V interesting - thanks! One great thing about Substack is that it gives wonderful writers (like Emma) an addition income stream from people who appreciate their work and wisdom.
FWIW my daughter is a successful professional writer in the US, with 12 published books published by 3 publishers in the last 5 years, which sell pretty well. She has no agent, and is not bothered about Advances because her books always earn a lot more in royalties.
IF (as I very much hope) my Alice & Anselm novel goes out to a highly competitive auction I will try to persuade the Agent that the Auction should be about who will commit most to promoting the book. We'll see - and cross that bridge when we come to it!
Congratulations on your daughter's success and hopefully your own! Totally agree - Emma deserves to be paid for her work and her wisdom. Regarding promoting books - I agree, if publishers won't promote your book, then it's very hard to sell copies. You might consider getting your agent to lean on the publisher to find out exactly what their plans are. In my experience, publishers will promise the earth, but not always deliver. They often have publicity plans that they don't fully share with the author. For instance, publishers now have to pay supermarkets and retailers to stock copies of books, more if they want to have the book in a prominent position. So sometimes there's not enough money in the budget to do this, and pay for, say, widespread Facebook advertising. Knowledge is power!
May 24Liked by Emma Darwin, Wild Writing with Sanjida
Thanks. Fiction seems to be a Different World & I almost certainly need an Agent. It’s on submission to 7 at present. One major Independent Publisher looked at it & decided it wasn’t quite right for them but the head of their Crime biz was encouraging & said we’d get an agent. 🤞🤞
May 24Liked by Emma Darwin, Wild Writing with Sanjida
Nodded the whole way through this. Great article - I mean, depressing, but great! :) A real sanity check and a reminder that writing novels is hard, hard work, but man it's great too! :)
It's one reason I always suggest it's folly to write anything for which the *only* point is to get published. Of course we all want our writing to reach a zillion readers and/or make tons of money. The only way to really waste your life on writing is if your only feeling about anything that doesn't find a home is that you wish you'd never bothered...
V interesting - thanks! One great thing about Substack is that it gives wonderful writers (like Emma) an addition income stream from people who appreciate their work and wisdom.
FWIW my daughter is a successful professional writer in the US, with 12 published books published by 3 publishers in the last 5 years, which sell pretty well. She has no agent, and is not bothered about Advances because her books always earn a lot more in royalties.
IF (as I very much hope) my Alice & Anselm novel goes out to a highly competitive auction I will try to persuade the Agent that the Auction should be about who will commit most to promoting the book. We'll see - and cross that bridge when we come to it!
Congratulations on your daughter's success and hopefully your own! Totally agree - Emma deserves to be paid for her work and her wisdom. Regarding promoting books - I agree, if publishers won't promote your book, then it's very hard to sell copies. You might consider getting your agent to lean on the publisher to find out exactly what their plans are. In my experience, publishers will promise the earth, but not always deliver. They often have publicity plans that they don't fully share with the author. For instance, publishers now have to pay supermarkets and retailers to stock copies of books, more if they want to have the book in a prominent position. So sometimes there's not enough money in the budget to do this, and pay for, say, widespread Facebook advertising. Knowledge is power!
That's lovely to hear Nicholas - well done to your daughter. I'll cross my fingers (and toes) for you following in your daughter's footsteps :)
Thanks. Fiction seems to be a Different World & I almost certainly need an Agent. It’s on submission to 7 at present. One major Independent Publisher looked at it & decided it wasn’t quite right for them but the head of their Crime biz was encouraging & said we’d get an agent. 🤞🤞
Oh, well that does sound encouraging, yes indeed. Well done! :)
Nodded the whole way through this. Great article - I mean, depressing, but great! :) A real sanity check and a reminder that writing novels is hard, hard work, but man it's great too! :)
It's one reason I always suggest it's folly to write anything for which the *only* point is to get published. Of course we all want our writing to reach a zillion readers and/or make tons of money. The only way to really waste your life on writing is if your only feeling about anything that doesn't find a home is that you wish you'd never bothered...