<\/p>\n
Ready to get published, eh?\u00a0 Got your 1000 page talking penguin
\nstory complete with glossary, eh?\u00a0 Great!\u00a0 Send it out!<\/p>\n
A-ha!\u00a0 Fooled you.\u00a0 You struck out.\u00a0 Boy, that was great.<\/p>\n
Okay.\u00a0 What did you do wrong?\u00a0 Well, let’s overlook the fact
\nthat you wrote a 1000 page story about talking penguins and jump right
\nto the heart of the matter.\u00a0 Rule number two, after “You Will
\nFail,” is “You can’t get published unless you are published.”<\/p>\n
Business begets business.\u00a0 Money makes money.\u00a0 It’s the most
\nbeautiful paradox you’ll ever experience.\u00a0 You’re doomed because
\nthe person you sent your manuscript to gets, oh, roundabout a kajillion
\nmanuscripts a week.\u00a0 If he or she does not get a kajillion a week,
\nthen you don’t want to do business with them.<\/p>\n
Neat, huh?<\/p>\n
I’m being a little facetious here.\u00a0 There are ways to prop open
\nthe door and sell yourself effectively.\u00a0 I’ll see if I can keep
\naway from Hearts of Iron long enough to talk about staying focused
\nwhile selling yourself.<\/p>\n
It is all about that, by the way:\u00a0 Selling yourself.\u00a0 Every
\ngood writer must also be a promoter.\u00a0 Even though you’re doomed to
\nfail, you must never accept defeat.\u00a0 Easy, right?\u00a0 Sure it
\nis.<\/p>\n
I’ll begin with a story.\u00a0 Let’s take an average day at Ye Major
\nPublishing Company and Ye Major Literary Agency.\u00a0 Mail call!
\nOld man Caruthers shuffles in, the front of his postal uniform stained
\nby mustard and pastrami, and he drops off the big mail bag of
\nmanuscripts.\u00a0 The plucky intern, Lucy McMasters, empties the mail
\ninto a small antechamber containing a pile of unopened letters, a
\nshredder and three industrial-size trashcans.<\/p>\n
She then does what she was hired to do — remove every manuscript that
\nmatches a certain code, be it a person’s name or whatever, and stack
\nthem in the proper mail pile.\u00a0 Everything unsolicited goes into
\nthe trashcans.\u00a0\u00a0 These folks are a little better these days
\nabout sending a form letter telling you what to go do with yourself,
\nbut I wouldn’t expect it.<\/p>\n
Many of the medium and small-sized organizations are a bit more
\nrespectful, though.\u00a0 I’ve heard stories where the manuscript is
\nreturned with the letter…occasionally written on the title page in a
\nhurried scrawl.\u00a0 My favorite story is the writer who received his
\nmanuscript in the return mail with a big red line drawn through the
\nfirst few pages and the words “NOT FOR US” scrawled, in red, on page
\none.<\/p>\n
Cute.<\/p>\n
Now, having some experience in all this, I know exactly what’s
\nhappening. You freaks are driving us all crazy when you send us your
\n1000 page story and glittering cover letter saying how your great Aunt
\nHarriet died and, well, this is for her.<\/p>\n
Even if you’re the next Dickens, the agent (or the intern, editor, what
\nhave you) is going to go fish-eyed when the 5 pound, single-spaced
\npackage of paper crashes on his or her desk.\u00a0 That’s it, you lost
\nright there.\u00a0 Imagine coming into work every day at 8am and
\nreading really bad, hack writer stuff until 6pm, then taking a
\nbriefcase of crap home to read.\u00a0 Not always the scenario, but
\nclose enough. Put yourself in those shoes and ask, “What would I look
\nfor?”<\/p>\n
Short and to the point.\u00a0 There’s the key.\u00a0 A sample chapter,
\na professional cover letter, an outline or summary of the project, and
\na clear statement that it’s finished.\u00a0 Most likely, you’ll please
\nthe reviewer so much you’ll be spared the trashcan…for now.<\/p>\n
In my real life persona, I run a program that requires writers to send
\nin a limited number of pages for review.\u00a0 No more than 75.
\nOver the course of any given month, I can expect nearly 60 emails and
\nletters complaining about the page limit.\u00a0 “I won’t be able to
\nexpress my story.”\u00a0 “I can’t get the idea across.”<\/p>\n
I’ll clue you up — if you have this problem, you shouldn’t be writing.
\nRule number three:\u00a0 Quality not quantity.\u00a0 This was pounded
\ninto your head in freshman English, right?\u00a0 The reviewer doesn’t
\nstart with the story.\u00a0 The secret is (a) to write well and (b) to
\nbe able to finish something.\u00a0 If A exists, and B exists or can be
\naccomplished, then you’ll be closer to the goal.<\/p>\n
The discerning eye can judge your writing within 5 pages.\u00a0 No
\none’s paying attention to the story at that point. Hey, everyone has a
\nstory, everyone has an idea…very few can write well.<\/p>\n
Okay, then.\u00a0 Let’s say you can write well.\u00a0 You have your
\npackage — a good solid chapter, a letter saying this is a finished
\nproduct and listing your writer’s resume, a brief outline of the
\nfinished product and no delusions of grandeur. What now?<\/p>\n
Sell yourself.\u00a0 Whore yourself.\u00a0 Get the Writer’s Market or
\nsome other similar resource, make a list of all the magazines,
\njournals, agencies and publishers who sound right to you, get a whole
\nbunch of stamps and nice mailers and begin the game.\u00a0 It’s just
\nlike applying for a job — send your resume out, if it’s rejected send
\nit out again.\u00a0 Move down the list.\u00a0 Send out a manuscript
\nwhenever you hear a negative reply or if no reply arrives within a
\ncouple of months.\u00a0 At the worst, you’ll get some feedback from
\nthose who reject you.\u00a0 Remember – if you accept failure,
\nthen you have nothing to lose.<\/p>\n
There isn’t a single author who made a hit the first time around.
\nKing?\u00a0 Nope, rejected multiple times.\u00a0 Dickens?
\nRejected.\u00a0 Twain?\u00a0 Rejected even after he got big.<\/p>\n
If you have the final product, send it out.\u00a0 Again and
\nagain.\u00a0 Don’t give up.\u00a0 Eventually, someone will take
\nyou.\u00a0 Fortunately, in these modern times, it’s easy to get your
\nname out there and the writer’s resume is a simple thing to
\ncultivate.\u00a0 That’s something I’ll talk about
\nin February.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[352],"tags":[353,127],"class_list":["post-2582","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gsarchive","tag-gs-archive-2004-2008","tag-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2582","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2582"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2582\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2907,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2582\/revisions\/2907"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2582"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2582"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/greatsociety.org\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2582"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}