25 Reasons You Haven't Yet Been Published

[Katie-Ellen]

Aimed at novelists and screenwriters. A snarky little link, but I find it a liberating up-beat read. Refreshing. The elephant in the room is always going to be...maybe the writing stinks.

Making It As A Writer: 25 Reasons You Haven't Yet

Amongst many other things, the Tarot's Hierophant card represents a past, present or future publisher or agent. Pope Peter! Image by kind permission of Ciro Marchetti.

 

[Paul Whybrow]

Lots of common sense in this article, though your mention of the 'elephant in the room' had me thinking of an old joke about the perils of working with jumbo.

It strikes me as being applicable to the problems we face querying literary agents and approaching publishers:

A man with a carnival had the job of cleaning up smelly bucket-loads of elephant dung. A passerby, who saw him hip-deep in the excrement, asked: “My good man, how can you put up with such demeaning conditions? Haven’t you ever thought about another line of work?”

To which the carnival worker replied, “What—and give up show business?”

 

[Katie-Ellen]

Heheh Plenty of tat published, true, or what I think is tat but others clearly think differently...or it is a case of horses for courses, and if it sells, it's all grist to the mills. Maybe some books are marketed as a book to take on holiday and probably read only once. Others are marketed as books to keep, and both have their place.

I am reading a new novel from Julie Myerson ; The Stopped Heart. She can certainly write, this writer. My goodness, can she, and I think she might have been a journalist. The story itself, I am reserving judgement on...I see the way it's going and it's frightening. Murder, ghosts, ghouls in the Lethbridge meaning of the word, and yet it just says FICTION on the back cover.

Tagline: The Past Never Dies.

 

[Chase Gamwell]

I like this article. I was having tons of issues with all the rejections I was getting while shopping my mystery novel around until I realized that just because an agent says they like "mystery" doesn't necessarily mean they like "mystery". Once I realized this and started actually searching for agents requesting mystery novels - and submitting my queries to them - I started getting requests to read more. Now if my work is rejected, it probably just sucks!

 

[Katie-Ellen]

Your writing does NOT suck and time is on your side.

 

[Paul Whybrow]

I like this article. I was having tons of issues with all the rejections I was getting while shopping my mystery novel around until I realized that just because an agent says they like "mystery" doesn't necessarily mean they like "mystery". Once I realized this and started actually searching for agents requesting mystery novels - and submitting my queries to them - I started getting requests to read more. Now if my work is rejected, it probably just sucks!

One thing I noticed in seven months of researching literary agents and querying 160 of them, is that nearly all of them say that they like 'mysteries' or 'thrillers', but when you look at their roster of clients not one of them writes in these genres! They're hedging their bets, just in case the next Harlan Coben or Lee Child sends them a manuscript.

 

[Katie-Ellen]

The book described above, The Stopped Heart, ghosts and all, is a thriller 'at heart' writes the reviewer.

 

[Marc Joan]

Heheh Plenty of tat published, true, or what I think is tat but others clearly think differently...or it is a case of horses for courses, and if it sells, it's all grist to the mills. Maybe some books are marketed as a book to take on holiday and probably read only once. Others are marketed as books to keep, and both have their place.

I am reading a new novel from Julie Myerson ; The Stopped Heart. She can certainly write, this writer. My goodness, can she, and I think she might have been a journalist. The story itself, I am reserving judgement on...I see the way it's going and it's frightening. Murder, ghosts, ghouls in the Lethbridge meaning of the word, and yet it just says FICTION on the back cover.

Tagline: The Past Never Dies.

Sounds interesting. I'm always on the look-out for new authors. Is she literary in style or more inclined to genre writing?

 

[Chase Gamwell]

One thing I noticed in seven months of researching literary agents and querying 160 of them, is that nearly all of them say that they like 'mysteries' or 'thrillers', but when you look at their roster of clients not one of them writes in these genres! They're hedging their bets, just in case the next Harlan Coben or Lee Child sends them a manuscript.

I've found exactly the same thing. I had an opportunity to do one of those "quick critique" things on a blog. Pitches were posted in the comments and the agent responded to each one. Her profile said she enjoyed mysteries, but when she got to my pitch, it was way too classic for her. She wanted edgy and different. I think that's what most agents want out of a mystery. Or, rather than an actual mystery, they'd prefer edgy thriller/suspense novels instead. The two full requests I just received were from submitting to agents posting that they wanted adult mystery novels on #MSWL. Since I was sending them what they were actually looking for, they requested to read more. I'm guessing that, apart from these two agents, I'd be hard pressed to get any more full requests from cold queries.

 

[Katie-Ellen]

Sounds interesting. I'm always on the look-out for new authors. Is she literary in style or more inclined to genre writing?

I'm still reading but I'd say literary end of mainstream. It doesn't say Thriller on the back, just Fiction. It could say Horror, I suppose, in the same way that Dark Matter might be called Horror. But literary not genre Horror.

It's a ghastly story. As in, horrible. Other taglines could be Love Never Dies or equally Evil Never Dies.

 

[Robinne Weiss]

Re: Chase's observation. Every genre is broad, and some are as wide as the Serengeti. My husband and I both enjoy "fantasy", but some books that he loves, I think are complete crap, and vice versa. I always try to find out exactly which books an agent has represented--some will only do fantasy based in the real world, or steampunk, or dragons--it pays to find out the specifics. I might still send a query to one who isn't quite a perfect fit (why not, right?), but when the rejection comes, I don't fuss about it.

 

[Paul Whybrow]

When researching a literary agent look for their Twitter account, any Youtube videos they feature in, what they've said on Facebook and LinkedIn and if they have their own blog. Manuscript Wish List is invaluable.

They often reveal personal likes and dislikes in these places, that are markedly different to their profile on the literary agency—which is harder to change.

 

[Robinne Weiss]

And, you can find out things like what pets they have...I reckon it never hurts to throw in the mention of a big shaggy dog in your story if the agent owns an old English sheepdog or something...