Understanding the Industry
When I was a little girl and people asked me what I wanted to be when I grew up my answer was always the same, “A writer, a teacher, a candy-striper and a mommy.” Since that time, I have volunteered as a teacher for church and civic groups, worked in a local hospital, and am an extremely proud mother. So when I started working on my first novel a few years back, I thought to myself, “Easy peasy! I’ll type this up, send it to a big Publishing House and await their phone calls begging to print my manuscript. Then I can just bask in the awesome wonderfulness that is me.”
Sounds like a great plan, eh? Only one problem. I was living in FANTASYLAND.
Publishers are not sitting around waiting to hear from you. You can’t slap sixty-thousand of your brilliant words into Microsoft and then relax until the big, fat royalty checks start pouring in. It just doesn’t work that way. How does it work? Gee, I’m glad you asked.
1. Produce a quality manuscript.
Make your outline, write your rough draft. Edit your manuscript. Edit it again. Ask your best friend to edit it. Ask your high school English teacher to edit it. Ask the freaky-looking dude in your kid’s carpool line to edit it. Then, if you can afford it, hire a pro and let them beat the crap out of it with a red pen. Trust me. Just do it.
2. Do your research.
What genre is your novel? What agents rep in that category? What are their submission guidelines? What is the best method for contacting them?
3. Send out query letters.
Literary agents accept letters (called query letters) in which you give a brief description of your manuscript, identify the genre, offer any pertinent education or experience you have under your belt, and ask if they will consider reviewing your manuscript. (Do NOT send them a copy of your manuscript thinking once they see it in all its glorious wonderfulness they will read it and offer to represent you on the spot. Trust me, they won’t. Into the great wastebasket abyss it will go.)
4. Get a request for a manuscript.
Keep sending out those queries and hopefully (maybe, surely, possibly) one day you will hook an agent’s attention and he/she will pull your manuscript from the gloomy depths of the slush pile. So, when an agent requests a partial or full manuscript, send it in and hope for the best.
5. Secure an agent.
When an agent agrees to represent you, it is time to celebrate. Enjoy. (But remember you haven’t “arrived” yet. There is still a long way to go.) And just a note for newbies about agents. No reputable literary agent will EVER demand money or charge fees for reading your manuscript or agreeing to rep you. They get their cut later—when they sell your manuscript to a publisher.
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