I had coffee today with a neighbor of mine who just published his first book. The whole time I was meeting with him I was thinking to myself "when can I call myself an 'author'?". He cracked the top 10 of the Washington Post's non-fiction best seller list. It was interesting to hear about his experience. When he asked about where we were and when we started, I felt a little embarrassed about our big delay over the previous couple of months. I told him we started at the New Year, secured an agent who wanted to represent us, and have our proposal up to about 40 pages. His reply - "Wow, that is really fast." That was a surprise. It was a nice reminder about how picking the right partner so early was a very smart move.