Author Up Close: Yasmin Angoe—Just One More Thing

I met author, editor, and educator Yasmin Angoe through an organization for BIPOC editors. We’re not only colleagues; she is a constant motivator as I go about my own writing journey. Yasmin is a heads-down, work-hard, show-don’t-tell kind of person, and when this Deadline article announced her book deal and seven-figure TV option earlier this year, she showed the writing world she meant business. But headlines only tell part of the story, and I wanted to learn more about her writer’s journey. In the latest installment of my Author Up Close series, Yasmin shares her path to publishing, her wins and losses, and why she advises all aspiring authors to try just one more thing.

GW: Thank you for agreeing to this Q&A. The first thing I like to ask authors is about their author origin story. It’s kind of like a superhero origin story but with a pen. What’s yours?

YA: My journey was one with quite a few detours and bumps along the way. I’m sure you hear this all the time. But for me, it was a long time coming, and there was a point at which I thought I was going to quit because I was so disappointed and feeling really low about my writing. I’ve been writing for over twenty years. I’ve had two agents (dating all the way back to 2003- yeah that dates me) and I’m on my third manuscript. It’s this third one, Her Name is Knight, that I began hardcore in 2018 because I felt I was finally ready to write again. I’d been tinkering with the idea for several years prior to that but was focused on trying to get my women’s fiction book agented and then subbed to publishers.

I’d lost my dad a few years before I started this last manuscript, had a huge life change, and needed a place to channel my feelings. I also wanted a story that would not only help me work through my grief but would encapsulate my love for my culture while discussing some hard topics.

I wrote during my off time, breaks, after the kids were in bed and the house was relatively okay. Any free time I could get in, I wrote this book. It came out pretty easy and super fast because it was basically all told in my head, it just needed writing.

GW: What was the query process like for you? What lessons did you learn throughout that process?

YA: The query process was long, arduous, and heart-breaking at times. I’ve been through three processes. One old school back in 2003 when I landed my first agent. Back then you had to send partials or wholes of the manuscript snail mail to agents. My second go-around, the process was all electronic and I had over a hundred rejections before getting my second agent. It was super hard. When I parted ways with her in 2019 I knew I wanted to query this current book in 2020, and it took me about 7 months and about half the queried agents on my list this last go around.

The thing I learned was to keep going. To keep trying just one more thing…one more query, one more contest, one more whatever. It was the very thing I told myself before I submitted my sample to Sisters in Crime for the Eleanor Taylor Bland Award for Emerging Writers of Color. I was about to give up this dream of becoming a published author. I applied not thinking I’d get it. I actually forgot about it until I got the email in late July. I thought the email was a joke and nearly tossed it in the trash file. So that one more thing paid off for me twice in that month. I got my agent, Melissa Edwards of Stonesong Literary, right before I found out I’d won the award, and then I found out I’d won. It was like a one-two punch. Then the following month, I got a book deal. A month after that, a TV option. It was kind of wild, and I still have trouble believing it happened to me.

So my lesson? “Just one more thing.”

GW: Tell us a little about your debut novel. What is it about? When will it be published? What was it about your manuscript that caught your agent’s attention—in other words, what do you think made it stand out from others?

YA: My debut novel is Her Name is Knight. It’s being published by Thomas & Mercer and comes out November 1, 2021. I’m not really sure what caught Melissa’s attention, or anyone’s for that matter. LOL. I think it was that the protagonist is one readers don’t normally see, a female Ghanaian assassin. I think it’s her dual voice—her 14-year-old self and her adult self—that is also compelling. You find out why she’s become the way she’s become. You see it through her eyes, hear it through her voice, and you live it with her.

It’s about this woman who seeks revenge on the men who ravaged her Ghanaian village, murdered her family, sold her into human trafficking, and then return into her life many years later after she thought them long dead and buried. She has survived all these horrors done to her as a child because of them. So it’s a story of a survivor who refuses to allow these people to victimize her, or anyone else, again…with this new set of skills she’s acquired, of course.

GW: What advice would you give a newbie writer who someday wants to be doing what you’re doing?

YA: I don’t want to sound silly or cliché, but I would give the same advice I gave myself, to just try one more thing. If you love doing something so much, if you know in your heart of hearts that it’s what makes you happy then you’ll always try one more thing to be successful at it. Success may not be a book deal or a movie, success might only be the happiness and calm it brings you when you’re writing it, and that’s okay. Even if I’d never gotten my agent, won the award, gotten a book deal, and tv option…even if I’d quit back in April or May of last year, I would have eventually picked the pen back up, so to speak. Because crafting stories brings me joy. And that’s success.

Many thanks to Yasmin for agreeing to do this Q&A. You can learn more about Yasmin Angoe by visiting her website, YasminAngoe.com, and following her on Twitter at @yasawriter and on Instagram at author_yas. You can preorder her debut novel, Her Name is Knight, here.

Over to you: what’s the “just one more thing” you can do today to move you forward in your writing journey?

Grace Wynter

Grace Wynter is an author, editor, and workshop facilitator. She has an MBA from Georgia State University and a Professional Certificate in Editing from the University of Chicago. She has conducted workshops for organizations such as Writer Unboxed, Wake Up and Write!, Sisters in Crime, and the Atlanta Writers Club where she is also a freelance editor for their biannual Atlanta Writers Conference. Her editing clients include traditional publishers such as Penguin Random House, Harper Collins, and Hachette, and an array of indie publishers and self-published authors. Grace is the community architect behind Tessera Creatives, an online directory that connects authors and publishers with skilled, culturally competent freelance creatives who provide services for the publishing industry.

When she’s not alternating between the Marvel and DC universes, Grace resides in Atlanta, Georgia. You can connect with her at GraceWynter.com.