The A-Z's of book publishing

You know what? Every time I go onto one of those writing boards, somebody is asking for a fairy godmother to come fluttering out of the sky and pluck them out of the thousands of scribes out there in order to place them safely in the hands of a world renown agent. Often I send emails to each one of these people and try to explain to them how things work, and what they can do about their career if they chose to have a successful one. However, I think that instead of writing it out over and over and over again trying to get through to people, maybe it could work a bit better if I posted it all quite succinctly here on the blog. So, here we go kids...


Before the Writing
- Ghost-writers make this go faster, never use the publisher’s
- Self-publishing, editors and book doctors are all bad, bad, bad
- The only ‘yes’ you should use in this industry is your signature, because that’s what
everybody else does

The Writing
- Outline general topics, not structure
- Notebook and a pen
- Read constantly on topic, especially people you disagree with, underline passages
(movies count)
- Never force the words, never hold back the words
- Read newspaper or watch ½ hr of news everyday in order to find modern context to
your ideas
- Transcribe any hand-written work to the computer as often as possible in order to
provide periodically scheduled first edit
- Review topic outline often and revise
- Talk to as many people as possible about these ideas and take note of both how they
respond and how you explain in the face of that reponse
- Sometimes words don’t fit, ideas always do
- Pose an interesting thought every page, even if they are not yet explained
- Interview as many related people as possible about their ideas, not yours
- Apply for as many government grants as possible, they will held you subsidize creation
time and with future marketing
- Draft article queries for every idea you come up with for the book, send them out to
relevant magazine publications in order to muster possible pre-publishing deal buzz-
don’t draft actual articles though, only write articles that have been requested as a result
of a query


The Editing Process
- Transcribe all written material to computer and edit as you go from start to end
- Read through at least four times: there will always be at least one word you missed
- Use grammar check, it finds things you won’t
- Find three people to read you draft at this point: one who totally agrees with you on this
subject, one who totally disagrees with you on this subject and one who has no idea what
you’re talking about
- Always impliment their ideas, never leave out yours
- Use as much inter-textualization as possible
- Speak to at least ten recognizable experts within the field you are writing on, about
things you have said in the book. Make sure these are different people than those you
spoke to during the ‘writing process’, you can re-interview those you’ve interviewed
before, but treat them as extra additions to your interview list. Impliment everything
they say in agreeance to your points into the book as well as at least one thing they say
that is in disagreeance to you- one thing that you do not defend yourself against in the
book
- Impliment as many personal experiences as possible at this point, that way the ideas do
not revolve around you, but your experiences revolve around your ideas
- Ask the most agreeable person that you have worked with so far and ask them to write a
forward to the book
- Once complete, proofread as many as five times, at least
- Leave room for a sequel at the end
- Expand rather than retract

The Publishing Process
- Create a 3 paragraph query: the first paragraph is who you are, the second is about your
book, the third is about why you wrote it
- Create a 5 section proposal (maximum three pages)
a) Book Overview
b) The Market- who is your market, how many people are in it, any magazine
circulations for publications on your field, any statistics you can find that are in
your favor
c) Competition- cite three or four other books on the field you are writing on and
why your book is different/better
d) Marketing- how do you plan to sell your book, what do you bring to the table in
terms of sales skills or marketable reputation that other writers might not have,
what kind of unique promotional idea do you have (a website, unique book
signing locations you either have access to or wish to employ, what kind of
press you are looking to garner and how), any money you are willing to spend
and how you will spend it (grants received?)
e) Biography- why are you qualified to write this book, why are you interesting-
keep in mind that this section helps the reader to determine how you present
yourself as a person
f) Also include 3 sample chapters and a chapter breakdown (each chapter title and
a brief idea of what each chapter is about)
g) Add blurbs to the end of the proposal if you can (quotes about you or your
work- especially this book- from new organizations or from famous or
important people)
- You can develop these as soon as three chapters have been written and reasonably
edited, and start sending them out within two months of the anticipated manuscript
completion in order to have agents and publishers ready to see the final work as soon as
its ready and to skip several months of waiting time
- Send query to at least 100 different agencies if you do not already have one
- very few agents will reply positively and request your proposal, if they then like
the proposal, they’ll ask for the full manuscript
- be prepared for agents and publishers to ask for additional edits (again, always
impliment their ideas but never leave out yours)
- only sign with an agent that has sold consistently to the types of publishers you
with to publish with
- always bargain for a better contract, always insist on some sort of exit clause
- try to sign with someone that has both a law degree and has worked at a
publisher in the past (preferably as an editor)
- When you have an agent:
- submit to every publisher under the sun, this will assure you can play them off
each other and receive a better deal
- check in with agent at least once a month, if they are not being helful use exit
clause
- read everything they send and receive in order to monitor progress
- Send copy to as many contests as possible, they help sales tremendously
- Send manuscript to ten people you would most like a quote about the book for, to put
on your jacket
- Prepare your own cover design, if you want to

The Marketing Process
- Draft a list of publications in every major center of interest and ensure a gallery copy is
received by them four months before release date- three months prior is the standard, no
publication will review your book if it is any later than that
- Plan as many signings as you can
- Follow through on promises you made in your proposal- people will notice if you do not
- Interview with everyone that asks
- Draft another query and start to seek an agent for translation into other languages
- Ask advice from other authors on how they sold more books
- Send complimentary copies to every person either cited or quoted in the book, or that
helped you out a lot on the project
- Sign 200 books and have them signed by the more important contributors to the book as
well, keep a few and then sell the rest on E-Bay
- Link book to a speaking tour, contact tour agencies upon publishing deal, this helps to
pay for travelling expenses and signings in additional areas
- Records your own book on tape
- Approach TV production companies about developing TV special featuring ideas from
the book
- Draft queries for articles in conjunction to book and flyer all relevant periodicals, then
only write articles when they have been requested, you can also draft queries to have
your best interviews published as is
- Keep control information from every person you meet, they will be of help in the future
- Sell yourself in the media, sell your work in person
- Include a picture in all press releases and send a press release to all local periodicals
whenever you arrive anywhere for a book related event, use a general template for all
press releases for easy conversion
- Fame/importance of position, they get you a better deal with the publisher, but quality of
writing gets you higher sales
- Store signings are good for promotion, mostly because of the in-store posters that
advertise your signing and because the store will most likely place your book more
prominently in the store, so if people don’t purchase from you at the table, don’t lost
heart