Wednesday, March 28, 2012
Alas it has been some time since my last update, and for that I apologize. Though I have to admit I have been entirely to busy to even get a full night's sleep, let alone update a blog no one reads. So since the last update what has changed? Everything. I did indeed indie publish three books simultaneously at the beginning of February, and now as the month comes to a close, I can honestly say that I have learned a lot in the last month. The learning curve has been a steep one mind you, but I am a master at google research, and so have garnered a ton of useful information. As the days pass by I am constantly learning more on how to self promote and market my work, and find that in itself, this is a full time job. But with hard work comes rewards, and as such I have seen the efforts of my time returned in accumulating new fans and followers. Great news for me! I get several emails a week asking for the next book in the series (which is now written, but awaiting editing), and as such I feel that I must have done something right. It is very encouraging to hear from my readers, and gives me hope that one day perhaps I will be able to write full time.
Sunday, January 22, 2012
The Road I'm on....
First off I would like to give thanks to all those authors who have come before me and have taken the time to post on their own blogs and websites their experiences in getting published. Prior to this week I have to admit I was more than a bit naive. Other than several poems and a short story or two over the last decade and a half, I havnt bothered before to attempt to publish any of my work. I have always wanted to do so, but it never felt like the right time until now. So I will share with you what I have learned along the way, and in doing so I hope that I do not offend anyone or reveal any well kept secrets that I managed to dig up while researching the whole publishing game for myself.
I began researching a means to publish several weeks ago as I have two completed manuscripts for my first trilogy, and have begun writing the third. Having always wanted to see my work in a book store, on the shelf, a mere vanity I admit, I began searching for an agent who would handle all the "foot work" in finding a publisher for my first book. Having written what I beleive to be an acceptable query letter, I then emailed it along with the first ten (give or take depending on the individual) pages of my completed manuscript to several accomplished agents, as well as a few who are up and comming. Imagine my amazement when responses began to come back less than 24 hours after I began my submissions. Mind you they were all form rejection letters, but none the less they were much faster to respond than I had even hoped for. Over the next couple of days I had received 6 rejections. No suprise, after all you cant expect to find an agent on the first shot. However I had began to notice a trend in those rejections, nearly from the beginning, and I will share that with you here.
Female agents are MUCH quicker to respond than male agents. It is nice to hear back from them so quickly, but I was curious as to why they may have rejected my work so quickly and so decided to further research each of the first 6 agents who rejected me. I made another discovery almost immediatly, that almost seemed sexist. Every one of those women agents had all women clients who all wrote stories with female lead characters. No wonder I had been rejected so quickly. Im a man who has submited a work that had a male lead character....no dice. After pondering my findings for a day or so however, I made a connection that I had been lacking before, that put it all into perspective for me. The female agents who had dismissed me, probably before even the first paragraph was read, did not do so out of any negative thoughts or feelings to me, my sex, or my work. They simply knew it was not something they could really connect with.
When I go to purchase a book do you know what I buy? I nearly always buy a book with a male lead character. Why? I choose those books because as a male, I can connect easier to the male lead character within the story. For me, until now, it was a subconscious decision. However this realization showed me an error in my way of approaching garnering an agent. SO..... I sent out a few more submitals to male agents as the rest of the female agents had by this time already sent me a rejection. I must say that I have no hard feelings what so ever for the rejections I received from each of these destinguished and acomplished women. At least they took the time to respond instead of just hitting delete.
So began the wait to hear back from the many male agents I had solicited.....Yup still waiting. Waiting in itself may have been a blessing as it gave me a lot more time to do research and you will not beleive what I found. Literary agents, on average, have a 99.9% rejection rate, and they can receive two to three hundred submissions per day! Holy Crap! These are both figures I have gleaned from the pages of agents themselves, but it astounded me further to find that only about 1 in 1000 submissions will result in a request for a full manuscript, and only one in three (or less) of those will end in publication. What is worse than that you might ask?? For a first timer like myself, a publisher is unlikely to spend much, if anything, to promote my work even if they did choose to publish it, using their marketing money for their already established authors. Thats great for the Authors already in their arsenal, but unless you do a ton of marketing for yourself, even after reaching publication, you are most likely set up for failure, or medeocrity at best. By the way, the average paperback now sells for 7-8 bucks, of that, on a standard "first book" contract the author is likely to receive .40 to .80cents per copy sold. Know what else? With all the amazing digital devices out there, printed books are selling less and less, and digital media is growing!
It is with this infomation in hand that I have decided to self publish (indie publish) each of my manuscripts as ebooks. Going this route means I have to pay an editor to perfect my mistakes, and a cover artist to make my work more marketable. Also all the marketing of my books will be left up to me (hence this blog). So all I ask now is a little patients as I work out the finer details. Wish me luck and by all means share this page with your friends.
I began researching a means to publish several weeks ago as I have two completed manuscripts for my first trilogy, and have begun writing the third. Having always wanted to see my work in a book store, on the shelf, a mere vanity I admit, I began searching for an agent who would handle all the "foot work" in finding a publisher for my first book. Having written what I beleive to be an acceptable query letter, I then emailed it along with the first ten (give or take depending on the individual) pages of my completed manuscript to several accomplished agents, as well as a few who are up and comming. Imagine my amazement when responses began to come back less than 24 hours after I began my submissions. Mind you they were all form rejection letters, but none the less they were much faster to respond than I had even hoped for. Over the next couple of days I had received 6 rejections. No suprise, after all you cant expect to find an agent on the first shot. However I had began to notice a trend in those rejections, nearly from the beginning, and I will share that with you here.
Female agents are MUCH quicker to respond than male agents. It is nice to hear back from them so quickly, but I was curious as to why they may have rejected my work so quickly and so decided to further research each of the first 6 agents who rejected me. I made another discovery almost immediatly, that almost seemed sexist. Every one of those women agents had all women clients who all wrote stories with female lead characters. No wonder I had been rejected so quickly. Im a man who has submited a work that had a male lead character....no dice. After pondering my findings for a day or so however, I made a connection that I had been lacking before, that put it all into perspective for me. The female agents who had dismissed me, probably before even the first paragraph was read, did not do so out of any negative thoughts or feelings to me, my sex, or my work. They simply knew it was not something they could really connect with.
When I go to purchase a book do you know what I buy? I nearly always buy a book with a male lead character. Why? I choose those books because as a male, I can connect easier to the male lead character within the story. For me, until now, it was a subconscious decision. However this realization showed me an error in my way of approaching garnering an agent. SO..... I sent out a few more submitals to male agents as the rest of the female agents had by this time already sent me a rejection. I must say that I have no hard feelings what so ever for the rejections I received from each of these destinguished and acomplished women. At least they took the time to respond instead of just hitting delete.
So began the wait to hear back from the many male agents I had solicited.....Yup still waiting. Waiting in itself may have been a blessing as it gave me a lot more time to do research and you will not beleive what I found. Literary agents, on average, have a 99.9% rejection rate, and they can receive two to three hundred submissions per day! Holy Crap! These are both figures I have gleaned from the pages of agents themselves, but it astounded me further to find that only about 1 in 1000 submissions will result in a request for a full manuscript, and only one in three (or less) of those will end in publication. What is worse than that you might ask?? For a first timer like myself, a publisher is unlikely to spend much, if anything, to promote my work even if they did choose to publish it, using their marketing money for their already established authors. Thats great for the Authors already in their arsenal, but unless you do a ton of marketing for yourself, even after reaching publication, you are most likely set up for failure, or medeocrity at best. By the way, the average paperback now sells for 7-8 bucks, of that, on a standard "first book" contract the author is likely to receive .40 to .80cents per copy sold. Know what else? With all the amazing digital devices out there, printed books are selling less and less, and digital media is growing!
It is with this infomation in hand that I have decided to self publish (indie publish) each of my manuscripts as ebooks. Going this route means I have to pay an editor to perfect my mistakes, and a cover artist to make my work more marketable. Also all the marketing of my books will be left up to me (hence this blog). So all I ask now is a little patients as I work out the finer details. Wish me luck and by all means share this page with your friends.
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