I receive several emails every day asking me for advice and I always do what I can to help. But a few months ago it occurred to me that if I were to respond to these emails in a more public way, more people could weigh in on the conversation–and more people might benefit from it. I duly changed the message on my contact form, to warn people that their message to me might end up on my blog (anonymised, of course): and here’s the first one. There might be more. I hope it’s a help. Here we go.
I’m an aspiring novelist and recent graduate with a B.A in English. Thus far, I plan to head to get an MFA in Creative Writing in order to network with different authors and beef up my reputation, but I would like to ask if you had any advice for someone wanting to market their book online in order to create an audience. I’ve sent out query letters and of course have been rejected so I posted my book on bookcountry.com to get feedback and created a Facebook page for it. Are these steps in the right direction or am I being naive? What else can I do to help spread the word about my novel?
Years ago, I took an MA in creative writing at one of the more well-respected Universities and graduated with a distinction. I met a few writers there, but have now lost contact with most of them; and despite all the praise that it attracted at the time, my first novel remains unpublished. I’ve not yet found an agent or publisher who has been impressed by my expensive and hard-won qualification, although some have been impressed by my writing. And yet I think that the MA was well worth taking. Because although I didn’t get published, find an agent, or become firm friends with any famous or infamous writers as a result of it, the MA improved my writing no end and taught me a lot about writing and publishing that I didn’t know or understand.
The biggest thing that I learned from it, though, was how many really good writers there are out there; and how it doesn’t matter how good a writer you are: you’re never going to get published if you don’t finish the books you’re writing, if you give up submitting after the first stinging rejection, or if you send nothing out.
By all means take your MFS: but don’t expect it to help you when it comes to querying. The only important thing when you’re querying is the strength of your query, and the strength of the book you’re querying.
You write, “I’ve sent out query letters and of course have been rejected”. Why that “of course”? It implies that you know your writing isn’t good enough for acceptance. If you really think that, you need to stop querying, stop worrying about how to market your unpublished book, and work on making it better–or on writing a new and better book. It could be that your query isn’t up to the job (in which case spend some time reading Query Shark, and join AbsoluteWrite.com where you’ll get a lot of help and advice). But if you think that your book is good enough, then have more faith in it. If we, as writers, don’t believe in our books, then no one else is going to. There’s nothing wrong with being proud of your work, but it’s hard when all you’ve had is rejection.
Should you continue to work on promoting your book online? I wouldn’t. Wait until you have an agent, at least; or even until you have a publisher. At the moment you’re promoting a book which doesn’t exist, as far as the reading public is concerned. Even if you find a publisher for it right now, the book is unlikely to be published for at least another year and when it does appear it might have gone through some significant plot changes, it could have dropped a character or two, and it could even have jumped into a different genre. And your publisher might want to change the title you’ve given it–that’s often the case–in which case all your efforts will be for nothing. Do you think that you’re going to be able to maintain people’s interest in it for that length of time? And if so, how much effort is that going to take? Might that effort perhaps be better spent in writing a new and better book?
Very few writers get their first books published. Some don’t get their second, third, fifth, ninth or twelfth books published either. Some never get published at all. Keep writing. Focus on your craft. There’ll be plenty of time to promote your books once they’re published. Now is not the time.
Such a useful reminder – all the marketing in the world is a waste of time if you don’t have a book that is good enough in the first place!
Enormous sense, Jane, and a great answer to the question. As you say, there’s nothing to market until the book is about to be published, and the writer risks screwing a load of thing up during the process. She/he could still be blogging and networking, developing a band of people who respect her writing (other writing), her personality, her professionalism, anything, and that will all be useful later.
What a great and useful answer, Jane.
Why that “of course”? It implies that you know your writing isn’t good enough for acceptance.
For what it’s worth, I interpreted that as the writer saying ‘I know everyone gets rejected’ and showing that she is prepared for the industry. And I liked that little note – because everyone will face rejection, at one stage or another, and it’s important to be prepared for that without letting it knock our confidence.
A perfect response to a question so many unpublished authors ask. The writing has to come first. Always. Promotion comes only at the point that the writing is good enough for the book to be ‘out there’.
E.Maree wrote:
Ah–I’m being too jaded! I assumed it was meant in the vein of, “publishers won’t take on new writers and reject them all” which is, of course, a myth.
An excellent answer Jane, to a question that seems to be cropping up with increasing frequency. There appears to be an army of unpublished authors trying to increase their public persona before they are anywhere near publication. Don’t run before you can walk, as a much venerated author recently commented.
I, too, did an MA in CW, and though it didn’t do me much good as far as the writing went, I did meet my current publisher!
As usual, Jane is spot-on. And I, too, winced at that “of course”. There no “of course” about it unless your manuscript is not up to scratch and you know it. Don’t test the waters. Wait until you can swim like a fish. And then dive in.
In an ideal (or idealized) world, I suppose, an unpublished book could capture the imagination if the word got round or maybe even intrigue an agent or publisher who stumbles across the website (which I hadn’t heard of, incidentally)or even its Facebook page. But I doubt it.
A creative writing qualification is useful and does no harm but is only one aspect of writing a publishable book but it is in no way essential and certainly can’t help you on its own.
Lie low, spend your energy and time writing, polishing and learning. Selling, promoting, schmoozing comes later. Much later.
I took the “of course” to mean “If the manuscript hadn’t been rejected, I wouldn’t be asking you for advice.” So of course it was rejected: therefore, the request for help.
This person wants to study for an mfa in order to network and ‘beef up their reputation,’ rather than to learn more?
Sounds rather like someone is more enthusiastic about the whole idea of ‘being a writer’ than they are about writing as well as they can.
Your advice is all sound, I hope they take note and get their priorities more in balance. It does seem that an awful lot of aspiring writers are overly preoccupied with the process of publication rather than the process of writing.
I have to say I took the “of course” as “I wouldn’t be writing to you if they’d said yes” which is, of course, true. Tautologous but fair enough.
My instant reaction to the desire to “beef up their reputation” is threefold: I completely see where they’re coming from. We are told again and again from many angles that platform is everything and we start to believe publishers who receive two identical mss from two people with different backgrounds will select one over the other as a result of those backgrounds.
Second, would it make any sense for this person to think about establishing a reputation through getting some shorter pieces published in serious places connected to their genre alongside writing their longer work?
Finally, if it is a myth then it’s a prevalent one and perpetuated by the glimpses we are often offered, but the myth goes that connections get your manuscript under noses you could never otherwise reach. I know of a lot more than one instance of writers who hang out in Hoxton or Shoreditch who every night with industry types who also hang out in Hoxton or Shoreditch and get their manuscripts considerably more than under noses as a result of such out hangings. Again, I wouldn’t say anything other than that quality is the absolute first. But once quality reaches a certain level, it does sound, to people who have watched such goings on from a distance at least, as though saying networking is less important than further honing,is out of touch with reality – at least as far as certain kinds of literary fiction are concerned.
@ Neil:
Neil, I don’t nkow if this is an increasing phenomenon (I remember years back spending longer reading the Writers’ and Artists’ Yearbook than actually writing) but I do think the rise of digital self-publishing has increased this. It’s one of the things that drives me nuts about so many so-called indie authors and the blog sites they all flock to – all of it is about how to publish and how to market, and none of it is about how to write. How very different from when I meet up with writer friends in real life when the conversation is all about the actual craft of things
Dan Holloway wrote:
Hooray!
Hi Dan and Nicola. Hooray from me, too. I understand the necessity of marketing etc but, to me, the writing always comes first and that’s what I prefer to discuss. Too many writing forums are about the nuts and bolts of ‘getting it out there’ rather than the actual writing. I want more of that.
Every time I come here I wonder why I don’t come here every day. You always speak such sense.
Dan Holloway wrote:
I always think that too, and I know nothing
This is often my biggest downfall – getting so concerned about marketing, that I forget about the writing.
And the older I get, the more panicky I can get. For example, I run a literary blog that sometimes gets 10,000 visitors in a month…but I don’t have a book published yet. All of this blogging I do…an NO book.
I long to just devote myself solely to my craft. Wish I could say that I do. But, I don’t.
Love that you focus on craft being the most important thing a writer must accomplish first.
So true.
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Thank you for answering my question. I had no idea you’d answer it directly, actually, so I’m quite shocked and humbled by the help.
I’ll definitely take what you’ve said under advisement. I’ve been gathering resources from everywhere that I can and everyone says something different. The reason I’ve started an online campaign for my work is that I’ve seen several authors who have gotten agents/publishers based on their online presence and fandom. I hoped that spreading the word would at least increase my chances of getting an agent, not because I want to be some kind of celebrity or something.
Also, my “of course” comment merely meant that it’s natural to be rejected. Every writer gets rejected. It’s part of the process of trying to get published. Forgive me if I sounded arrogant or like I don’t believe in my work. I do. I think that my novel is worthwhile, but I also know that it isn’t perfect.
I also want to say that networking isn’t the only reason I want to go to grad school. I want to perfect my craft and work with other writers and learn to be better at what I do. This is exactly why I asked for your help too–I love talking shop with writers and editors and publishers. I learn so much from them, like I have with this very post and its comments.
So thank you, from the bottom of my heart, for your help.
Letitia, I’m glad you found my blog post, and the discussion which followed, useful.
You’re right that some writers have been offered representation or publication because agents or publishers have discovered their blogs: but most writers still get there through the more usual route of query/submission. There’s nothing to stop you trying out blogging etc if it’s where you want to go: but don’t consider it a substitute for submissions.
And you didn’t sound at all arrogant. In fact, you seem perfectly nice and very hard-working. Good luck with your book.