Confessions of a Former Query Addict

Happy 2012! 

What a year it’s been. Exactly a year ago, I woke on New Year’s Day to one of those emails that used to flood my brain with a mix of adrenalin, serotonin, and hope—a burst of euphoria that somehow made my life of constant rejection bearable. It’s a high only an aspiring author knows.

There it was in my inbox on New Year's morning—a positive response to a query I’d sent to an agent months before: 

 “Your writing is delightful, and your characters are original and inviting. I would cheerfully read anything you wrote. I think you’re very talented…” I started to squee and do a happy dance.

Then I read on. It was a no.

The agent was turning it down because “the market has become unforgiving of the isolated well-written mystery. Series do better.”

But…it was one of my Camilla Randall mysteries! The only reason I hadn’t mentioned it is I knew a querier shouldn’t mention more than one book at a time. A major no-no. So I wrote back, groveling, saying the book was indeed part of a series—would she, pretty please, like to read book one?

Two days later I got a yes. I sent off the ms. for The Best Revenge.

...and never heard another word.

For all I know, the manuscript is still sitting in some unpaid intern’s e-slush pile.

I continued on this hamster wheel for another—I hate to admit this—eight months, sending out query after query to every agent who’d ever sold a mystery like mine. This on top of four previous years of query hell. Yes, that adds up to nearly five years. (My first publisher went under in 2006.)

And before I found that publisher, I’d spent much of the late ’90s and early ’00’s doing the same thing. Several queries took, and I was represented for much of that time, so instead of query hell, I’d lived in submission hell—another neighborhood in the same arrondissement of Hades, with slightly more prestigious real estate.

It was like being addicted to a drug. Those few “yes” responses--a request for a partial here, a full there, an "I love this, but..." glowing rejection--gave me the highs that kept me going and going, hoping for that one big score.

But I was saved by an accidental intervention by three people: my blog partner Ruth Harris, editor Les Smith at Popcorn Press, and author/editor/international entrepreneur Mark Williams at MWiDP.

Ruth’s comments here on the blog and elsewhere were my first wake-up call. Here was a bestselling author whose work I loved, who had made it to the pinnacle of writerly success—the New York Times bestseller list. She’d also been an editor at several of the Big Six houses. And she’d walked away from all of it in order to self publish. I had to admit maybe there was something to this indie thing.

Then I heard from Popcorn Press—a small indie publisher whose editor liked my blog, admired my professionalism, and wanted a look at my backlist. It took me a few months, but finally I offered them my two backlist titles.

But for my three new titles, I was still jonesing for that big score. I clung to hopes that my latest—the Hollywood mystery, The Gatsby Game—would finally land me an agent. I figured since it offered a solution to one of the ten most notorious Hollywood mysteries of all time—which is still unsolved—New York might see some potential money in it.

In September, I finally got that offer I’d been dreaming of for five years. Here was my big score--an offer of representation!

But it came with an astronomical price tag. The agency wanted a total rewrite. Not an edit. A tear-it-up-and-start-over rewrite. I was going to have to eliminate all mystery elements, humor, gay characters, and ties to the real Hollywood scandal. They wanted a simple, Harlequin-type romance.

Not only was I going to have to give up the story I’d been aching to tell for decades, I was also going to have to erase my own personality: squelch all my Dorothy Parker snark to become Barbara Cartland-sweet

It took me three days, but I finally had to admit the price of that fix was too high.

Enter Mark Williams. He had read Sherwood, Ltd as a favor, to check for the accuracy of my Brit dialogue. He loved it. And it seemed he was starting a new international publishing venture. He made me an offer on all three books—to launch before Christmas.

By Christmas.

Not maybe-get-an-agent-someday and possibly-publish-three-years-later-if-you're-really-lucky. He wanted to publish all of my new books in the next three months. He also wanted quite a bit of editing (Les at Popcorn wanted some, too.) But these were real edits: aimed at improving the books, not just wedging them into some marketer’s wish list. Still, doing them in that time frame--while promoting the other books--seemed deeply bonkers.

I said yes anyway.

The last three months have been a brain-frying marathon, but somehow, all five books were e-published between Sept 28^th and Dec. 28^th.  An amazing example of teamwork. Thanks Les and Mark! Look what we did!

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I also must to thank Laura Morrigan of Covers by Laura, Megan Derico of Derico Photgraphy and Katheryn Smith at Popcorn for designing such fantastic covers.

All five novels should be available in paper early this year from Popcorn. I love the quality of the paper copies Popcorn has done for Food of Love—while keeping the price under $10. I hope they’ll be able to do the same for the others..

And I also have to mention the two anthologies that came out in the same three months. Saffina Desforges Presents, from Mark Willams and co. and Indie Chicks from the fantastic group of independent women authors brought together by the hard-working Cheryl Shireman (to read her inspiring piece, check out my INDIE CHICKS PAGE) 

And I owe a huge amount of thanks my wonderful blog partner, Ruth Harris, for keeping this blog going while I was going a little nuts over the past three months. (OK, a lot nuts.)

Am I saying you should all stop the agent query process and start looking at small publishers? Not at all. For one thing, you generally have to query them, too. And if you’re considering that route, remember small publishers vary wildly. Read the contract carefully and have it checked by a lawyer or publishing professional. They should be offering a much better royalty than Big Six, because there will be no advance.

The biggest drawback with a lot of small publishers is the price of the books to consumers—often close to $20 for a paperback. It’s very hard to sell many units at that price. Ditto high-priced ebooks. Anything over $5 is a very hard sell for a non-name author, so be sure to check a publisher’s prices before you query.

But for me, this route has been like getting off a drug that was killing me. There’s a saying attributed to everybody from Freud to Einstein (but probably penned by Rita Mae Brown) that says “the definition of insanity is expecting different results from the same behavior.”

That’s what I was doing, sending out those endless queries.

From that agent’s rejection I got a year ago today, I should have realized I wasn’t on the right path. Nothing was wrong with my writing, but my work was never going to fit into the wish lists of the Big Six, who are increasingly focusing on a younger demographic.  

But readers are another story. I’m building momentum with steady sales, and when MWiDP offered The Gatsby Game free for four days on the KDP direct plan last week, it hit #40 in contemporary fiction and got over 2500 downloads. And now The Best Revenge is climbing the charts.

I'm not against the query process. I still think most new writers benefit from it, and it's still the most reliable path to a professional writing career. But we also need to know when to quit and try something different..

If you’re young and write YA, especially steampunk or another trending genre, there’s a very good chance you’ll land an agent and maybe even a contract with a Big Six publisher. But if, like me, you’ve built up solid inventory and are getting the same “this is beautifully written, but…” results, it may be time to give up the query addiction and take charge of your own career.

And maybe next year, instead of waking up to one more close-but-no-cigar rejection, you’ll have a bunch of your very own titles on Amazon, available to readers and actually making you some money.

And maybe you’ll even get some good reviews, which are a better high than even a request for a full manuscript. Seriously--way better. I am lucky enough to have had some fantastic reviews from people whose opinions I value highly, like Irish author Gerry McCullough, Canadian reviewer Benoit Lelievre at Dead End Follies , Regency Romance author Anne Gallagher, and Book Blogger Donna Hole  Many thanks to you as well as all the other wonderful readers who have left such great reviews on Amazon and Goodreads.

For a great overview of this tumultuous year in publishing, I recommend David Gaughran’s superb wrap-up post on what happened in self-publishing in 2011.

And if you’re considering indie publishing, read Kristen Lamb’s wonderful post on the subject last week.

How about you, scriveners? Have you ever been addicted to the query process? How long do you think a person should keep querying before they look for another path?

Click Here to go to the Fair

This week I’ll be joining in Susan Kaye Quinn’s Internet Indie Book Festival. She’ll be providing readers with a look at some brand new indie titles for your new Christmas Kindle (I got mine! Love it!) Stop by for a look at some great new, affordable books that were released in November and December.

Why Chasing a Big Six Contract is Like Crushing on a Bad Boyfriend

While I’m teaching at the Central Coast Writers Conference this weekend, we have a guest post from the awesome Michelle Davidson Argyle, Literary Labster and author of the thriller, Monarch, which debuts this week from Rhemalda Publishing. Michelle did an  in-depth study on her blog last year on small presses. That study helped me make my decision to go with a small publisher myself. It’s an alternative most writers don’t consider, but in this era of upheaval, the small press is a strong choice for writers who don’t feel they have the time or skills to run their own self-publishing business.

Right now, corporate "Big Six" publishing can be a dangerous place for writers. Advances are shrinking, contracts are going draconian, and corporations are acting out their collective fears on unsuspecting debut authors. 

A horrific story emerged this week from a debut author who was “fired” by a Big Six publisher just before her novel’s launch, because she self-epubbed a collection of previously published short stories. She’d intended for the ebook of stories to promote her debut novel, but the corporation doesn't seem to care about motives or results. What they care about is that authors to know their place. Which is under a very big thumb. Big Six authors are currently considered corporate property. They are not allowed to write, publish, or distribute one word—even a word written and published before the book contract—without express permission from their corporate owners.

This author’s editor called and screamed at her and demanded the return of her advance. The book is now being held hostage while she goes through an expensive lawsuit. (And she’s been “muzzled” so she’s not allowed to give us any more information on this.) 

The corporate overlords are trying to destroy an author's budding career because of something she did at her own expense for the purpose of promoting their book. (If you want to help, you can buy the ebook of Kiana Davenport's short stories here.)  

I don’t know where the author’s agent was during all this, but AAR's response to the situation has been less than supportive. It seems some agents are more concerned with pleasing publishers than in  protecting their clients' interests. I’ve read about this phenomenon on more than one blog this week. I suppose it makes sense. Fewer editors are buying fewer titles as bookstores close and print fades, but 1000's of potential clients are still showing up in agents' slush piles every week We are expendable.
   

So what’s the alternative to this kind of horror, other than self-publishing?

The small press.

Small-to-medium independent presses are an increasingly attractive alternative.

• Small presses usually price their ebooks more reasonably than the Big Six. (The Kindle version of my new novel FOOD OF LOVE will cost $2.99--shameless plug there--as opposed to $11+ for Big Six ebooks.) This allows new writers to make more sales and establish a fan base.
• Small presses usually pay higher royalties. They don't often pay advances, but Big Six advances now only average in the four figures. (I heard from agent Laurie McLean this weekend that offers of advances of $1000 are not uncommon these days.)
• Small presses usually use POD technology. That means book can stay in print for years. Big Six books often are pulled from shelves within weeks if they aren't meeting sales expectations.

There are drawbacks, of course:

• Small presses ask you to do a lot of your own promotion. But so do the Big Six. In fact, in my experience, small presses actually offer more promotion than big corporations give to non-superstars.
• It's tough to get small press books into big chain bookstores. But the chains are dying.
• Small presses come in all shapes and sizes. Lots are in precarious financial health. So do some research and check them out, preferably with one of their authors, before you sign. Run all contracts by a lawyer. Check Writer Beware and other watchdog sites before you query them.

And remember: a struggling young writer named J. K. Rowling, who’d been rejected by all the biggies, was first published by a smallish, independent press.

PUBLISHING IS LIKE A HOT LOVE AFFAIR

by Michelle Davidson Argyle

I’ve noticed a trend in the writing world lately. Maybe it’s not even lately. Maybe it has been happening forever, but within my own circles it's popping up everywhere. The trend is to make it big as fast as you possibly can. Right out of the gate. Bam. You’ve got it made. Money, fame, a career where you can write books at your own pleasure and not worry much about anything except enjoying respect and validation that the world will give you.

The reality is, however, that most authors do not make it big right out of the gate. Most authors don’t sell millions or hundreds of thousands of copies of their first book (or second, or third, etc.) Many of them don’t even sell thousands. Some not even hundreds. As sad as that is, it’s a fact. Some of my favorite authors have been around for over ten years, and most of them have a huge backlist of books. Get this. Most of them started out small. Their debut novel was not a smashing success according to industry standards. They simply sold well enough to keep writing books and eventually they became more well-known and widely-read. They climbed that ladder nice and slow. They were patient.

The Hook

When you’re an author and you start to look at the publishing world, something changes inside you…like a seductive man or woman eyeing you from across the room, it reels you in. You want to be published. You want it so badly you’ll do anything to get it, and just like that you’re hooked. You dream about it. Eat it. Drink it. For some authors it kind of consumes everything they do. They start molding their books to specific boxes so they can sell easier, bigger, faster. Authors might not mold their books on purpose; they do it because it’s nailed into their heads that if you don’t write X, Y, or Z and you don’t write them a certain way you might as well kiss Big-6 Bestseller Huge-Career Publishing goodbye. So many authors stand up and start twirling around the room with that hot love affair and they don’t look back. They start writing for the wrong reasons—and like any hot love affair it is all-consuming.

Ok, so maybe that’s not you and you write what you want how you want it. There are alternatives to big publishing. Or you can get lucky and someone big takes a chance on you and your work. Maybe what you write just happens to fall into the nice little box the big guys want. Yay!

The Alternatives?

So there are alternatives! There is self-publishing and small presses. Those are hot-ticket items, too, right? We’ve seen small guys go big this way. You can, too. You don’t have to waste years of your life querying agents and piling up hundreds of rejections. Wow, an easier way into the career you want. Sounds pretty great, huh? Just skip the gatekeeper and do it yourself or find a small press. Right?

I’m here to tell you I’ve done both. I haven’t gone the Big Route yet into the huge publishing arena, but like I talked about above, I’m starting small and I’m exercising my patience in this career that I’ve been working toward since I was ten years old. Last year in 2010 I self-published my fairy-tale themed novella, Cinders, about Cinderella after she gets married. It is a tight, dark literary piece that I knew would not sell big. It was small and didn’t fit anywhere. In fact, I wrote it to self-publish it because I wanted to learn all about that arena. So glad I did. Through some twists and turns it landed me with my current publisher, Rhemalda Publishing—a place where I am valued and I’m extremely happy because of it.

So I’ve found a good spot for me, but let me tell you that I haven’t avoided the hot love affair of publishing. I want you to know that it exists no matter which route you take.

No author can avoid the politics, the stress, the nightmare, the beauty and excitement of publishing a book. It really is an intense, amazing process no matter which route you go. It’s personal. It will probably change your life and it’s up to you to decide if you want it to turn into more than a quick affair or if you’re in it for the long haul.

The Illusion

I think the most frustrating thing I’ve seen happen in the publishing world is new, young writers looking at authors who have “made it” and not seeing how hard it was for them to get there. It’s an illusion that they made it big out of the gate.

Some other illusions I’ve seen are:

(1)  Self-publishing is easier.

If you think starting your own business and making it succeed in a timely manner (while also riding an insane rollercoaster of emotions) is easy, you’re deluding yourself. Sure, it can be easy if you don’t put much into it. Good luck succeeding that way. Self-publishing is just as hard as traditionally publishing, if not harder to succeed. It might feel faster and easier, but in the long run it is not. Everything is just spread out differently.

(2)  Publishing with a small press is settling for less.

Actually, publishing with a reputable small press can be a very smart move. As my friend who introduced me to Rhemalda Publishing told me – “A small press can be a really great way to get your feet wet.”

I was impressed that Tinkers, a novella, won the Pulitzer Prize in 2010. Guess what? Tinkers was published by a small press. When I heard that I started thinking about small presses in a different light. All of a sudden they became a little more elite in my mind. Cool. Indie. Smart. And a really great place to start my career.

I happen to write things that don’t fit into any box. They might look like they fit into a box when you see them marketed, but when you read them you see quite quickly that they are in some world just off the mark of anything you’d expect. Quite a challenge to find an agent let alone a publisher for that kind of work. Small press? That’s another story. They fill all those gaps the bigger publishers leave wide open. The gaps where I usually find my favorite type of literature.

Publishing with a small press isn’t settling; it’s simply one step in a ladder going up. I plan to stay with my publisher for many years down the road as I gain more readership and release more books.

The best thing? With a small press you can have a lot more control and say over your work. Less sales? Less money? Perhaps. Perhaps not. Less happiness in your career? No way.

In the end it all depends on what you want as an author. Don’t kid yourself thinking there’s only one way to publish or that any path is easier than another. And don’t jump into that hot love affair with your eyes closed. It’s a wild ride and one that could end really ugly if you don’t research, gain a great amount of patience, and work hard every single day. Luck only happens to those who put themselves in its path.

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Michelle Davidson Argyle graduated from Utah Valley University with a BA in English/Creative Writing in the winter of 2002. To date, she has completed five novels, and has published several short stories and the novella Cinders. With her two fellow members of the Literary Lab, she has edited two anthologies, Genre Wars and Notes from Underground. Her novel, Monarch, a contemporary thriller, was released by Rhemalda Publishing this week.

What about you, fellow scriveners? Are you still holding out for the overnight-success, hot Big-Six affair? Have you considered the alternative of a small press? Are you less likely to read a book published by a smaller press than one with a corporate logo?

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Next week, on Sept 25th, Ruth Harris will bring us some inspiration from a writing superstar—the man who was chosen to step into the shoes of mystery writing icon, Robert B. Parker. Michael Brandman is the television and film producer who, along with Tom Selleck, wrote and produced Robert B. Parker's Jesse Stone movies for CBS. Production was recently completed on an eighth Jesse Stone CBS movie, BENEFIT OF THE DOUBT. After Mr. Parker's death, Michael, who had a long association with the author, wrote a new Jesse Stone novel, KILLING THE BLUES, which debuts with Putnam this month.