Publishing 101

Hello, Authors!

If you are visiting this page, you may have attended my Publishing 101 session at the Rocky Mountain SCBWI regional conference. Thank you for stopping by to pick up additional resources. It shows you're serious about your publishing career!  If you landed on this page by accident and you're interested in writing children's books, stop what you're doing and join SCBWI www.scbwi.org!

Before reading further, here's the most important thing you need to know: to be a good children's book writer, you need to be a avid kid lit reader first. What's on your bookshelf?

FORMATTING YOUR MANUSCRIPT: A properly formatted manuscript is an important step in the submissions process. From Keyboard to Printed Page on the SCBWI website https://www.scbwi.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/From-Keyboard_2014.pdf

Craft Tips:  

Interview with Richard Peck:  Here he talks about his writing process.

Dream Team: Nick Healy, Caryn Wiseman, Andrea Brown, Jennifer Mattson, Melissa Manlove

Craft tips from agents and editors:  Great advice from a writing workshop weekend offered by a panel of Agents and Editors who served on faculty at Big Sur in the Rockies. Article title: "What Agents and Editors Think When Reading Your First Page". The highlights from this article include (1)Don’t rob readers of experiencing the emotional state of a character.

SHOW don’t TELL: Don’t write, “George was upset about his report card.” Write, “George wadded up his report card and shoved it to the bottom of his backpack.”

(2)PB writers: Watch out for clause-filled sentence structure

(3)Avoid over choreography, didactic intentions, and characters with stuff happening to them rather than the protagonist making stuff happen. For the full article, click Craft tips from agents and editors

You can find more craft tips in my 2011 Interview with Matt de la Pena:  The interview begins with me gushing over one of his novels. Dig in further, because within the interview, you will find some gems and inspirational writing and working tips. My favorite piece of advice, "I think voice is WAY easier if you’re 100% honest."  And "Don’t fake it. Don’t chase trends. Be real. If it hurts, it’s gold. If it embarrasses you, it has to go in. If it shames you, it’s the most important ingredient."

Querying Tips beyond my regular tip of sticking with three paragraphs (the hook, the book, and the cook), I advise you visit ASK DAPHNE at KT Literary: KT Literary allows authors to submit to "Ask Daphne" for query feedback. Learn from one another's mistakes!

Agent Interviews:  Reading interviews with agents is one key step to discovering if he/she is the right agent for you. When querying agents, open with why you chose to query them. here are a handful of interviews for your review (you'll find more at Writer's Digest, Absolute Write, and other blogs):

Interviw with Hilary Harwell

Interview with Kristin Nelson

Interview with Shannon Hassan

Interview with Deborah Warren

Interview with Tricia Lawrence

An upcoming webinar Query Workshop:

Professionally Personal: How to Compel Agents in One Page or Less. (Webinar) October 10, 2017 7:30-9:00 PM Eastern time, Hosted by MD/DE/WV SCBWI. ADDITIONAL QUERY CRITIQUE SLOTS NOW AVAILABLE. Agent Hannah Mann of Writers House discusses what to stress for success when it comes to querying agents, including how to stay brief and be heard without coming off as generic, how to strike a balance between broad appeal and agent-specific, and choosing the perfect comp titles. A recording of the webinar will be available for one month after the live event. The recording will be for registered attendees only, so if you can't make the live event, you can register to view the recording. Cost: SCBWI Members: $15 for webinar only; $30 for webinar + query letter critique with Hannah Mann of Writers House or Carrie Howland of Empire Literary; Non-members: $25 for webinar. https://mddewv.scbwi.org/events/webinar-with-agent-hannah-mann-professionally-personal-how-to-compel-agents-in-one-page-or-less/

Important places to turn for information:

KiteTales:  this is the quarterly publication put out by editor Shelly Steig with the RMC SCBWI. To access KiteTales, you must be logged in to your SCBWI account. Here you will find agent interviews and writing and/or illustrating tips.  To enjoy current and past issues of Kite Tales, visit RMC.SCBWI.ORG ( https://rmc.scbwi.org/ ) Log in to your account first (access denied until you log in) and click on the side bar items called "FOR OUR MEMBERS" and then select KiteTales.

EVENTS:  Also under FOR OUR MEMBERS (log into your SCBWI account first) you can follow the Good News, Contests, and Upcoming events link to find out about free events as well as fee-based workshops. 

Insights:  This is an online publication put out by SCBWI headquarters. Every issue of Insights features an agent or editor interview.

The Bulletin:  This is a quartly publication put out by the SCBWI, you can choose to receive it via email or snail mail.

Writer’s Digest:  sign up for their free email newsletter. They regularly feature new agents who are hungry for submissions.

Publisher’s Weekly: stay informed with this publication and agent deals.

Publisher’s Lunch: Free newsletter and a great place to read about new deals. Here you will see one-liners (log lines) about recently aquired books. When reading the one-line logged lines, you might find inspiration for how to word your "hook".

Agent Query:  good place read about agents and possibly vet them. Keep in mind, this is not a fool-proof vetting source, but it's a great place to get started. Here's how they describe themself: "AgentQuery.com offers one of the largest searchable database of literary agents on the web—a treasure trove of reputable, established literary agents seeking writers just like you. And it's free (not because there's a catch, but simply because not enough things in this world are free)."

Preditors and Editors: Another online forum to vet which agents are following best practices.

Follow RMC SCBWI on our closed Facebook page (members only page, so you'll request to join when you first arrive. Here, we post regularly about industry news and upcoming webinars and events.

Follow RMC or me on Twitter:

@SCBWIRockyMtn  this is the RMC SCBWI account

@Bkshelfdetectiv (this is me, Kim Tomsic)

Fiction Writing Workshop with Sara Megibow of Nelson Literary Agency

About the Publishing Industry from industry expert Sara Megibow:

Last year Sara Megibow received 36,000 query letters. Of the 36,000 queries, she requested 2,500 partial manuscripts. Out of the 2,500 she then requested 98 full manuscripts. Of the 98 hopefuls, she offered representation to nine clients and of the nine clients, Sara sold five manuscripts.  Math review--36,000 hopeful queriers and five scored a book deal.


TRADITIONAL PUBLISHING TIME LINES:

When you query an agent, you can expect a response with in six to twelve weeks. If they request to read more (partial or full), you can expect your next response in six to nine months. If the agent offers representation, you and the agent may spend time editing your manuscript before submitting to a publishing house. Once submitted, it can take an editor an average of two to three months to read (Sara has experienced wait times from one month to eighteen months). If you are offered a book deal, you can expect to see your book on the shelves in two to three years after the offer. Another math review: if you are starting the query process with your completed manuscript today,  March 13, 2011,you can expect to see your masterpiece sold at your local bookstore in 2014.

SARA'S ADVICE TO WRITERS:
Writers need to be aggressive marketers. What's your marketing plan? What Conferences do you attend? Do you know the people at your local bookstore? Do you have a positive web presence? When an agent is considering your work, they will probably Google to investigate your web presence. You should have a positive presence in the following medias:
Twitter
Facebook
Author Web Page

Sara says establishing an author web page is super-duper important. Okay, "super-duper" is my word, but she highly stressed the need for a web page or a blog site. If you have no web presence, she will probably skip your project. Remember, your competition includes 35,999 other queriers waiting for her attention.

WHAT A LITERARY AGENT LOOKS FOR (Other than snappy writing):

1. Do you know your genre (exactly where in the bookstore will your work be placed)?  In your query, you need to be professional and that means you show you know your genre. How? Your protagonist needs to be the right age for your genre; your word count needs to be spot-on and proper for genre; and you need to know precisely where your book would fit on a bookstore shelf.

"To increase your odds of landing an agent, you need to be able to nail your genre."

Genre examples:

Middle Grade- a protagonist who is nine to fourteen years-old (5th 6th 7th 8th grade); word count 30,000 - 50,000. Conflict is something light such as first fight with parents, lemonade stands, changing schools, first crushes, etc. Very rarely "issue-y".

Young Adult - has a teen protagonist, 50,000 to 90,000 words, can be dystopian, fantasy, romantic, etc. but must be a teen protagonist. Conflict can be anything as deep as issues seen in SCARS (a cutter novel) by Cheryl Rainfield or as fun and light as SCORE (coming out)  where conflict is about a young woman who plays quarterback on her high school football team , but may lose her scholarship because of a boy issue.

Science Fantasy 80,000-150,000 is preferable word count (but 200,000 okay)

Urban Fantasy-set on earth, looks like Earth, but some fantastical element 80,000 to 150,000 words.

Commercial Fiction Chic Lit - usually about first job, fashion, leaving the nest, etc.


2. DO YOU KNOW HOW TO PITCH YOUR BOOK? Can you tell what your book is about in one or two sentences? Your inciting incident should be in the pitch. For example, when you go to see a movie, you usually know, based on one or two sentences, what the movie is about. These one or two sentences are also known as the elevator pitch (being able to sell your storyline in the time it takes to complete an elevator ride).

**Inciting incedent is the magic key to your pitch.**

3. QUERY LETTER - QUERY LETTER 101:
A query letter is a two paragraph description of your book. Yep, all 50,000 words condensed into two compelling paragraphs. Based on the statistics above, it's easy to understand why writing a great query letter is vital. Sara recommends http://www.agentquery.com/ for more information on this subject.


She also says Kristin Nelson does a fantastic query letter workshop. Remember that your query should read as if it were the back cover of your novel. Research agent and make sure they rep the type of book you wrote (i.e. don't query your cookbook to an agent who only reps dystopian YA). Query must be no longer than one page. For more help, see http://www.agentquery.com/ or http://www.nelsonagency.com/


4. BOOK MUST BE COMPLETE - don't query if your work of fiction is not 100% written and ready to go.


Side note and something to think about: The publisher needs to be able to sell at least 15,000 copies of your book in order to meet their PandL requirements. Figure out what your work is similar to and hope that author had sky high sales. Typical advances for a debute author in children's literature $5-10K.


Quick notes about Sara:  Yes, Sara is accepting new clients. Please visit her website to learn about the type of projects she represents. Her query information is available at http://www.nelsonagency.com/ Sara's favorite genre- Epic Fantasy. She says a prologues doesn't work if nothing is at stake. Says women's fiction can be more prose, but can often has too much angst. Sara likes STAY as a great piece of women's fiction. She also likes SIMPLY FROM SCRATCH. One of the most important tools in selling your book is nailing your pitch.

RESOURCES:
http://www.nelsonagency.com/ and their list of Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
AAR (association of authors' representatives)

Last minute words of wisdom:  Read books in your genre, avoid data dumps, work on POV, achieve great dialogue, and balance description, show don't tell, and remember, a reputable agent never gets paid for reading your work.

By the way, Sara donated her time for this workshop to raise money for a Colorado school.


Organizations you can join: 

http://www.scbwi.org/ for picture book, middle grade, and YA writers
http://www.rwa.org/ for romance writers
http://www.rmfw.org/ for fiction writers