The Cart Before The Horse

This week has turned into one of engaging research for me. One of my priorities was to come out of this week with a step-by-step guide on how to get my written works published. That, from what I've gathered, is an arduous task. So I laid it all out in front of me (and now you) in an exercise of trying to understand what I need to do, exactly. This, of course, requires me to actually have a written piece to start following the steps below. Hence the title of this post. But eh, now I've done my research. All I have to do is get cracking!

Without further ado, here's how I (or anyone, really) go about getting published.

0.5) Research the market. A bit of a gimme, but know what to write based on what people will want to read. See: The vampire craze has mostly passed at this point - pick another cryptid to make your sexy teenage romance. This may be a bit of hubris on my part, but I'm a pretty avid reader and I'd like to think that I'd write something that I'd want to read, ergo, something with decent appeal. I include it because it's been the number one piece of advice in all of my research, so I guess there's a lot of shitty less popular book ideas out there.

1) Write something. Basically anything. Or a collection of somethings. That's the primary objective. I'm on it.

2) Find an agent. This seems to involve a few sub-steps, such as writing a query letter to send to potential agents, and even that has sub-steps of addressing specific agents and their requirements within various agencies. What the agent does (if they like the ~300 word query letter) is champion my story. 

2.5 OR 1.5) Get my piece professionally edited. I've looked at a few different places, and across the board they had conflicting opinions on getting an editor before or after an agent. Arguments for BEFORE include looking professional and polished with your work, as if you are prepared to go to any lengths to ensure the quality of your piece. Arguments for AFTER include a lot of agents have their own preferred editors for their clients, want a raw piece that can be buffed under their supervision. This only matters so far as me already having a piece to be looked at so... Cross this bridge when I come to it.

=> It should be noted that for either the editor or agent, a fiction writer will need to have the full manuscript ready for the first encounter. Apparently non-fiction writers can get away with just the first three chapters completed until they actually need to get seriously edited and published. 

3) The notes above after 'Write something' are irrelevant if I self publish. The nice thing about traditional publishing is that it controls a lot of the marketing and legwork that goes into selling a book, and more specifically the funding that makes it happen. I don't necessarily have the popularity to make self-publishing worthwhile. At least, not at this juncture. If I have something I need to write and put out there and don't need to profit off of it, then that's the ideal route. 

4) What happens after an agent accepts my manuscript? Because that's the primary question after I've written a story, written a query letter, and given that query letter to anyone who might be interested. From what I can gather, this is its own song and dance none too different from a job interview. You should have multiple agents on the line, figuring out what the deal is from each of them. If you get an offer, don't immediately accept that offer - let that agent know you want time. This can be time to consider, time to let other agents know you HAVE an offer so they have time to get back to you, and also time to research the quality of the offer. Two weeks was the general consensus on how long one should wait MAX on finalizing a decision on an offer. After that it gets pretty rude. 

5) Follow etiquette. Once a decision has been made, let ALL potential agents know (whether you heard back or not) that you have made a decision and that you now have an agent. This can trigger some eager/competitive agents to rush through your manuscript when they might have otherwise thought they had time. If they do, they like it. That's promising. 

6) This is (in theory) where the magic happens. The agent submits the manuscript to editors and publishers, or the editors then submit it to publishers. Every place I've read about this emphasizes that this will take time. Regular check-ups with agents should be once a month at most, with a phone call once every six months. The waiting game is played to various possible results. This is probably what I'd label as the Least Fun-Sounding Part, because there's minimal control - even if the manuscript goes a year without selling to a publisher, that doesn't necessarily indicate bad writing or a bad agent. And with that knowledge, you're supposed to sit. And wait some more. 

Here's where I am most concerned. Due to the nature of publishing writing, the variances between each 'standard author/agent relationship' can be pretty drastic. Each source I look into tells a slightly different story. Advice written broadly about the field gives significant chunks of time to expect, erring on the side of caution. Bits written by experienced authors can be tales of whirlwind blissful romance friendship business partnership. Or they can be the horrors of The Worst Agents Ever™ that include jumping from agent to agent with heart-wrenching struggles to find success. 

Thankfully, I've got time to figure that out, and my experience will be unique as well. And it'll help to talk to authors in the meantime to establish some reasonable expectations for an agent, or the process in general. But, uh, basically... This. This is what I've got in store.

Time to get to it!