my son, but to be a better dad for my son 💙 Read my essay on surviving Xmas with a dysregulated 4yo, boomer parenting advice, and a system that was never built for modern families.

#parenting #gentleparenting #mentalhealth #twodads #australia