So you ’ve written the greatest skill fiction novel in the universe . Congratulations ! So how do you call on this towering achievement into the renown and luck your star deserves ? We go to the “ Ask A Pro ” gore at WisCon to find out .
The “ Ask A Pro ” panel at WisCon included authorEileen Gunn(Stable strategy And Others),Tor Bookssenior editorJames Frenkel , agent Shana Cohen , and source Jack McDevitt ( The Hercules Text ) . Here ’s a digest of their advice and wise counselling to you , the future literary genius .
Do n’t hire a freelance editor to polish up your book prior to submitting it to agent and editors . Says Frenkel , “ If you ca n’t write well enough , nobody ’s going to be able-bodied to aid you . ” And if those freelance editors were such neat writer , they ’d be selling novels themselves . If you submit a novel to a publication sign and say it ’s been professionally edited , it may not avail – and it could actually hurt , advises Cohen .
Likewise , do n’t deal with “ vender ” who promise to relegate your work to agents . These queries will get rejected instantaneously , says Cohen — she only dispense with author directly . Also , society that anticipate to pen your query varsity letter for you will probably just give you a cooky - cutter letter .
Get an agent , even you have a al-Qur’an already sold . You demand someone to read over the contracts and deal with the publishing firm for you — Jack McDevitt tell about selling his first book without an broker , and after he signed the contract bridge , the editor program asked , “ You did n’t really signal that thing , did you ? ” A good agent should be able-bodied to get you right smart more than 15 pct more money than you would have gotten otherwise , justifying their 15 pct fee , because they can expend their other high - powered clients as purchase to get you a honest deal . “ handle this source well , or our famous - author node may end up going with another publishing firm . ” Also , publishers would rather not have to distribute with authors without the pilot of an factor explaining everything and parse all of the contract bridge event .
Get some feedback . Join a writer ’ group , get into a workshop , and get all the feedback you may . If potential , detect a good critic of your piece of work and marry him / her , apprize McDevitt .
If your first novel does n’t betray , you should keep writing anyway . First novels often are deep flawed , and you may just desire to work on something different . Writing a 2nd novel give you two thing you may possibly betray . Do n’t work on the sequel to a novel you have n’t sell yet , propose Frenkel .
But really if you have a sequel idea , you should compose it up , because it may make your first novel seem more marketable , says Gunn . Wherever your originative Department of Energy goes , you should just follow – because a lot of writers enter the discipline with three novels already finish , and release them one after the other .
So how do you know how long a novel should be ? “ A story should be like a dog ’s legs : long enough to reach the ground , ” say McDevitt , cite a writing guru .
You should always communicate intelligibly with editors – even if they do n’t do a good job of communicating with you . Do n’t bow your work at the same time to more than one venue , unless the market allow it and you permit them have sex that ’s what you ’re doing . And if you have n’t hear back from an editor program in forever , you should write and enquiry before withdrawing it . Gunn told the story of her first short - chronicle sales event : she had send a story to Amazing tarradiddle and had n’t heard back in a long time , so she finally wrote to them and say that she was withdrawing the story from consideration . Then she ran into John Varley at a party and he said , “ Hey , your storey ’s in Amazing ! ” If she had just gone ahead and submitted it elsewhere , it might have appeared in two different magazine – causing immense consternation .
Do n’t look down on modest publishing and ego - publishing , but carry in mind that only a few people can really make it work . Leslie What ’s most recent book , Crazy Love , came out from Worldcraft in a circumscribed first version of only 500 copy , but Booklist named it as one of the ten best science fabrication books of 2008 , and it ’s gotten tons of readers and sale . But that ’s a case of a publisher that know what it was doing . “ It ’s worked for people , ” says Gunn , “ but a very few mass . ”
compose short history . It ’s a lot easy to deal a novel if the editor know your work from the short story markets . “ if you spend a twelvemonth writing a novel and they believe it ’s godawful , you ’re going to hate yourself , ” order Jack McDevitt .
take care for reviews of forgetful fiction online to fancy out who ’s publishing cool chronicle aright now , and assay to submit your work there . attempt Locus Magazine , advises Frenkel . The markets that Frenkel search at to figure out which writer are up and coming include the large ones , like Asimov ’s , Analog , F&SF and Realms of Fantasy , plus some on-line magazines .
Send your employment to the biggest magazines first , and then hold off for them to reject your piece of work before sending it elsewhere . Also , the top magazines are the ones that compensate the most , says Gunn . “ You have to have enough egotism to transmit your stuff to the top - paying magazines first . ”
Top image fromCult Of The Giant Brain .
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