Category Archives: Getting Published

Overcoming Writing Excuses: Start Your Book Today

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You have an idea for a novel/nonfiction book/stage play/screenplay/book of poetry/book of essays/etc. but you haven’t been able to actually do anything with it.

It sits there. An idea. Going nowhere.

If you don’t activate it soon, you’ll lose interest in it and enthusiasm about it.

You may have any number of excuses for not moving forward and developing your idea. Some of the most common excuses are:

  1. I don’t have time to write.
  2. I don’t know how to write or, I don’t know how to do this kind of writing.
  3. I’m not good with spelling and grammar.
  4. Other people whose works I’ve read are really good writers. Where do I get the nerve to even think that I can write in their space?
  5. This will take me such a long time. Is it even worth it to start?
  6. What if I finish it and it doesn’t get published?
  7. What if it turns out to be awful? I’d be so embarrassed.
  8. What if it gets published or I self-publish it and no one reads it?

Most of these excuses are bullshit, and badass writers don’t indulge in bullshit. Acknowledge them for what they really are: AN EXPRESSION OF FEAR.

  1. I don’t have time to write. There are ways to squeeze writing time into the busiest schedule. I’ll recommend some in another post. But this is probably about you being afraid. If you write TEN MINUTES A DAY, you’ll put it more than an hour a week. You can accomplish a lot in an hour.
  2. I don’t know how to write or, I don’t know how to do this kind of writing. You learn. You learn by doing and by reading about writing. There are MANY resources available to you (including some I offer).
  3. I’m not good with spelling and grammar. Then you write what you want to write and either hire an editor/proofreader or get that smart English major friend of yours to correct your masterpiece for a few beers.
  4. I’ve read books like the one I want to write by really good writers. Where do I get the nerve to even think that I can write in their space? These writers inspired you to write! And keep in mind the fact that they didn’t start out being really good writers. They probably started out feeling just as doubtful about their ability as you do now – BUT THEY DID START.
  5. This will take me such a long time. Is it even worth it to start? That’s something you need to decide. However, wasting time thinking this way will not get you to the finish line any faster.
  6. What if I finish it and it doesn’t get accepted by a publisher? Then you self-publish it. (SHAMELESS SELF-PROMOTION ALERT: See my course, How to Self-Publish Your Badass Book on Amazon. It’s on Teachable.com.)
  7. What if I self-publish it and no one reads it? You will have to promote the hell out of it. I cover how to do that in the above-mentioned course.
  8. What if it turns out to be awful? I’d be so embarrassed. There is no limit on the number of times you can revise it. You can continue to improve that. You can hire a co-writer or an editor to help you improve it.

There. There is no excuse for the excuses you’re using to excuse yourself from writing what you want to write.

Get to it.

Keeping Track of Submissions

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The why is easy. You want to keep a record of the people, companies, theatres etc. that you have sent your work to – or sent a query letter to – so that you don’t:
• Duplicate submissions (which will waste your time and piss the submittees* off)
• Miss submitting to someone you should submit to (which may prevent you from getting published or produced)

I recommend using an Excel worksheet. It’s easy to use and does everything you need it to do. If you have another program that you prefer, use it. There is no one way to do this.

What should your spreadsheet include?

• The name of your work – this can either be a column, or you can have an entire tab devoted to one work.
• The name and title of the person or company or organization you’re submitting to.
• The name of the publishing company, theatre company, publication or whatever organization it is that you are sending to.
• What you’re sending. Is it a query letter? The first ten pages or three chapters? A synopsis? What goes in this column will depend upon what the submittee says he or she wants you to send. You can find this information on the company’s website. Do not ignore it. If a literary agent wants a synopsis and the first five pages, do NOT send the entire novel or nonfiction book because it is so brilliant, so well-written THAT YOU ARE CERTAIN the agent will want to read the entire thing, not just five pages. If the agent likes those pages, he or she will ask to see the entire manuscript. Disregarding instructions is a BIG red flag; you are letting the agent know that you will be difficult to work with. Likewise, if a publisher says they don’t accept unagented work and you don’t have an agent, don’t send to them out of an overabundance of confidence. It will be a wasted effort.

You may NEVER get a response

Sadly, many cells in this column will stay blank. You often won’t hear back from agents or publishers – even those who say they are open to submissions. Accept that fact right now, so you won’t pine away for an acknowledgement that you exist. That you write. Some agents will answer you, but that will almost always take a looooooong time. Agents get a lot of submissions. Don’t think about that. It will only depress and discourage you. If you are determined to be a writer, write and submit. Rinse and repeat. Screw the competition.

If you actually DO get a response-

Keep notes about them. I might write something like: “nice rejection email – it’s in agent folder.” That tells me to check that email I saved the next time I submit a (different) work to that agent. I might use the comments in their email, to remind them that they liked my writing the last time. “I appreciated the positive feedback and constructive criticism you gave me on my novel, ‘Palm Tree Pipe Dreams.’” With that, I am reminding the agent that even though they did not decide to represent me, there was something about my writing that they liked. If an agent absolutely HATED my work (and they will rarely admit to that), I jot that down, too, so that I don’t waste time sending to them in the future.

Other things to keep track of

Make note of things you learn that will save you time and effort going forward. Things like:
• Ms. QPOEIREWPOIU is no longer with this agency.
• This agency is no longer in business.
• This agency says it no longer accepts submissions.
Like that. Information that will help you going forward.
A lot of the above is relevant for fiction, nonfiction, short stories, plays and other creative endeavors. You can also keep a spreadsheet when applying for paid writing assignments or for full- or part-time writing jobs.

Why You Should NOT Pitch Your Work as Unique

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This is going to be a hard truth to swallow, so brace yourself. Even though you’ve written something you’re convinced is a one-of-a-kind piece – and it may well be – that’s not the way you want to sell it to literary agents and publishers.

The literary industry is, first and foremost, an industry. It exists to make money. Sure, it does so by managing the work of authors, which is pretty great. But it is, essentially, a profit machine.

Profit machines are not designed to take risks. On one level, agents and publishers are looking for the next fresh voice. They love books! They love reading and they love authors and they are always on the hunt for writing that speaks to them in some new way.

However, they must be reassured that there is some precedent for whatever it is you’re submitting to them – especially a precedent that sold well.

Name Dropping is Not Only OK…

When composing your query letter, you’ll make a stronger case for yourself if you place your book into a recognizable context. For example: “My thriller, Miles to Go Before I Die, explores territory familiar to readers of David Baldacci and Harlan Coben, but with a surprising main character: a flight attendant with a gambling addiction who finds herself thrown into a world of global intrigue.”

Damn. That sounds good. Maybe I should write that book! But note what I did in that description. I invoked the names of two best-selling authors, thereby associating myself with them and hinting that my writing is as good as theirs. Hinting. Then I drop a twist into it, by telling them about my main character. A flight attendant with a gambling addiction? If nothing else, it should make them curious.

The book does not have to be just like those written by Baldacci and Coben. The phrase “explores territory familiar to” is sufficiently vague.

What I’ve done here is to let the agent or publisher know that there is an existing readership for my book. Baldacci, Coben and other successful authors of thrillers have laid the groundwork for it and built up a community of readers who love thrillers. In other words, I am telling the publishing industry that my book is likely to make money. Is that guaranteed? Of course not – but the people I’m querying already know that. What they want to know is that profit is likely.

(Note: I’ve used a fiction example here, but this strategy can be used with nonfiction as well.)

Send a Signal

In the example above, I’m also demonstrating that I have some understanding of how the publishing industry works. I am sending a signal that the agent or publisher will not be dealing with some amateur who is trying to sell them a poorly written book.

The point of a query is to get agents and/or publishers interested enough to request your manuscript. They cannot afford to waste time and energy on a book that will probably not appeal to readers. Even if what you’ve written is unique, dropping names and mentioning genres will place your book in a recognizable – and intriguing context. It will increase your chances of having your manuscript read by decision-makers in the publishing industry.

Self-Publishing is for Losers…or is it?

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The only reason a writer should self-publish is if they are unable to land a deal with a publishing company, right? And the only reason a writer can’t get a book deal with a publishing company is because their book isn’t good enough, right? They’re losers.

At one time, self-publishing did have a stigma attached to it. That still may be the case among some snobs at elite publishing houses, but since I’m not invited to dinner parties at their luxury Manhattan apartments, or to summer weekends at their Hampton estates, I don’t care what they think.

Neither should you.

The internet has had a democratizing effect on publishing. When you look up a book on Amazon, is it immediately apparent whether or not the book has been published by, say, Simon & Schuster or by you? Sure, if you scroll down and squint at the fine print, you’ll see the publisher’s name, but it’s not what you’re going to base your decision on. You’ll have already been intrigued by the title, or the cover art, or the synopsis.

The point is: the self-publishing option has helped level the playing field.

And there are some good reasons for self-publishing instead of attempting the traditional route:

  1. Fewer hoops to jump through. Most major publishers won’t accept unsolicited manuscripts. They will only consider submissions from established literary agents. That means you have to first get an agent to represent you, and then that agent must try to get your book placed with a publisher. If you want to try this, get ready for a lengthy and arduous process that involves researching agents to find ones that would be a fit for your book, writing and sending query letters to those agents (some of which you’ll never get a response to) and then, if a miracle happens and one agrees to rep you, formulating book proposals for the publishers your agent will query. If you self-publish, your book can be available online quickly.
  2. Numbers. You are up against tens of thousand of other writers who are also querying literary agents.
  3. Time. Let’s say your dream comes true and your manuscript gets accepted by a publisher. It could take two years until your book actually gets published. The wheels grind slowly at these big companies. I don’t know about you, but…tick tock. Two years???
  4. Support – or lack thereof. Publishers tend to focus their attention on their big moneymakers, not on newbie authors. James Patterson gets plenty of marketing and promotional support. You won’t necessarily feel the same love. Even if you’re published, your book could minimal marketing attention.
  5. Control. This has both pros and cons. As a self-published writer, you have total control over your book’s cover art, back cover description, marketing, etc. For some writers, that’s a relief. For others, it’s frustrating. Once you sign a contract with a publisher, you relinquish a great deal of control over your book.

Writers who self-publish aren’t losers. They are making the choice to not let the traditional publishing industry control their writing destiny and prevent them from doing what they want to do: get their books into the hands of readers.

I’m not saying it’s easy, but it is doable.

For badass writers, anyway.

Just sayin’: I can help.

Best-Selling Writers Who Overcame Rejection

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You’ve heard of J.K. Rowling. Love her or hate her, ya gotta admit: the woman has sold some books. 450 million of them. “Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone” – the first in the series – was rejected by 12 different publishers. It finally sold, but her editor advised her to stick with her day job – which was teaching – because she probably wasn’t going to be able to make a living as a writer.

“Gone With the Wind” was given the thumbs down 38 times before Margaret Mitchell finally found a publisher for it.

A Bucket of Pig’s Blood

Stephen King’s manuscript “Carrie”? 30 different publishers said, “no” to it. It was finally accepted, sold more than a million copies, got made into movies – you know the Carrie story. The bucket of pig’s blood, up in the rafters – yikes!

“M*A*S*H*” – it was a book, then a movie and then an iconic and long-running TV series. Twenty-one publishers turned down Richard Hooker‘s book. One finally saw it’s worth. All it takes is one.

Agatha Christie – her first novel never got a nod from a publisher. Never. She didn’t let that stop her. She wrote another novel. It finally found a publisher only because she agreed to change the ending. Sometimes ya gotta be flexible. Ms. Christie went on to publish 71 more novels.

A Time to Kill…Publishers

Dr. Seuss – turned down by 27 publishers. What? Now, you can read Theodor Seuss Geisel’s many published books in the air. You can read them anywhere.

John Grisham’s first novel, “A Time to Kill” – rejected many times. Finally picked up by a small publisher, who printed 5,000 copies. It didn’t sell well, until he wrote more novels and they became bestsellers, and then his fans went back and found “A Time to Kill.”

William Faulkner, James Patterson – I really shouldn’t mention those in the same breath, I know – but they do have something in common: their first novels collected MANY rejection slips from publishers. They persevered. If Louisa May Alcott took rejections to heart and stopped submitting to publishers, we wouldn’t have “Little Women.”

“The Diary of Anne Frank,” a book that has had an extraordinary impact on our public psyche, was turned down by 15 publishers before one that recognized how extraordinary it was. Through it, the memory of Anne Frank and all those who suffered during the Holocaust lives on.

The Takeaway

The lesson here is obvious. If you believe in your work, don’t let rejections get in your way. Badass writers reject rejection. Keep submitting. If you don’t believe in your work, no one else will.