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Aug 04
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Often times at our events, I get asked this same question (usually by tweens) when they find out I’m an author.
They ask, “Are you rich?”
I have to really, really try not to laugh at that question. Really. Really. Try.
Sure, it’s the kids who actually ask, but I don’t doubt that many, many people assume that we are rich. Adults just know that it’s not polite to ask someone about those things.
Still, this question is quite telling, it shows that a good portion of the public think that being an author = rich. Mansions. Movies. Chateau in France. Etc.
Another one that gets me: “You should get them to make a movie of your book.”
Hmmm. Great idea. Why didn’t I think of that?
Or: “You should go on Oprah.”
Yep. Got her on speed dial, how could that have slipped my mind?
Because when people think of authors, people think of *famous* authors like Stephen King, J. K. Rowling, Stephanie Meyer, James Patterson, etc.
Even I, just a short year ago, believed that if we could hit the much coveted New York Times Best Seller list, that we’d be doing okay.
Not.
(In case you missed my post on Publishing Realities, you can read it here, complete with NYTimes Best Selling Royalty Statement.)
Reality is most certainly a bitch.
For those of you who follow me on Facebook and/or Twitter, you know that Ethan and I now have a New York Literary Agent!
Yeah us!
Her name is Louise Fury with the L. Perkins Agency, and she’s all kinds of awesome. I’ve started working on a YA Steampunk Romance that she’ll be shopping around later this year.
Now that we have an agent, we have a better chance of being published by a NY Big Boy. That means, when she sells it, an advance and better distribution! Still, even with that coveted 6-figure advance, we’ll be far from “rich.”
Just think: say we get a $100,000 advance, $85,000 of which we get to keep (15% to Louise), it’s likely the only money we will ever see from that book because “an advance” means an advance against royalties. Big Boy Publishers offer between 5-7% in royalties. Let’s take that large end at 7% on a moderately listed YA paperback novel of $8.99. That’s $.63 a book, meaning the book would have to sell nearly 160,000 copies *just to break even* on the advance. The average books sells 500 copies. We’ve sold 5,000 copies over the last 18 months in the Rowan series, which is about what a midlist author sells, even with a NY Big Boy.
If it takes me a year to write a book, that’s 85k a year. Not bad, by any means, even for me and Ethan both.
That’s the norm in publishing.
(And even that’s changing. Read this post by 20-yr veteran author Robert J. Sawyer. He wrote FlashForward. You might have seen the TV show, which is now canceled.)
But then let’s take into account the five years it’s taken us to get there without being paid any advances. That $85k/yr has just been averaged into $17K/yr for our first sale. Hopefully thereafter, I can be writing a book a year and making about $85/k every year for a single book. Still $100K is a huge advance. Most advances are more like $10-30K.
And that doesn’t factor in that authors have to use *their own money* for publicity. The publisher doesn’t help with that unless you are Stephanie Meyer or one of those other big names.
Seriously.
And this is all best case scenario with a NY Big Boy. Being with an independent publisher, we get a higher % on book sales, but have a more limited distribution. We rarely make anything that we haven’t hand sold at an event. And over the past 18 months, we’re consistently spending more than we’re making on travel, fees, marketing, and just living.
I wouldn’t be turning down even a $30,000 advance at this point.
If you’re thinking about becoming an author so you can be rich? Think again.
You’ll spend less money, have far less stress, and have just about the same odds by playing the lottery. In fact, I’m thinking more and more about that strategy.
So… No, little girl, I’m not rich. I’m surviving.
If you like our books, please support us by buying one instead of borrowing one.
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Apr 01
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Everyone says not to do it.
But guess what?
We do it.
We all judge a book by its cover. More so than I ever thought.
As you well know, gentle readers, Ethan and I have been busting our tails for the past two years promoting our award-winning series Rowan of the Wood. People love it. Our fan base is growing. We do event after event, and things are going quite well for us! After all, we sold over 4,000 books in 2009. That’s 800% more than the average book sells in its lifetime!
Still, at every event we get these exact same questions:
“Is this a children’s book?” or “Is this a graphic novel?”
We sold as many books as we did because we were there literally selling each book. 85% of those 4,000 sales were when we were there to explain that it, although appropriate for children, is not solely a children’s book.
It’s the covers. They are beautiful works of art by Ia Enstera. We adore those covers! It’s been a pleasure looking at them every day. People comment on the beauty of the art constantly!
But the questions remain:
Does it make people want to pick up the book?
Is it reaching our target audience?
This is a difficult question, as our target audience is fantasy readers of all ages.
After doing this for the past two years, we’ve learned that our largest readership seems to be women from 15-85.
Seriously.
Kids do read the series and enjoy it. Teens read the series and enjoy it. Families read it together and men love it as well, but by far the largest percentage is women.
I think this is because of our dual protagonist: Cullen and Rowan. Cullen, a 12-yr-old orphan hero-type, pulls out their maternal instincts. Rowan, the handsome, love-sick Scotsman/Druid and his tragic story of love, speaks to their romantic side. They also identify with the antagonist Fiana and her plight.
This theory about the cover art was driven home when my long time friend and colleague O. M. Grey told me that a literary agent contacted her based solely on her cover and book premise. After reading the book, the agent loved her story and writing so much, she offered her representation!! Congratulations Olivia!
The response to her Steampunk book has been overwhelming, and it’s not even released yet! (It’s a great book, btw… I got to read it early!)
It’s been so great, that the publisher decided to do a pre-release special on the KINDLE! It’s sold more copies in 2 days than WITCH did in a month! And that’s all based on the cover and the premise! (**& it probably has at least a little to do with the popular Steampunk theme**)
It is a pretty awesome cover:
(I suggest you get it, actually. Quite a good read if you like steamy Paranormal Romance with Vampires… sprinkled with Steampunk & Mystery.)
AVALON REVISITED on KINDLE – $0.99
So… we’ve decided to do an experiment. We’ve decided to go a different direction for the third book FIRE OF THE FEY, and we might even be changing the first two covers as well.
Fantasy artist Susan Schroeder is working up some concept art for the 3rd book, but nothing is set in stone yet.
We want something that appeals to kids, teen, and adults. That’s not asking for too much… right?
Comments?
Opinions?
Thoughts?
Should we change the first two covers with the release of the third book or leave them alone?
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Oct 19
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I totally forgot.
I mean TOTALLY!
We were thinking of going last year up in Canada, but I just said we’d wait until this year when it was in San Jose.
Well, I forgot.
Our friend and fellow author, Robert Stikmanz, is going, and I though it was quite serendipitous because we will just happen to be in San Jose at that exact same time visiting Ethan’s Aunt Patricia for her 60th.
Rob says it’s where authors go to network with agents, publishers, film people, game designers, etc…. and I *really* want to option the rights to Rowan of the Wood for screen.
Since it was so magnificently serendipitous, I began changing plans in my head and drudging up memories from my Cannes Film Market days, getting ready to network and pitch and pitch and pitch.
I moseyed over to the World Fantasy Convention website to get tickets… and THEY’RE ALL SOLD OUT!
EEEEK!
Plus… $125 to attend! Yikes!
No wonder fans don’t go to these!
So now, I’m thinking about just how much research and preparation I’d have to do over the next week to make it worth my while…. and wondering if I should just plan on going next year when it will be in Columbus, OH. We will, serendipitously, be in Cleveland with my Uncle Bill, celebrating his 60th.
This time, I set up a reminder on my calendar.
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Today on the Samhain Blog Book Tour, we’re at The Neverending Shelf! There is a darkly humorous interview with the Vampire Fiana and a contest! Go enter!
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Oct 01
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Thus far in the series, I’ve covered the Four Basic Publishing choices, the NY Big Boys, and Literary Agents. Before we go on to Basic Choice #2: Independent Publisher, let’s recap with a Pro/Con list for the Big Boy publishing avenue.
PROS
- Huge publishing name behind you
- Possible marketing budget & in-house publicist
- Industry connections
- Media connections
- Prestige
- Best shot at NY Times/USA Today Best Seller List
- Likely decent-t0-good bookstore placement
- Wide distribution
- Possible hefty advance
CONS
- Landing an agent and NYBB publisher are about as likely as winning the lottery
- You get a very, very small percentage (2-7%)
- It’s still up to you to market your book, and you see less return per book
- It will take 3-5+ years to see your book in print
- They give your book 90 days to make a splash, then they go on to the next one
- The publishing industry is in a great state of flux at the moment. Things are changing, but the NYBB aren’t changing with them. They’re still working off a century-old business model
- After all the research and querying you may still not get an agent
- After getting an agent, you may still not get a publisher… now you’re 2-3 years into this process, so what’s next?
- It’s, as you can see from the above two, very risky. However, the reward can be great.
Tomorrow we’ll start in on the little guys; i.e. Independent Publishers.
< — (Last Post) Literary Agents
(Next Post) #2 Indie Publishers — >
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Sep 30
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Good morning, writers!
If you’re just joining us, it would behoove you to start at the beginning of this blog series to get the whole picture, as this blog is the 4th post in the series, but the information herein can also stand on it’s own.
So. Literary Agents. Those elusive, magical creatures that will help you and your book rocket to the NY Times Best Seller List… because without them, you have virtually no chance in getting a NY Big Boy publisher, which is your best (but certainly not your only) chance in becoming a best selling author on a grand scale.
Before you ever contact even ONE Literary Agent, there are three things you absolutely must do.
- Finish & polish your book. This means have more people than just your family members read it, like beta reading groups, writing groups, online critique, etc. (Sometimes for non-fiction, an agent will only require a book proposal, but this blog series is focused mostly on fiction writers.)
- Research. And I mean extensive research that will likely take 3-6 months of your time before you ever send your first query. More on this below.
- Write and revise and revise and revise and revise and revise your query letter based on the information you found in the aforementioned research. Then get it critiqued and revise it again.
I’m not kidding.
Literary agents get between 75 and 500 queries every. single. day. Most of them are crap queries from writers who didn’t do the above three things. These are easily deleted by these agents, but it also likely puts them in a deletey mood. I can only imagine how exhausting it is … day after day.
I participated in Nathan Bransford’s “Agent for a Day” exercise, and I got slapped with the reality of what a literary agent goes through daily… and on a very, very light day. I suggest you read this entire exercise from beginning to end.
Then I suggest you read his blog in full as part of your research. I’ll post other blogs for you to read as well in the links section below. If you really, really want that NY Big Boy, you will do all these things first. There are no shortcuts.
Don’t be a query they can easily delete. Don’t give them a reason to delete it. They don’t need a reason to delete it. They need a reason not to delete it. DO THE RESEARCH.
THE RESEARCH:
Before you ever submit to an agent, you have to get to know them. Each and every one of them.
Don’t submit a YA story to an agent who says they do not represent children’s books, unless they specify that YA is okay. YA is a fuzzy area – some consider them children’s, some don’t.
Learn about who they are. Their choice in client leans heavily on those who make a personal connection with the agent in questions. It has to do with what they like. What they need.
They don’t care that “everybody” likes your book. Whether that “everybody” is friends and family or whether you’ve actually tested the market.
***personal experience side note***
When we left our first publisher this past April, I thought about looking for an agent… briefly… but when my ability to market our book to the point that our previous publisher couldn’t keep up with the print demand didn’t impress them, I decided against it.
We had sold over 2000 copies in the first 4 months, no small feat for a first-time author and small indie publisher. Remember, that is 4x the amount the average book sells in its lifetime. The agent acknowledged that it was impressive, but it wasn’t enough. When I told the agent how people responded to the book, how I received countless emails about how they couldn’t put it down, etc… this agent responded, “Now you have to get an editor to feel that way about it.”
That’s when I was done. I had thousands of readers who said they loved it, but I had to work to impress a single person. Not for this writer. For me at that point in this series, it was too much work and risk to wait possibly years to get the sequel out. I didn’t want my growing readership to have to wait that long, so I chose a different route. We’ll get to that in a future post.
***end side note***
WHAT THEY WANT
- A query letter that causes them to pause. Voice. Good writing.
- Something they can **sell** – this is the key. Because if they can’t sell it, they don’t get paid… then they can’t pay their mortgage.
- Something they can sell is often something that can be put into a box. The publishing industry likes boxes. I was once told that I would have to rewrite my series in first person for it to sell as a YA book… bullshit. There are countless YA books out there in complete omniscient. I’ve just recently read two of them. But that’s the box they’ve currently chosen.
- They don’t like crossovers. Again. The box. It doesn’t matter that the best selling series of the 21st century is a YA crossover, they want to put them in a box. It’s easier to pitch to the publishers.
- Many, many, many of them don’t like prologues or series. Go figure.
I’m not saying this makes any sense. I’m just saying this is what I’ve learned.
The better you know the agent you’re querying, the better chance you have at standing out amongst their enormous slush pile.
Use something like QueryTracker to help you keep track of the agents you research and ultimately query. It’s well-worth the $25 for the premium account.
Find your top 10 agents. Do even deeper research on them. Follow their blogs for a month or two before you query. Follow them on Twitter. Get to know them as people…
Then your query has to knock their socks off.
After those rejections, do the next group. It can take up to 6 months for an agent to respond to your query. If you’re not getting a request for a partial for every 3rd query (and you’re submitting to the right agents in the right way due to your research), then there is something wrong with your query. Revise it again.
Did I mention this was time consuming? This is where I said this route could take 5 years or more to see your book in print. If you don’t want to wait, then this isn’t the avenue for you.
Truly, there are so many Dos and Don’ts for agents, I can’t put them all here… and it would only be repeating what’s elsewhere anyway. This is the part where you have to do your research.
Don’t think you’re the exception. You’re not.
Don’t think they’ll love your pitch so much they’ll represent something they don’t normally represent.
They won’t.
I mean it. You are not the exception.
In their eyes, you are another wannabe author who needs them. If you give them *any* reason to pass you over, they will. Because they don’t need a reason to pass you over. They need a reason not to.
I mean it.
Do the research. When you think you’ve done enough research. Do some more.
LINKS:
- QueryVote – a site I set up for your to test your query letter out on other authors. Lots of great tips and links from this site. This is where I put up a lot of my own research when I was considering this avenue. I’ll repost only a few of the links here, but you should go through them all.
- QueryShark – read the entire thing and take copious notes. I know there’s a lot to read. I know it’s a lot of work. This is the price of finding a NY Big Boy.
- Nathan Bransford – read the entire thing. I mean it.
- Rejection Trading Cards – interested site put up by an aspiring author. You’ll learn a lot.
- AgentQuery – Free, one-stop writer’s resource on the web about literary agents and publishing.
Trust me. Finding an agent will be your full-time job for 3 months to a year, or more. It’s a commitment. It’s a lot of work and research, but it will be worth it when you hold that 6-figure advance in your hands from HarperCollins. If it happens.
It is a huge risk, but it all depends on what you want.
I know this is a super-long blog post, but the next one will be much more concise. 
< — (Last Post) NY Big Boys
(Next Post) NY Big Boys Pros & Cons —>
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Sep 29
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Writing a book is really hard. I know. I’ve done it twice now.
But writing your book is the easiest part of this process. Getting published is infinitely more difficult, especially if you go with the first of the four basic choices: New York “Big Boy” Publisher.
Random House. Scholastic. HarperCollins. Penguin. WW Norton. Doubleday. Tor.
I would even consider Little Brown in this (non-comprehensive) list.
Pretty much, if J. Q. Public has heard of them. They’re big.
They also have countless number of imprints that look “Indie” at first sight, but they’re actually a Big Boy. Do your research.
Remember those questions I had you answer yesterday? Here is where you’re going to start to need them.
If you want your book to rocket to the top of the NYTimes Best Seller list, a NY Big Boy is your best shot. (Realities of a bestseller royalty statement)
If you want a hefty 5 or 6 figure advance, a NY Big Boy is your best shot.
If you want your book out within the next 5 years or you want more than 2-7% of the cover price, then you don’t want a NY Big Boy.
The Big Boy publishing industry is working on a century-old business model. Let’s say, just for kicks, that you query some agents and by some miracle you get one this week. Another miracle, that agent gets you a publisher next week. It will still be 18-24 months before you see your book in print.
That’s how the Big Boys work.
Additionally, Big Boy or not, it’s up to the author to market themselves and their book. Unless you win the lottery a third time (that’s after getting an agent and a big publisher with a fat advance), you won’t get any marketing budget from the publisher. If you’re really lucky, you *might* get matching funds to what you put up for marketing.
And if you thought getting a publisher was hard, it’s a huge piece of dark chocolate cake next to marketing your book. That will be the next blog series.
On top of that, with a Big Boy, your book as 3 months (90 days) to make its mark, or they go on to the next book.
However, with a Big Boy, you will likely have the benefit of their in-house publicist, their impressive name, their media and industry contacts, prolific distribution, and possibly excellent bookstore placement, which is how 60% of readers find their next book.
However, again, it’s extremely difficult (read: near impossible) to get a NY Big Boy as your publisher. Of course it happens every single day, but, again, the odds are akin to winning the lottery.
First, you absolutely have to go through a literary agent. NY Big Boys do not take unsolicited submissions.
Getting a literary agent takes huge amounts of research, a query letter even more polished than your completed novel, a high tolerance for rejection, more patience than this author has, and an unwavering positive outlook.
This I’ll save for tomorrow’s post: Literary Agents
< — Four Basic Choices (previous post)
(next post) Literary Agents — >
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Jun 26
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For those of us in the business, it is quite apparent that the publishing industry is in a mess. It is a corporate top heavy, bottom-line driven colossus struggling to keep from going under. Bookstores big and small are scrambling for survival as well. The industry is changing fast and the giants are not nimble enough to adapt quickly enough.
What is a writer to do? A very few authors get most of the market while the rest are left out in the cold pounding upon the publishing house doors.
Agents may be a significant reason for this. At one time authors submitted directly to the publisher. This meant that publishers needed staff dedicated to plowing through slush piles. They were getting overwhelmed. By limiting submissions to only agents the bulk of this task was transferred off their payrolls. The agents now had to sift through the slush to find the gems.
But who pays the agents? They get 10-15% of what the authors make. Therefore they need authors who are going to bring in six figure advances to make it worth their time. No publisher is going to give an advance of that size unless they expect to make at least a seven figure return on the book.
To make matters worse, only about 30% of these million dollar deals succeed. Because of the money involved for promotions these books have only about six months to succeed. If it doesn’t happen by then, the publishing house drops them.
The result of these kind of business practices is that more copies of fewer books are filling the bookstore shelves. Publishing houses have become a massive barrier between authors and readers, restricting access to all but a few authors and increasing the cost of books for the reader without actually adding any value.
Agents are simply another line of defense between authors and readers. Their only concern is marketability. They are forcing authors into formula writing since anything truly creative and unique won’t fit into their tightly defined marketing strategy.
This is part of the reason why good books are so hard to find and so many shelves are filled with mediocre more of the same. Very few real masterpieces can break through the publishing barrier. But when they do, they are followed closely by a mass of imitators.
What is the solution? Small publishers and self publishing are both on the rise. With a small publisher, the agent line of defense is bypassed and the author submits directly to the publisher. This makes getting published at least a little easier. The down side is that there is little or no money available for advances and promotion. The author is left to do all the promotion themselves without receiving any money for their book for 4-9 months. Unless they already have some money put aside to pay their bills and promote their book for the next twelve months, their book will probably not be going anywhere anytime soon.
Another difficulty is that the publisher probably won’t be getting any money for the book during this time either. But they still need to pay the cost of producing and distributing it. This means that if a book takes off it can outsell the publishers ability to keep it in print. This also can end a book’s career. There is nothing worse than having to cancel an expensive book tour because bookstores can’t get the books.
Self publishing is a very good way to get ones books into the hands of readers when done right. But the author should have a good understanding of the process including marketing. This option has its own problems however.
The biggest hurdle is the stigma that comes with self publishing. People often associate self publishing with amateurs, or they think the book wasn’t good enough for a traditional publisher. Unfortunately, both are all too often the case, but they are not the rule.
There are too many vanity publishers around who are only in business to make money from authors without any real interest in getting their books sold, or even read. The cost of printing makes it impossible for the author to sell them at a profit without pricing them way above the market average. There are some reasonable options out there however. I personally would recommend Lightning Source which is a division of Ingram for Print on Demand books as well as off site printing for larger orders.
Then there is the whole topic of e-books and e-readers. But since this blog is in danger of turning into a book I will save that topic for a later posting.
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Apr 12
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This is the end of a very, very rough week, and I hope, the beginning of a new way.
I was raised Catholic. Yes, with the guilt and ritual and dogma. All of it. However, I haven’t been a practicing Catholic (or Christian, for that matter) for about 15 years now. I almost forgot it was Easter this weekend, as I celebrate the wheel of the year at Ostara and Beltane, especially since we aren’t spending this Easter with family.
I was reminded of the holiday by suffering my own symbolic crucifixion and resurrection.
On Thursday, I learned that our book, Rowan of the Wood, was suddenly unavailable to bookstores and to the community at large. Since we’re in the middle of a national tour, you can imagine why this caused us to tailspin into chaos. We were receiving several concerned emails and cancellations from scheduled book signings because they couldn’t get the books.
Everything else stopped.
I mean, everything stopped. Everything I was working on from accounting to marketing to blog tours to interviews stopped. After all, we had invested thousands into this book tour, into this marketing plan, and suddenly we’re faced with the possibility of having to cancel it.
Not okay.
Because of this, I missed the most important interview of my career thus far because I was too preoccupied dealing with something we, as authors, should never have to deal with: people want our books and they can’t get them.
Our publisher assures us more books are on the way to the distributor and warehouses as I type.
Tragedy averted.
Still, this tailspin lasted throughout Good Friday and the failure of #tweet4loan.
I was broken. Truly. I felt crucified. I felt as if all my effort and work was for nothing.
Also on Friday, I had a very good conversation with a literary agent about marketing and the future of our books. She’s not interested in representing us because she does YA and she said our book was really MG (middle grade), but she did say that we really knew how to market ourselves. Through her suggestions, it looked like our plans for the remaining four books had to be altered significantly. Basically, leaving Rowan of the Wood behind and beginning anew with Witch on the Water, the true beginning of the story. Rowan would become more like a prequel to the actual series.
Saturday. I was a zombie. I saw the last 3.5 years of our lives as wasted time. We had traveled down the wrong road, in more ways than one, and this road was getting rockier and more precipitous. It seemed as if we had crossed the point of no return.
Sunday. I awoke to a lukewarm review, and just went back to sleep. Enough.
Then it hit me.
The epiphany.
My own symbolic resurrection.
A new path on this rocky road revealed.
The problem is not the book. The problem is the target audience. Rowan of the Wood is not a YA novel. It’s not a MG novel. It has a dual protagonist: Cullen Knight (12 yr old) and Rowan (40-yr-old) the wizard who has been trapped in a magic wand for fourteen centuries. The antagonist is clearly Fiana, Rowan’s wife who took the long, hard road through those fourteen centuries, descending into deeper, darker magic to do so.
But the truth is in the conflict.
Whereas there is the conflict between Rowan and Cullen, since they’re forced to share a body, the real conflict is between Rowan and Fiana. The tragic love story of two people split apart by time and space.
This is an adult book that kids will also enjoy, not the other way around.
So. New marketing strategy. New focus for the sequel, which, also upon a closer look, is more about the adults in the story than the kids.
This is an adult book. This is a dark, tragic romance of which these kids and other people from Fortuna, CA are trapped in the middle.
This is Urban Fantasy, period.
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Apr 09
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Over the past month on Twitter, we’ve seen #queryfail and #agentfail, but what about #publisherfail?
It all began with #queryfail about a month ago. Literary agent extraordinaire Colleen Lindsay started it, and it took off immediately. I couldn’t pull myself away from the computer all day (as if that’s unusual!), and I learned a lot about querying on that day. It has inevitably helped me for my upcoming round of queries to got out later this month. It even inspired me to set up a blog where authors could post potential queries and get feedback.
Since, there was a very unprofessional backlash against agents by writers who felt slighted and embarrassed, I suppose. Very petty, to say the least. The personal attacks were uncalled for… and, again, unprofessional. It resulted in a total #writerfail and #commondecencyfail. Here are a few good blogs about it. They say it better than I can.
#agentfail – A Response from a Non-Failing Agent
AuthorPass & AgentPass Day
The Fail Sisters: #QueryFail & #AgentFail
Let’s remember that this is business.
Perhaps some comments during #queryfail tweets had a mocking tone as the agents waded through their slush piles, but for the most part it was just factual…and quite sad. At least that was my impression.
So. What about #publisherfail, where agents and writers can comment about snafus of the publishers? Please don’t mention specific publishers. The comments can even by hypothetical. Even the big NY publishers don’t usually offer a marketing budget unless the author already has a proven track record. They also are the ones who have to eat the cost on returnable books… but what are some other things? Someone recently told me that the publishing industry is working on the same timeline as it was 200 years ago.
What would be a #publisherfail in your opinion?
- Not printing enough books to keep them in the warehouses and on the shelves?
- Late accounting reports & short royalty checks?
- Creative accounting?
- Release dates pushed back again and again?
- Or perhaps something more general like why it takes 18 months to get a book out?
The best thing I got out of #queryfail was perspective. Are the above reasons normal and even an expected reality in the publishing industry, or are they truly a #publisherfail?
#agentfail was ultimately a totalfail because it was personal and unprofessional, but some of it also gave readers perspective. The difference between what writers expect and what agents do. Again, it gives perspective. It can be a learning experience and an exercise to close the gap between expectation and reality between all three parties: writers/authors, agents, & publishers.
Comments about both self-publishing houses and traditional publishers are welcome, but please keep it factual and professional, not personal and petty.
Also, stay tuned for the next episode of #queryfail next Friday: 4/17
In the mean time, head over to #QueryVote to test out your query before sending it on to an agent.
Tomorrow: #tweet4loan! Help us reach our goal to sell 300 books in a day on Amazon via Twitter.
FOLLOW ME!
**Other contest guidelines on how to win a $100 B&N Gift Card here. **
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Mar 27
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We’re gearing up for a very big promotional push at the beginning of April.
April 6-17 Rowan’s Beltane Blog Tour. Stops to be announced shortly!
We’ll also be giving away prizes like signed books and Barnes & Noble gift cards.
Also, inspired by author Steve Ouch (@steveouch), I’ve spoken to my banker as well. She’s agreed to give us a business (book tour) loan for our Summer Geekalicious Grand Book Tour if we can sell 300 books in a day! She’s making us jump over a higher hurtle than Steve’s banker did. Perhaps I should call Steve’s banker!
We’re very grateful for this opportunity, and we’ll be attempting a #tweet4loan project patterned after Steve’s on April 10th.
Additionally, like I always do, I’m trying to go above and beyond! If we can garner enough sales, we can attract the attention of a literary agent for the next book in the series. I’ll be hosting a contest during the same dates as my blog tour where I’ll be giving away a $100 Barnes & Noble gift card. There is only one mandatory rule, and that’s to buy a copy of Rowan of the Wood on Amazon between the dates of April 6-17. My own personal goal is to reach 500 books in those two weeks (including the 300 #tweet4loan project).
Details to soon follow. Stay tuned to our blog!
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