Why have I always looked down on e-publishing? Well, I was taught, by professional writers and editors alike, that self-publishing is for people who, to be blunt, suck too much to make it in the big leagues. If I valued my work, I would sell it. If I couldn’t sell it, that’s because it wasn’t good enough to sell, and I wouldn’t want anyone seeing it anyway. Now, I know that was true 10 years ago, and it’s still at least partially true today. But times are changing in the publishing industry, and just because I might not like the change, doesn’t mean that the change is going to stop happening. Time only moves forward. I mean, there are lots of people out there who strongly believe life was better in the 1950s, but the good old days of the 1950s are not ever coming back, and they know that, and it makes most of them a little bitter.

When I was a boy we didn't have your top-laps and your i-whatsits. Why, we wrote on rotten barrels with tobacco juice for ink, and we liked it!

And for us writers, there really is no such thing as the good old days, because there’s never been any money in writing. So should I be bitter about losing something I never had?

So, why is it us-vs-them? Why is it paper-vs-epub? Why can’t I do both? Why do I have to choose? Who is telling me not to self-publish? Professional writers and editors, that’s who. The people I would be competing with for readership. That’s who tells me not to self-publish. Hmm.

Say I did decide to self-publish a story on Amazon or Smashwords or whatever? What is the worst thing that could happen? I not sell any copies? I try to sell my novel later and the Agent says, “Well, I’d love to take you on, but I see you e-published a novella on Amazon last year, and that is just too unprofessional for us here at Big League Ltd. Sorry kid, I just can’t take you seriously. You dun goofed.”

Hussy.

But that’s the boogie man, isn’t it? That’s the threat. You self pub, and no one in the publishing industry will touch any of your other projects with a 20-foot pole.

But in a world where tweeting pictures of your breakfast is the done thing, self exposure is bad?

Reallllllly?

I mean it’s not like I feel dumb for putting up free flash fiction on my website. I’m proud of every one of those stories. I don’t think they are worth any less than the stories I’ve sold professionally. If I did think they were lesser, I would never have put them up on my blog in the first place. In fact, my only regret is that I don’t have more.

These are revolutionary thoughts for me, things to be chewed over for a while before pursuing. I don’t even know how or where I’d sell my stories, as I’ve been too busy being a snob to be in the know. So I have some legwork to do, before I get all up in the e-bizness. But, I really want to know, why can’t I do both? And why shouldn’t you?

Can I just say: I feel completely ill-equipped to talk about this subject. Quite simply, I don’t know the answer.

I once heard Kevin McIlvoy speak on revisions, and he talked about revising a story 48 times and having it published and then revising it some more even after it was published because for him it wasn’t done yet. And, man, do I get that. I can stay in revisions forever, finding a better word, a better sentence structure, something more authentic or punchier or compelling.

But then…

I recently heard James A. Owen address revisions. His advice was to stop revising when you’re just making changes to make changes. In his words, endless revisions is like riding twenty miles on an exercise bike and getting nowhere. And I totally get that, too. Sometimes endless revisions is a way of hiding. It’s not done yet, so I don’t have to show it to anyone and face possible rejection.

If only there was some kind of recipe or formula. Maybe something like:

X words × Y drafts ÷ Z minutes = Done

(I never was that good at math.)

Does it depend on the project? In my experience, there are stories that race out of my brain almost complete. They require little revision. And there are stories that feel like pulling deep-rooted teeth and require many drafts before they’re even coherent. Both kinds of stories get rejected. Both get published. Revision seems to have little to do with it.

Is it done when there’s nothing left to change? I recently read a well-published novel that had several glaring copyediting errors. Was it not done yet?

So, because I have more questions than answers, and because this is something I wonder about and wrestle with, I’d like to hear from you.

When is it done?

It used to be that you could give a new writer advice on the publishing industry and be pretty certain that what you were telling them was the truth to the best of your knowledge. There were ‘sure’ paths to take (ie write the best book you can, get it critiqued, start the next book, then submit to an agent and keep your fingers crossed). These days not so much.

Unless you’ve been living in a cave, you’ve probably noticed the explosion or implosion happening in the publishing industry. Even those of us who’ve been in the rodeo for a while, don’t exactly know how to ride this particular critter. There are clauses popping up in contracts that would curl anyone’s hair. So what’s a writer to do?

I’ve been giving this particular question a LOT of thought. See I started out selling books to an online e-publisher, then moved to NewYork publishing via several contest wins. I’ve had three separate agents–one of which left the business–and I have the scars to prove it. The scent of desperation coming out of New York right now is absolutely cloying. I find myself in a position that I hadn’t anticipated. (I’m sure a lot of writers do.) I have a release, Blood Lite 2 coming out in September 2011 (shameless plug), but I’m officially out of contract. What does that mean? I haven’t sold a new book yet.

Being out of contract is not unusual in publishing. In fact, it happens to most writers at some point in their careers. What’s different now is that for the first time I’m not sure exactly what to do. Due to the current publishing climate, I’m not in a particular hurry to jump back into the fray. This does not mean that I’ve stopped writing. On the contrary, I seem to be in squirrel mode. By that I mean I’m writing and stockpiling manuscripts. I have one novella, one contemporary, and a fantasy YA finished. I’ve also just started work on an urban fantasy romance. Hope to have a rough draft done in August. I plan to follow that book up with a straight urban fantasy. Once I’m done, I think I’ll be in a good position to test the waters again…if I want to.

These days authors have a choice when it comes to publishing and the line in the sand continues to grow. There are some authors who believe that N.Y. publishing is antiquated and should be done away with. Most of these authors come from a self-publishing/indie background. There’s nothing wrong with indie publishing. I’ve been slowly putting my backlist up with a few original pieces tossed in for giggles. The other side of the fence is lined with authors from a traditionally published background. They’ve written their books, got an agent, and sold their work to N.Y.  Both sides have strong opinions about the right way to publish. (HINT: There isn’t one.)

The thing is I think in order to survive in today’s publishing climate an author must figure out how to do both. Right now there’s a lot of enthusiasm coming from indie authors, especially the ones making decent money. For every one of those authors, there are thousands of othersmaking very little–much like in the traditional publishing model. As excited as I am about the indie opportunities, I know just like when the first wave of ebooks hit in 2000/2001, it will not last. That’s why these days it’s more important than ever to diversify. I cannot stress this last point enough. Every writer has to think about the long game. Short-sidedness is inexcusable, especially with all the free information floating out there.

Indie publishing has been touted as a short cut to publishing. Although most aspiring writers won’t want to hear this, indie publishing is not a short cut. You still have to spend hours and hours working on your craft.  By the way, this never ends. You still have to write hundreds of thousands of words. You still have to know how to tell a good story. You still have to have your work critiqued by someone other than your mom. (Unless your mom is like my mom and will tell you exactly what’s wrong with your book.) Just because you can publish a book in a matter of hours these days, doesn’t mean that you should. Indie publishing is always an option, but it should never be your ONLY option.

Jordan Summers has eighteen published books to her credit. She is a member of the Horror Writer’s Association, Science Fiction and Fantasy Writers of America, Novelist Inc., Romance Writers of America, and the Published Author’s Network. Her next release, BLOOD LITE 2 comes out Sept. 2011. You can reach Jordan through her website: www.jordansummers.com.

Urban fantasy is a vast, undiscovered country that’s still in its early growth period as a genre. If you’re looking for a place to break into the market, I think nothing offers so many opportunities as urban fantasy—the “rules” are few and the editors are already looking for books that are a bit different from the early tropes that have been established.

I spent seventeen years trying to get published in various genres before I discovered urban fantasy at the bookstore. The basic premise was a revelation to me: pick a critter from mythology or folklore, drop it into a contemporary setting amongst clueless humans, and hang on for the ride. When one considers the breadth of human belief and the staggering number of places those old gods and creatures can get into trouble in the modern world, the possibilities are endless—but if you look at the shelves, you’ll see that only a fraction of the territory has been explored so far. Most everything is happening in New York, Chicago, or Los Angeles, and most of it concerns vampires, werewolves, demons, or faeries. To contribute something new, therefore, all you have to do is browse and see where there’s some negative narrative space on the shelf—a wee little niche that you can fill, that you want to fill—and then write it. I know it’s easier said than done, but honestly, it worked for me. I got a three-book deal by starting with this very basic market analysis.

One thing I noticed immediately in my review of the genre was that there were relatively few males writing about male protagonists. That would set me apart right away. Once I had that thought, my own fondness for Celtic traditions suggested a Druid in the modern world might be a good time. My quick scan of the shelves revealed that there were exactly zero urban fantasies featuring a Druid hero. I have since learned that there was a series at that time featuring a Druid in Boston who’d lost his powers, but I went to writing The Iron Druid Chronicles thinking I’d have no competition (instead of little competition) and my book would therefore stand out a bit from the rest of the slush pile. I had a blast writing it; compared to the baggage that vampires and werewolves drag around with them, Druids are practically blank canvases.

By the time I finished Hounded, the first book in The Iron Druid Chronicles, I’d been trying to get published for nineteen years. When it landed me an agent inside of two months, I began to hope that maybe I’d finally written something ready for the market. It turned out to be precisely the sort of thing publishers were looking for: once my agent submitted it, Hounded sold in just two weeks in a four-way auction. It can happen for you too.

There are still plenty of niches in urban fantasy that need filling. To my knowledge, there are no gay or lesbian main characters; there’s a profound lack of gnomish heroes trying to make a difference in a world dominated by human giants; there are no manticores struggling for acceptance in a world full of prejudice, and so on. Go see for yourself; the ideas are out there, waiting for you in the bookstore, between the books that are already on the shelves, screaming in all the voices of the world’s mythology that they deserve some attention.

And whatever you do, whatever you’re writing, keep at it and don’t give up.

Kevin Hearne is a native of Arizona and really appreciates whoever invented air-conditioning. He graduated from Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff and now teaches high school English. When he’s not grading essays or writing novels, he tends to his basil plants and paints landscapes with his daughter. He has been known to obsess over fonts, frolic unreservedly with dogs, and stop whatever he’s doing in the rare event of rain to commune with the precipitation. He enjoys hiking, the guilty pleasure of comic books, and living with his wife and daughter in a wee, snug cottage.

PLC: First of all, congratulations on Possession! What do you hope readers will take away from this book?

EJ: I hope readers are glad they spent the time to read it. That the hours were worth it. If that’s the case, then I’ll be happy.

PLC: For those who don’t read your blog, will you share a bit about your journey getting this book published?

EJ: Oh, man, I don’t think we have enough time for that. And I don’t really blog about the behind-the-scenes of how I queried and stuff. Also, people aren’t reading my blog??? I’m shocked.

Anyway, I wrote POSSESSION in April of 2008—which was before The Hunger Games was published and before I even knew what Publishers Marketplace was. I’d been a writer for about 3 months, and POSSESSION was my third novel.

I wrote it and put it away, and sort of worked on it off and on for the next 8 months. During that time, I was querying my first novel, which failed epically. In December, I was looking for the next book I would try to query, and I chose POSSESSION. So I revised hardcore for about 4-5 months and started querying.

8 months later, I’d done two agent-requested revisions, sent 189 queries, and been rejected a billion times. Then I got an offer of representation. I did a few more revisions and the book sold fairly quickly after that. That was February of 2010.

Now it’s June 2011, and my book baby is about to be born!

PLC: What has surprised you the most in the process of getting Possession published?

EJ: Actually seeing the book. I know that sounds lame, and I know it’s a book, but to actually see it? That was holy blow-my-mind weird. Surprising. Like, “Hey, it IS a real book!! Wow.”

PLC: You’ve written a book for aspiring authors entitled From the Query to the Call. Will you tell us a bit about this book and how our readers can get a copy?

EJ: This book stemmed from my time writing for the QueryTracker blog. I’d spent a great deal of time studying and perfecting the query writing process, and I’d been blogging about it on QT. And I like writing query letters, which is a bit on the psychotic end of the spectrum.

I’d queried my brains out, had many experiences, and decided to put it all together in a guide for aspiring authors to use and learn from. So I did. The eBook is free on my website: www.elanajohnson.com

PLC: We are continually amazed by all the things you’re involved in (writing, WriteOnCon, Query Tracker, League of Extraordinary Writers, family life, social media, etc.). What’s your secret for getting so much accomplished and doing it all so awesomely?

EJ: I find what I can give up, and I give it up. Usually it’s sleep. I try hard not to give up the time with my family, friends, and co-workers. Something has to give, so yeah. I’m tired most of the time. Or at least my clone is…

PLC: What’s once piece of advice you have for aspiring authors?

EJ: I’ve given so much advice, and I hate to repeat myself, so I’ll see if I can come up with something else…

Listen to your gut. If it says you’re not ready, you’re not ready. Get back into the MS and revise some more. If it says you’re ready, chug the Pepto Bismol and get submitting. I really think the gut knows.

PLC: As fellow fans of bacon, we’d love to know your favorite concoction. What in the bacon realm really brings you to your knees?

EJ: Okay, so you know I’m not hoarking back at every meal, right? I mean, I want to, but yeah. Doesn’t happen. For me, there’s no better pairing than bacon and hamburgers. A good thick slice of bacon on a hamburger… Yum.

Thank you, Elana!

When Amy asked me to guest at PLC, the first thing I did was go to the site and read how the group started.  What I found was an earnest story about a few people standing in an empty parking lot, pouring their hearts out to each other about their hopes and aspirations.  These were people that desperately wanted to write.

She also let me know that the majority of PLC’s readers are aspiring authors.

It’s a bit daunting then to try and compose a blog post that’s inspiring to writers but I felt I should try because I thought I understood these folks, at least partly, since I too had come from this stock.  When I was in my twenties I wanted to see a book in a store with my name on it so badly that I couldn’t even explain the desire to my friends or family without sounding crazy.  I lived in a small town.  My writing group consisted of one.

I think it’s because of these solitary roots that I love Cyril Connolly’s assertion that it is, “Better to write for yourself and have no public, than to write for the public and have no self.”  Sounds brave, doesn’t it?  There’s a bit of spit in there, projected at the face of the world (if you take it the wrong way). But I believe the spirit of the thing resides in a fundamental commitment to honesty which I believe (unless you are a profoundly good liar) fuels all good writing.  In other words, “writing for yourself” is writing honest.

And so?  That means it’s ok to have no public?  To have no book on a shelf?  Yes, I realize that the essential counsel is drown out by the longings of an unpublished writer.

Nevertheless: having a book on a shelf at B&N is not so different from *not* having a book on a shelf at B&N (even though, yes, you can want that and, yes, you should keep trying).

I’m not a new writer.  The only thing new for me is having published my first novel and attained the life-long aspiration of seeing it at the book store.

When this sort of thing happens to people, I’m sure there are those out there who believe that they have finally “arrived.”  After all, the hard cover first edition is like the birthing of your masterpiece into the universe, isn’t it?  Some may think they’ve transformed or transcended to some celebrity status and that they are now truly and unequivocally “professional grade”.

I’m not going to pound those people but…

You see, it’s all quite a bit less rapturous.  I think of it more as a wedding rather than being drawn into the media’s heavenly rays of light.  I mean, it is a big event full of euphoria and celebration, but it’s also tinged with worry.

You’re thinking, “Well, here I am.  Found a partner who’d have me.  I wonder where it goes now.  Like another story: I wonder how this will turn out.”

The publisher is your partner.  They’re quite nice to you because, of course, they believe in you: else they wouldn’t have bought your stuff(s) see?

But you do tend to have some anxiety over reviews, sales, etcetera.

“Yeah, but those are good problems to have!” you yell at me.

Sure.  You’re correct.  But I’m just saying it’s not magical bliss.

Once the novelty of the thing has worn off, the bliss still comes from writing, from assembling words and sentences and so on.  That’s your joy.  Your joy is not in a spot light somewhere or even in the best review of the year.  Good and bad reviews both affect you only momentarily.  The only thing that is permanent is the craft itself and what it does to you while you are doing it.

On the shelf, your book is looking back at you with all of its polished stiff-spined sheen, a thing to be consumed.  It is an object fit for consumption, just as easily mass-produced as it is returned and mulched.  It is a brand, fit for derision and adoration and everything in between.  And now, congratulations, so are you.

But it is not (unless you earn your bread from writing) the thing that matters.  Thank God I don’t earn my living from it.  If I did, I’m afraid it would thoroughly suck the joy from it.  Because what I want is to savor words and mess about with ideas and construct wild realities.  I don’t want to try and guess what I think will sell and then write that thing.  Sorry Tor, it’s the truth.

In that regard, there is no telling how long I will be “in print” as it were.

Yet, the fact remains: I have written.  Like you, I have slaved over that sentence, that paragraph.  I have literally sweated it out, agonizing over the words, knowing that no matter which ones I choose, they will be wrong for some readers.  That’s when you have to stop caring and start writing.  I did and so have you.

And that’s what it means to write for yourself.  I don’t look at my book on the shelf and see it like other people see it.  For me, it is not a consumable. For me it is the proof of my struggle to create something and learn something and tell something that for me was true.  It is like a monument now, a stone graven with some obscure message I have left along the road.

Passersby may pause at it, marvel, or try to hurl it into the weeds.  But for me, its heft goes through my palm along my arm and into my soul.  For me it represents things that I do not expect it to represent to anyone else.

Getting published will bring you a set of fans and critics.  Admittedly, this is fun: to be loved and hated.  There’s something cosmically *right* about it.  You get your emails and your reviews and you experience a margin of fame.  You realize that for better or worse, the world at large has to some degree noticed you and responded.  But this is nothing to do with writing.

The thing you keep is the battle fought in the pages, before they were polished (published or not), before you called it “done.”  You are a writer if you write because you must.  This is the truth.  When your truth is solid enough that other people feel it in your words, then you will certainly be published.

Until then, you carry on.

Anthony Huso is a video game designer, “self-described nerd” and the author of The Last Page, published by Tor Books.

http://anthonyhuso.com

When I’m working on a new picture book, I remind myself that if people don’t care about my main character, they won’t care about my story.

I always keep A.R.F. in mind.

A stands for active. I want my main character to be doing something. No one wants to read about a kid who just sits on the couch all day.

R stands for relatable. I would never write a story about a little old lady who does yoga in the morning, works in her garden in the afternoon, and knits sweaters at night. Why? Little old ladies are not relatable to my young readers. I want my readers to have a connection with my main character. I want my readers to think, “Yeah, I know what that feels like.”

F stands for flawed. My main character is not allowed to be perfect. Perfect is boring. A flawed character is much more interesting. A bonus? Those flaws often increase the tension.

In my latest book, Mr. Duck Means Business (Simon & Schuster, 2011), Mr. Duck enjoys a life of quiet solitude and keeps a tight schedule for himself.

He’s active. Each morning he stretches, fluffs his feathers, and glides across his perfectly still pond.

He’s relatable. Mr. Duck enjoys the sameness of his days. Kids can easily understand what it is like to not want to embrace change.

He’s flawed. Mr. Duck flips out when the other barnyard animals mistakenly think they’ve been invited to his pond for a swim.

In the end, however, my active, relatable, flawed Mr. Duck makes a big discovery:  sometimes life calls for a little commotion.

Tammi Sauer has sold nine picture books to a number of major publishing houses:  Bloomsbury, Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, Simon & Schuster, and Sterling. One of her latest books, Chicken Dance, received the 2010 Oklahoma Book Award and the 2009 NAPPA Gold Medal Award. It was named a 2009 ABC Best Books for Children and a 2010 Chicago Public Library’s Best of the Best book. This book was also recently released in French which makes her feel extra fancy.

Visit Tammi online at www.tammisauer.com.

My path to publication was a long and winding one: seven and a half years to get to the first publishing deal.  And in that time, I racked up so many rejections, I sometimes felt as though I could probably keep my house warm all winter just by burning form letters.  When all you hear is “no,” you begin to think there’s a trick to it.  There’s got to be.  As a writer seeking that first deal, I’d joke about what I thought it would take to snag an agent or editor: blank checks with my submission?  Maybe attention-grabbing glitter?  Maybe hand-delivering the manuscript dressed up in some unforgettable favorite-literary-character-of-all-time costume?

In truth, there IS a trick to landing an agent or editor.  And I used the same trick to snag my first publishing deal—and the second—and to land my agent.

And that super-highly-classified secret, which I’m about to divulge for the very first time?

It’s…

It’s…

A query letter.

That’s it.  That’s what got me in the door at a publishing house, where I sold two novels myself—and at a literary agency, where my agent sold my third novel, my first middle grade, which will release in ’12.  A query.

Your shoulders just fell a little, didn’t they?  “A query?” you’re saying.  “But I’ve been writing queries all along. That’s no secret.”

But, in a way, it is.

So many writers spend so much time working on their manuscript, I think that they can often neglect to really hone the query.

Write the query, put it aside, and write it again.  If you belong to a writer’s group, the group needs to give you feed back on your query—not just your manuscript.

…So much exists in writing guides and online regarding queries, I’d encourage you to read and digest it all.  Every writer’s guide and agent’s blog has its own slice of advice.  Try several different techniques to figure out which angle works best for your own specific project.

Trust me: stop looking for crazy tricks.  The deal is the query.  Work on the query.  I guarantee it’ll sell your work.

Holly Schindler is the author of two YA novels: A BLUE SO DARK (2010) and a romance titled PLAYING HURT (2011). Her debut middle grade is forthcoming from Dial. She has a YouTube channel where she posts writing advice and tips.

PLAYING HURT (available March 8, 2011):

“I have an idea for a story,” she said. “I’ve even written some of it.”

“Why don’t you finish it?”

“Yeah, I should. I will. Someday.”

Someday.

On Monday, a fellow writer and friend of mine passed away after a very brief battle with cancer. Her death was sudden. Shocking. My first thought on hearing the news was, “How is this possible?” My second thought was, “She never finished her novels.”

To my knowledge, she’d written three, but never completed them. I don’t know why, but I suspect it had something to do with Someday.

Not long ago, Laurie Young wrote a guest post here at the PLC called Writing Scared. Please read it. Laurie put a lot of wisdom into that post, wisdom that has hit home for me this week.

Yeah. Writing scares me. Well, not so much the writing part as the sending-out-for-others-to-read part.

But dammit, I don’t want to leave this earth not having tried.

I’ll resist the temptation to post the “carpe diem” clip from Dead Poets Society. But can you stomach a few quotes?

How do these strike you?

To always be intending to live a new life, but never find time to set about it – this is as if a man should put off eating and drinking from one day to another till he be starved and destroyed.  ~Walter Scott

Waiting for the fish to bite or waiting for wind to fly a kite.  Or waiting around for Friday night or waiting perhaps for their Uncle Jake or a pot to boil or a better break or a string of pearls or a pair of pants or a wig with curls or another chance.  Everyone is just waiting.  ~Dr. Seuss

As you grow older, you’ll find the only things you regret are the things you didn’t do.  ~Zachary Scott

For a long time it had seemed to me that life was about to begin – real life.  But there was always some obstacle in the way.  Something to be got through first, some unfinished business, time still to be served, a debt to be paid.  Then life would begin.  At last it dawned on me that these obstacles were my life.  ~Fr. Alfred D’Souza

You will never find time for anything.  If you want time you must make it.  ~Charles Buxton

Many people die with their music still in them.  Why is this so?  Too often it is because they are always getting ready to live.  Before they know it, time runs out.  ~Oliver Wendell Holmes

Fear not that life shall come to an end, but rather fear that it shall never have a beginning.  ~John Henry Cardinal Newman

And this one for my friend Derek:

Life is what happens to you while you’re busy making other plans. ~ John Lennon

At the end of my philosophical gnawing, all I’m left with is a question. A simple question that breaks the legs out from under all of my excuses. It’s a question I pose to you here in all seriousness.

What are you waiting for?

The road to publication is long and without road signs.  There’s no one to hand you a map or rules to the road.  So when every would-be author hits the road with his or her finished manuscript, they are vulnerable to predators.  The scent given off by a new author is very powerful.  The wolves and bandits will smell you coming a mile off.  I think first time authors must smell like cut bait.

For most authors, finding a publisher is a Tolkienian adventure.  My personal quest to find a publisher took two years and cost me hundreds of dollars.  But in hindsight, a number of my run-ins with the wolves and bandits were of my own creation.  To my credit, I dodged the perils that line the road to publication without serious injury, but they could have been avoided all together, if I’d been a little smarter.

Gone are the days when fiction authors could sub their novel directly to the New York publishing houses and be given a chance.  Every author needs an agent to be their guide to publication.  But, how does the naive author know what a reputable agent looks like?  This is where I wasted a lot of time and money.  I scoured the various Writers’ Digests of Literary Agents because that’s the right thing to do.  Unfortunately, these digests are like yellow pages.  They list the good, the bad and the ugly.  I sent blanket queries and synopses to over a hundred agents without a clue of who I was introducing myself too.  Not surprisingly, I introduced myself to some of the carpetbaggers along the way.

I had agents who said they loved my work and praised the great book I’d written when I’d only sent them a one-page query letter.  One agent threatened to trash my name in the industry when I quizzed her on her standard operating practices, then she sent my manuscript back in pieces.  Luckily, I never broke the golden rule of dealing with agents—DON’T PAY AN AGENT ANY MONEY UPFRONT.  Regardless of their reasons, reputable agents don’t ask for money before they market your book.  I know it’s tempting to accept an agent’s offer, but the newbie author has to know when to say no.  So when an agent asks for $700 for printing and postage expenses or $200 to read a manuscript before they’ve done a thing, don’t haggle or negotiate, say no thanks and move on.

Although it seems to be a growing trend for reputable agents to charge expenses for postage, I’ve known authors to have paid less than a hundred dollars.  But the agents bill after the fact, not before.  If any agent says they are charging expenses, ask what they are for and get an estimate before you a sign contract.

So, if I was setting out on the road to publication again and was hunting for an agent, what would I do differently?  First off, I wouldn’t bother with the market guides.  An unsuspecting author doesn’t know what they are letting themselves in for.  If you want to find an agent, start with their trade association.  The Association of Authors’ Representatives, Inc. (AAR) lists their members, a code of conduct that all their members must abide by and a great list of questions to any and all agents who offer representation.  There are some great agents out there who aren’t AAR members, but finding them is hard, so the AAR is a good place to start.  Another good resource is writers’ associations.  If you are a mystery writer, consider joining the Mystery Writers of America.  If you are a horror writer, consider joining the Horror Writers Association.  These places have a member’s directory where the authors list their agents.  The first time author should write to these agents.  The agents listed represent someone with a reputation in the same genre and someone who has made a legitimate book deal.

After doing things like this—the right things—the first time author still may not find an agent.  I didn’t.  This means you probably aren’t going to get a book contract with Harper Collins, Penguin or Time Warner, but it doesn’t mean all publishers are off limits.  There are a number of small and medium-sized publishers who will deal with unknown writers.  You need to do their homework.  Scour bookstores and jot down the names of publishers.  Seek out their websites and check out their guidelines.  If a publisher says they will take unagented submissions, then submit.  You have nothing to lose…

…or do you?

There are bad publishers out there, just like there are bad agents.  The same law about agents applies to publishers—DON’T PAY A PUBLISHER ANY MONEY UPFRONT. Publishers pay authors, not the other way around.  Again, if you are asked for money, walk away.  If you see an author mention their publisher and you’ve never heard of them, check them out.  See if the publisher’s claims live up.  If a publisher says their books are available on Amazon, use the search facility on Amazon.  Punch in the publisher’s name and see how many of their titles pop up.  If you don’t find any or it says to allow six weeks for delivery, there may be problems with distribution.  And if so, your book might make it to print, but not much further.  Authors shouldn’t be afraid to ask for changes to a publisher’s contract.  If certain rights are asked for and you aren’t happy, negotiate them out.  Again, the likes of the HWA and MWA do have typical sample contracts that authors without agents can use for reference.

The road to publication is fraught with danger.  But it doesn’t mean the first time author has to be mugged and left for dead.  First timers need to stop sticking pins in the pages of digests and hoping for the best.  To put things into a plumbilogical terms, when hiring a plumber to fix a broken pipe most people don’t go for the first name they see.  Usually, they ask for a referral and check that the plumber is licensed.  The search for an agent and/or publisher should be the same.  You need to know the industry and ask around, choosing from trusted sources.

Following my tips won’t guarantee you publishing success, but they should help prevent you from walking into some of the horrors that lurk on the road to publication.

Good luck, people.

Simon Wood

[email protected]
www.simonwood.net

Simon Wood is an ex-racecar driver, a licensed pilot and an occasional private investigator. Simon has had over 150 stories and articles published. His short fiction has appeared in a variety of magazines and anthologies, and has garnered him an Anthony Award and a CWA Dagger Award nomination, as well as several readers’ choice awards. He’s a frequent contributor to Writer’s Digest. He’s the author of WORKING STIFFS, ACCIDENTS WAITING TO HAPPEN, PAYING THE PIPER, WE ALL FALL DOWN, TERMINATED and ASKING FOR TROUBLE. As Simon Janus, he’s the author of THE SCRUBS and ROAD RASH. Curious people can learn more at www.simonwood.net.  His latest book, LOWLIFES, is a multimedia project.  People can check it out at  www.lowlifes.tv.