How do you get a book published?

My friend and I are writing a fictional book, it is directed towards teenagers. We are in the very beginning of writing the book. We have just finished laying down the plot and we did tons of research for different characters. We're hoping to get it published but are very confused on actually how to get it published. We were hoping for it to be published by Scholastic but we don't even know how to offer the idea to them. I would very much appreciate if you would tell us how to get a suitable publisher and how to actually confront them with our book.

Dave's Answer:

Congratulations on your tremendous progress with your first book. Regardless of the outcome, it's great that you and your friend have figured out a single topic, done the research and are starting to do the homework of figuring out how to attain your goal of being published!

Now, the bad news. It's tough, really tough, to be published and for every book that's in print, there are a dozen that aren't worthy of print, and for every hundred in print, maybe one squeeze out enough sales to make the author enough for a Big Mac. For other than a few hundred truly successful authors (Grisham, Rowling, King, etc) it's really not a great way to generate income. Falls into that "starving artist" category for the most part.

Having said that, there are a number of channels you can pursue to see if publishing is in your future, and to pursue any of them, you'll need a detailed outline (figure 10-20 pages) of the book along with a sample chapter (again, another 10-30 pages) as well as a smartly written cover letter that suggests target market demographics (for example, urban female teens rather than "teenagers") and explains why you two are the perfect authors for the work.

Scholastic Corp. Because this is so daunting a task and because the odds are quite frankly pretty poor, many authors opt to use an agent who can not only represent them to the publishers, but also take the barbs so that you, the author, can remain relatively unscathed as your proposal produces yet another rejection note.

There are a number of different books on the market for aspiring writers too, and I suggest a visit to your local library and chat with the librarian will greatly help you find the 3-4 classic works. You can also use Google to dig up lots of useful stuff too, including a search for "author's agent Tennessee" to find agents in Tennessee or similar.

Scholastic is a big fish in the publishing world too, so it's no surprise that if you go to its Contact Us page, clicking on "will you publish my book?" reveals:

"Thank you for your interest. We're very sorry. Scholastic and most other children's book publishers do not accept unsolicited manuscripts. Most works are submitted by literary agents or are created under a contract.

Our Editorial Department suggests that you may want to consult the current issue of the CHILDREN'S WRITER'S AND ILLUSTRATOR'S MARKET. It retails in the $20.00 range and should be available at most public libraries. They feel this book is helpful for aspiring children's writers. "

Even given that, though, please don't be discouraged! In fact there are also many more self-publishing options than ever before and your self-published book can still appear at sites like Amazon.com!

Good luck again on your endeavor. There are lots of books published annually and lots of great agents, so between the two, hopefully you'll land your first contract!

Categorized: The Writing Business (Article 7640, Written by Dave Taylor)
Tagged: authorship, book publishing, self-publishig
Previous: What are all these icons on my Mac menu bar?
Next: Mac email has strange numeric charset encoding problems?

Subscribe!

Never miss another Q&A article! Click to subscribe:

Comments

How do I get a literary agent so I can submit my book and illustrations to you?

Posted by: Sharleen Hargreaves at March 7, 2009 1:07 PM

Hi Sharleen. Congrats on the progress with your book, but I can't publish it for you or help you with that. To get an agent, try using Google and searching for agents in your space (children's books, for example). You can also try searching your local area too. Hope that helps, and good luck to you!

Posted by: Dave Taylor at March 10, 2009 11:14 AM

This information is very helpful considering I am a really young writer. I am really looking for a chance to become a successful writer!

Posted by: Paige at April 17, 2009 2:36 PM

me and my best friend want to get our book published please help us

Posted by: allise at June 15, 2009 1:45 PM

I would like to have my book publish.

Posted by: Dae'Von Hairston at May 31, 2010 8:34 AM

I have written a 313 page book on one of the fastest growing industries in the country, time share sales. For 21 years I worked for the largest company in the world, Fairfield Communities, now called Wyndham. Last year, just Wyndham sold 1.6 billion in time sales. For 14 years in a row, out of 600+ agents, I was the number one producer. I titled my book because in 1970, I was the worst failure in sales. One of the agents took me under his wing 10 days before I was to be fired, and helped me.

Today, 85% of all new agents, will not make it for 90 days. They don't get trained. Time share is selling well across the country, but these 85% "failures" like I was in 1970, unless they get help from someone like me, they're doomed. i.e. If an agent wrote $500,000 to $750,000 in one year, they get rewards. In August 1982, I worked 3 weeks and wrote $568,652, a record that still stands today. My plaque with the picture of my face, and the volume number, will be included in my book. New agents want to learn from the best, and I am not afraid to show them every technique I have learned over 40 years. For clarity, this record was for "front line" sales, not "in-house." With the permission from one of my clients, I recorded out entire 3 hour presentation. In my book all of our conservation...60 pages, is typed in 13 front, New Times Roman, and all the rest of the 313 pages is typed in 11 font, Ariel which is me giving the reader my advise. On an 8.5 x 11 my margins are 1.1 top bottom, right left. There is no other book written by a sale person who was the number one agent, 14 years in a row from 600+ agents for the largest timeshare company in the world. FYI my margins on the 8.5 x 11 is 1.1 inches all around. I used 13 font Time New Roman for my conservation with the Fishers, and 11 font Arial Black for all other information / instruction. My book is part narrative / part training. Personally, all other “training books” were written by just “trainers.’ None of these have been in the trenches. I believe, talk is cheap….show me, don’t tell me. Look forward to hearing from you.

Posted by: Patrick Doyle at October 23, 2010 6:38 PM

I have something to say, now that you mention it, but ...

I do have a lot to say, and questions of my own for that matter, but first I'd like to say thank you for all your efforts on this Web site by buying you a cup of coffee!

I do have a comment, now that you mention it!