Getting Your Book Noticed
This article on book writing is written by one of four authors that help you every week to learn how to write a novel and get published.
This article is by Faith Hunter:
Bait and Hook
Let’s say I don’t have mega-luck on my side. What can I do to make my chances of a first-book-sale better?
Last week I blogged on the reason why a first book by UnPub usually has to be so much better than the bestseller by Author X, Y or Z. Question four I left hanging so I could devote a bit more time to it. And it was…
Let’s say I don’t have mega-luck on my side. What can I do to make my chances of a first-book-sale better?
The answer is – a lot! It’s a writing (and advertising) device called Bait and Hook. Not Bait and Switch, which a lot of writers (and stores) try, but Bait and Hook. And yeah – think advertising.
I love to tell the story of the way my mystery agent does business. He’s a one man agency, and he gets an average of 35 submission s a day, seven days a week, holidays and vacations included. Some are email queries which he handles with a quick yes/no form letter. He has three:
- Yes, send three chapters and a synopsis.
- Yes, send the whole manuscript, and I want an exclusive (not used much).
- No thank you.
That will leave some ten to fifteen manuscripts and three-chapter submissions to read. Every dang day! So, he has a rule of thumb, phrased as a question: How little do I have to read to stop reading today? That is where you, UnPub come in with Bait and Hook, but more on that later. If the first sentence is not a grabber he sends a rejection. If the second sentence is bad, ditto. If the first paragraph is okay, he’ll set it aside to read further. When he has weeded out all but five, he’ll read the first five pages of each. If nothing grabs him, it gets a no. If something grabs him, he’ll send it to his daughter. She will read the first five pages, and send it back with a graded reply:
- You should take a look at this one.
- This one is fantastic!
- This one stinks (lots of those).
His daughter is 16 years old. She has been his reader for four years, weeding out the non-acceptables. Yeah, a twelve-year-old was rejecting writers’ manuscripts, and doing a great job at it. How sad is it that even a twelve-year-old girl can see when a book stinks? Does that mean that your book stank? No. That day he may have been on vacation and he sent out blanket rejection letters. I know, ouch. But every agency has days like that, which is why, if you don’t have a personal entrée to an agent or editor, it become a numbers game.
Example: Kim Harrison. Not name dropping here (maybe a little) but she has a great story. (Jump in here, Misty, anytime!) I was a member of a writers group at the time and was mentoring Kim and several other writers. This was back in my work-butt-off-phase of life which I have thankfully left behind, at least a bit. I was also in charge of putting together the mystery author and agent panel for a prestigious writing conference. I had already met (via Internet) the agent I wanted her, and other the writers in the group, to have. I asked him to come to the event. Kim and all the writers’ group were all invited. Mind you – Kim had already written a query to this guy and he rejected her. He met her, liked her blurb, and asked for the manuscript. He read it on the way home from the event and signed her. Well, he asked for a monumental rewrite, but when she delivered, he signed her. And the rest of history.
Every agent I know has a system (criteria is the polite word) to answer the most important question of their day: How much (or little) crap do I have to read to stop reading today? So, UnPub’s job is to blow the agent away. Bait and Hook. Kim tried it via the standard method and didn’t meet the agent’s criteria. So she tried another way and voila, she was in.
Read the rest of this article titled bait and hook plus read many other posts by four authors that have published over 40 books between them.