“As I was working on the book, I went to a lot of writers’ conferences and writing classes and established relationships with other authors, and the main thing that they always talked about was, ‘Don’t let the rejections discourage you.’ When I got to the point of querying agents, I went into it like, ‘Don’t be sad if you get rejections.’ I was prepared for it. I know some people go through, like, terrible situations, but for me it wasn’t that bad at all. I got a lot of rejections, but the agents wrote back with such nice feedback. And I appreciated their honesty. A lot of them told me [that] because it was an Afro-Latino topic, they didn’t know what to do with my story. They were all very candid about that, which at the moment I was like, ‘Well, what? There’s this big push for diversity. Why wouldn’t you?’ Now, looking back, I’m thankful for it because I’m happy with my agent, who understands the need for it and was able to push for it.”