General advice from published authors to aspiring writers

[WJCherf]

The mainstream publishing world is a shark tank. Get used to it and move on.

Have faith in your work.
Share it with friends and famly.
Listen to their reactions.

Act on those reactions. Clean up your act grammatically.

Find a good editor that you can work with easily. Whether you like it or not it you will form a partnership, and hopefully, a friendship as well. If you don't click, find another editor.

Once the ms. is in tip-top shape, have some non-friends and family read it. Again, listen to their reactions.

Fix as needed.

Now, if the ms. is ready, screw the mainstream publishing world and put it on Amazon as an ebook and enjoy, currently, 70% royalties. This simple fact is one that no mainstream publishing house will extend to any green, first-time authors.

Now comes the really difficult part: marketing your book. If you went the ebook route then you are computer savvy. Stick with the computer, use social sites, blogs in your specialty (like this one), and do your homework to "get hip" to what is currently working.

[Teresa Edgerton]

Originally Posted by WJCherf

This simple fact is one that no mainstream publishing house will extend to any green, first-time authors.

Not a fact -- as a little research into how many debut authors the mainstream houses publish each year would tell you.

Not very many debut authors compared to the number of submissions they receive, but to say that it never happens is simply not true. Unfortunately, this kind of misinformation discourages many talented writers from even trying. It doesn't hurt to try it first -- 8% of ten thousand copies sold is better than 70% of the handful most self-published writers sell -- because self-publishing remains an option afterward.

[evester]

I find the advise on getting someone you trust to read your work a little bit annoying, writing is my little secret because there is the thing "you are always changing your mind on what you want to do" and I enjoy writing, I enjoy reading. I have told my mum to read one of my short stories, I gave it to her over a month ago and she still hasnt read it with the excuse that she is busy or tired. If even my own mum can't read my work and tell how wondeful it is...whats the point of teling anybody! sorry, my confidence has plumeted big style...

[Dante DiBenedetto]

I remember watching an interview with Elmore Leonard (Three-Ten to Yuma). He said he researched the market before he ever wrote his first short story meant for publication. That was a piece of advice that really stuck me a few years back. He didn't have much difficulty getting published because of that.

So I guess it really depends on how you want to approach your writing and what you prioritize. Do you want to become published more, or do you just want to write whatever whim is fluttering in your heart at the time?

I've only written one short story where pursuing publication was pre-meditated. The novel I'm working on right now is as well. However, that doesn't mean that I outlined tropes/strategies specifically to sell my wares. I simply used the research acquired to help me understand what it is that tickles the entertainment bone of the reader.

I dismiss published authors that like to call that strategy selling out. If they had no idea what the demands of publishing houses and agents were before submitting their manuscripts and their book deviated from the norms, they were ridiculously lucky and should be grateful.

[Ursa major]

If authors only submitted for publication that which was selling "at the moment" (or what was being accepted by publishers a year or more before), nothing essentially new would ever be published, only riffs on what's already out there.

So perhaps it is we readers who ought to be grateful that some writers are willing to risk commercial disappointment or failure to bring us what they hope will be selling in the future. After all, even if we buy a book, it only costs us a few dollars, pounds or euros; the book has cost the writer months (or even years) of toil, without any guarantee at all of a single cent or penny in return.

[HareBrain]

Originally Posted by Dante DiBenedetto

Do you want to become published more, or do you just want to write whatever whim is fluttering in your heart at the time?

That's an incredibly dismissive way of putting it. I don't think anyone who works hard on a novel for several years can be accused of writing on a fluttering whim.

I dismiss published authors that like to call that strategy selling out.

So might I, if I knew they existed. I don't know I've ever come across a published author who said this. (Some unpublished ones, sure.)

If they had no idea what the demands of publishing houses and agents were before submitting their manuscripts and their book deviated from the norms, they were ridiculously lucky and should be grateful.

And so were we. Without that, there would be no Riddley Walker, and probably no Lord of the Rings (Tolkien's publishers wanted another Hobbit, remember). If everyone wrote to the market, where would the groundbreaking stuff come from? We need a mix of both, but I'd suggest we need the risktakers more.

[Dante DiBenedetto]

Originally Posted by Ursa major

If authors only submitted for publication that which was selling "at the moment" (or what was being accepted by publishers a year or more before), nothing essentially new would ever be published, only riffs on what's already out there.

I'm not ragging on authors at all who end up being published without researching the market. Many writers end up doing so unconsciously, simply through emulating their favorite writers. I'm also not advocating being formulaic for the sake of a sale.

I was simply remarking that if your goal is to be published, as opposed to hoping to publish something you ended up writing, then you damn well better make sure you've done some planning, and that the people you're submitting to have published something in the vein of whatever you wrote.

The first novel I ended up writing was purely for pleasure, and had no market in mind. It was a complete joy ride and one of the best experiences in my life. A few years later, I'm looking to write something in hopes of being published. It's just practical advice. It's the same advice any agent would give you.

I apologize if I wasn't clear in my original post. I hope that sorts it for you.

[Kissmequick]

It's perfectly possible to keep one eye on the market, while still writing what your fluttering heart demands. It's not an either/or proposition.

The book(s) I've got coming out with Orbit next year started with me realising I was enjoying the trend of cynical/snarky anti-heroes. It sounded like fun to write one, so I did. (And it was fun). Am I writing hard-heartedly to the market? No, I don't think so. It's still my story, the way I wanted it, what my fluttering heart demanded. Just so happened that the market sparked the idea.

You can look at the market and think, ooh, actually I can do something with that....

Other than that:

Read

Write

Read more, and analyse it

Write more

Observe the world and people around you, in detail.

Study what is selling, and while not writing especially to it, keep the market, and the reader, in the back of your mind when you write.

Critique others' work (you'll find it easier to see problems in others work and then you'll see where you've done exactly the same in yours...). Also pays dividends when you need someone to crit your work. A writers group is great, if you can find one that meshes with you and where you are at.

Do not suffer from Golden Word Syndrome - be prepared to murder your darlings. With a chainsaw and napalm if necessary. You are not a special snowflake, or the gods' gift to the literary world (Probably anyway! )

Remember you can always still learn. There is no 'I have finished' to it. Learn, and keep on learning.

Remember there is no one book in the whole history of books that everyone loved. Develop a thick skin, and know that criticism of your work is not criticism of you. Even when it feels like it.

Then write some more. Always be working on one project or another (even if just daydreaming about the plot etc, which is the extent of my planning).

When it comes to querying do your research. I cannot emphasise that enough. Make sure you aren't querying anyone dodgy (lots of scammers out there, and dodgy publishers too), that they have a good record. Have they sold, or are especially looking for, the sort if thing you have written? Before you sign, ask LOTS of questions, make sure you are totally happy with them.

And cultivate sheer dogged persistence.

[Dante DiBenedetto]

Oh man. You guys are never going to let me live that fluttering line down, are you... haha.

I really love your piece of advice

Read more, and analyse it

Reading with a critical eye has helped me extensively. I have my editor to thank for that. Thanks for sharing your advice!

[Grizzgreen711]

Great advice, most all of it I found early on in Stephen king's A Memoir of the Craft. Still the most honest, inspiring book I've read.

I've found that the more I've been reading, the better my writing has gotten. I don't read with a critical eye, rather it's almost as if I pick up things here and there automatically (or perhaps, subconsciously I am reading with a critical eye). I read for pleasure, and it seems to inevitably find it's way into my writing.

[sknox]

"Write like you have a message from the king"

Love that line.
I don't much care for the "write your passion" stuff. I don't have some dark secret burning my soul. I just have some stories in my head that I think people will enjoy reading, but more than that I have a strong desire to get the damn things written. I want to do the doing of it, to see if I can build it, to see how it turns out. Then I want to hear from others and see if I can make it better.

No epic passion, no swooning needs, and no utilitarian desire to crack a market and make a buck. I have a craftsman's attitude: a fascination with the tools, admiration for a piece well made, and a hope that some day I'll make my masterpiece and be admitted into the guild.

[BetaWolf]

Michael Moorcock http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2010...ction-part-two

1 My first rule was given to me by TH White, author of The Sword in the Stone and other Arthurian fantasies and was: Read. Read everything you can lay hands on. I always advise people who want to write a fantasy or science fiction or romance to stop reading everything in those genres and start reading everything else from Bunyan to Byatt.

2 Find an author you admire (mine was Conrad) and copy their plots and characters in order to tell your own story, just as people learn to draw and paint by copying the masters.

3 Introduce your main characters and themes in the first third of your novel.

4 If you are writing a plot-driven genre novel make sure all your major themes/plot elements are introduced in the first third, which you can call the introduction.

5 Develop your themes and characters in your second third, the development.

6 Resolve your themes, mysteries and so on in the final third, the resolution.

7 For a good melodrama study the famous "Lester Dent master plot formula" which you can find online. It was written to show how to write a short story for the pulps, but can be adapted successfully for most stories of any length or genre. http://www.paper-dragon.com/1939/dent.html

8 If possible have something going on while you have your characters delivering exposition or philosophising. This helps retain dramatic tension.

9 Carrot and stick – have protagonists pursued (by an obsession or a villain) and pursuing (idea, object, person, mystery).

10 Ignore all proferred rules and create your own, suitable for what you want to say.