Young Writers Society

Here's what troubles me. As many of you may know (or have figured out) already, English is not my first language, yet I write my novels in it nonetheless, and would very much like to publish those novels eventually.
So let's say I do finish a novel, and it's all set for contacting a publisher about. There isn't a publisher here who'd agree to publish anything in English, so my chances with doing it in my home country basically don't exist. I do, however, find some agents and publishers outside of my country (more specifically, I had found some in the UK, mostly because I thought I'd be living there by now at the time I searched for those, but hypothetically speaking it can be any country) and want to contact them.

How do I do that? Do I go via an agent, and let them deal with publishers because they understand how the whole thing works there? We don't even have the concept of agents here (or at least I've never heard of anyone using them), so that'd be completely new kind of approach for me. Or do I contact a publisher directly?
I take it I should note that I'm not from [the country the publisher's in] and also that English is not my first language, but I kind of feel like that might discourage them of even reading the excerpts/novel itself, because "English is not my first language" is often used as excuse for "this is terrible writing and we all know it, but the idea is good so eh?", and I don't want my novels to be seen like that <.< On the other hand, not mentioning it at all seems kind of like cheating, plus I think those cover letters should state where the writer is from, and it's not like I could hide it either.
Must I, before contacting an agent/publisher, be sure I have the means to get there ASAP if they invite me for some kind of interview or want to discuss something with me, or would they be understanding and we could talk about everything via e-mails or alike?
Would anyone even consider publishing a (debut) novel of some random author from some random country, who doesn't even have anything published in her own language to show off with? Or, say if I do have something published in my own language, then why would they bother with the whole thing if I can obviously publish something right here where I am..?

I'm sure I didn't ask quite everything about the subject, so feel free to chime in with all kinds of advices - or more questions, if you are facing (have faced) the same issue. I've researched a bit and found some agents who seem to not be opposed to writers from random other countries, but I'm still pretty lost about how to go about all this ._.
Thanks in advance~

Out of curiosity, which country are you from? And no, English isn't the best language on earth. Some are more efficient; some are more flowing and poetic. (I've often noticed that Japanese songs, for instance, would make better poetry in English. We can't seem to conceive of a song not rhyming, much of the time.)

Stori wrote:And no, English isn't the best language on earth.

...where did I say it was, again?

I'm from Croatia, and while I'm perfectly capable of writing in my mother tongue, I prefer English... I do still write in Croatian on occasions, but those rare gems I might once consider worth publishing are in English.
Unfortunately I'm nowhere near as fluent in any other (more poetic) language, so I wouldn't be able to create anything in them or see if any of them could qualify as the best on Earth xP

I'd contact an agent, first, and go through the publishing process that way.

International publishing is interesting in that first publishing rights are sold by country anyway (unless you get a deal where the publisher snaps up all first rights across the world at once). So, basically, you just want to sell the very first publishing rights in an English speaking country first.

Maybe something like, "I am looking to publish my first novel internationally in a market better suited for it"? That's my gut instinct, anyway.

...where did I say it was, again?

You didn't. I just wanted to stifle any suggestion that, because it's the second-most spoken language on earth, it's somehow "superior" to other tongues.

That said, it would be nice to live in a world where everyone was encouraged to learn at least two languages. We could then communicate more easily with people in other nations... but I digress. To Rosey-wan you listen.