For thirty years I worked with books: in bookstores and in distribution; as a research assistant and copywriter; and as a promotion manager, editor, and finally, publisher. In February 2022, I left the industry (although I still do some ghost-writing, and some writing for myself). I did it for many reasons, which I won’t bore you with here, but I still get asked by would-be authors how they can get a book published. So, for what it’s worth, this blog gives you my ten cents. (If you want to skip the rest and go straight to the oracle, visit Jane Friedman’s excellent all-service resource on publishing and writing.)

Still here? Ok, then. Be aware: The following words are colored by my labors at a small, independent press, and so may read as jaundiced, defensive, or pugnacious. Not good, I know; but if nothing else, I hope I’ll be able to provide you with some protective armor as you gird for the battle ahead.

Before Writing a Word

The first thing I find valuable to consider when thinking about writing a book is the many other forms of communication that exist: blogs, op-eds/journalism, photography, video, audio, music, spoken word/theater, dance, painting, sculpture. In fact, the Culture & Animals Foundation, the non-profit that I am the executive director of, sponsors and celebrates many such forms of expression on behalf of nonhuman animals.

Depending on one’s skills, background, means, and where we live, these other media might be more efficient and effective for your message. Remember, too: a printed book is a pretty permanent form of communication. You might want to be more flexible, less committed, more experimental. A series of YouTube videos might reach more people, invite more feedback, and be removable whenever you want. Bound and printed words? Not so much.

The second thing I like to keep in mind are the many kinds of volumes that exist: manuals, chapbooks, ‘zines, monographs, course books, novellas, and so on. Each have their publishing niches, markets, and identities. They all demand different skills, usages, and styles. Why write a 50,000 book when, perhaps, you’re better off writing a 5,000-word short story, or a series of ‘zines to distribute to friends or at conventions?

The third thing I muse about are the innumerable genres and sub-genres clustered within fiction and nonfiction: thrillers, erotica, high literature or pulp, memoirs, self-help, history, graphic novels, and so on. Even children’s literature has its categories. There are tons of platforms where you can experiment with writing before you commit to a book: Wattpad is a great example if you’re into genre fiction; Substack is good for nonfiction; you can practice story-telling at the Moth. The good news is that these and many other platforms invite feedback and critical appreciation before you commit to print. They’ll also tell you (and a potential publisher) if you have an audience.

All this is to say that, from the outset, you need to ask yourself: Is the book the first form that my work has to be in, or might it be the end point after my story has tried different formats and modes of expression? If it needs to be a book, what sort of book am I trying to write, and for whom? And in which niche or genre will it fit?

Once you’ve addressed those questions, the next step is to explore who else has written on the topic and in the appropriate format or genre. Publishers are going to want to know how your book is different from and similar to other works; a thorough knowledge of what has already been said or remains to be told will be invaluable.

The Process of Writing

The feminist writer Carol J. Adams taught me a phrase a quarter of a century ago that I’ve tried to keep in mind in all the books I’ve written or authors I’ve advised: Trust the process. Everyone has their own methods to get their book done. Some like to plan the book in advance, others like to dive in; some want to start on page 1, others piece their work together like a puzzle; some write four hundred perfect words a day, others pound three thousand out of the keyboard and then throw most of them away. Some prefer a black Sharpie on a yellow legal pad; I like to type within a 1.5 line–spaced, Microsoft Word document using only Times New Roman 12 point. (I don’t want to have to think about format, lest it distract me.) It doesn’t matter: There’s no correct way to write a book, and no tried-and-true method for making it happen. What you need to do is trust that your process will get you to the end. If that entails long walks, copious cups of coffee, or reclining in bed until noon, then that’s what you have to do.

Plenty of people have opined on the art of writing: Anne Lamott and Stephen King among them. As someone who’s written twelve books (both under my own name and someone else’s), I find the act of composing at once artisanal and magical. Why artisanal? Because there’s a lot of important, skilled construction involved: sorting out where information goes, and in what order; deciding on which details to include; connecting paragraphs; providing a narrative arc; getting the reader through a nuggety section; and so on. It’s magical because sometimes you find yourself searching for an entry-point and you come across a random anecdote, detail, or scene that unlocks an entire chapter or section. In my experience, this dichotomy—between the workmanlike and the miraculous—exist across genres and within fiction and nonfiction.

Now, before we become too dewy-eyed about the process, it should be acknowledged that plenty of published works have prose that’s serviceable rather than elegant, and information nestled beneath subheads and peppered by bullet points. The author may be yoked to professional requirements: the book is for their course, or it’s a manual or a Ph.D. monograph. If that’s your situation, then your task is to gather your material in a way that makes sense to you and the reader, and then lay it out so your reader receives the information in the manner that reflects the subject most accurately.

Preparing the Manuscript

Whether you needed to eat noodles for six months or complete a 2,000-piece jigsaw to get there, eventually (with any luck) you will arrive at a full manuscript. It’s at this point that you’re obliged to be honest with yourself (I know, writing is hard!). Just because you’ve printed a big pile of paper doesn’t mean you’ve completed your manuscript. That pile is likely to be, as Anne Lamott once called it, “the shitty first draft.” In other words, it may say all you want it to say, but it is emphatically not ready for publication.

Why? you ask. What’s wrong with it? Well, as a publisher, I’ve received many such submissions. They often contain much raw emotion that’s been dredged up in the course of writing (and which, to some degree, you need to expurgate if you’re to reach this stage). The draft can be full of vague, declarative statements; information dumps; undeveloped ideas; overdeveloped attitude; inconsistent grammar and spelling; and all sorts of other perfectly understandable problems that would be more than apparent to the writer, if only they put down the tome, waited a few weeks, and then read it again.

It doesn’t matter who you are, or how many books you’ve penned, you’re going to have to deal with the shitty first draft (some reek less than others). It’s going to require more work—and not from your editor. A good rule of thumb is to read the book aloud to yourself. The repetitions, solecisms, non-sequiturs, tonal anomalies, information clusterf—ks, verbiage, and nonsense that will reveal themselves will astonish and dismay you. The good news is that you can fix them, and no one will know any different. If you’re honest (that word again) with yourself, you’ll also find yourself cutting out all the bad jokes, rollicking invective, and purply prose that you thought were (respectively) hilarious, completely justified, and the acme of fine writing. Time can heal all things, and in this case, weeks spent away from the first draft will enable you to be much more clear-eyed about the manuscript you’d thought was finally done and dusted.

At some point—whether on the the third or thirtieth draft—you’ll have checked every fact, fixed every typo, provided every citation (and in a consistent style), and read the whole shebang out loud to your satisfaction. (Don’t worry: there will still be lots of errors!) It’s now time for someone else to see it. Unless they are a particularly honest [sic] critic, a partner, parent, or friend should not be approached. Even though you may get the feedback you want, you’re unlikely to get the feedback you need. Consider hiring a professional editor to provide some polish. If you’re writing an academic book and the thought of preparing endnotes, citations, and a bibliography causes you to break out in hives, you may want to turn that task over to someone else, too. (Don’t expect your publisher to do this for you—unless you want to pay for it.)

Now What Happens?

This next stage is where the publishing industry trifurcates. One group of writers won’t get an agent and will go the self-publishing route (more on that in a moment). Others will send their manuscript directly to the publisher (I’ll talk about that soon, too). And a third will get an agent and enter the murky waters of mainstream publishing. (That, also, I’ll discuss.)

Self-Publishing

Many famous authors began their literary life paying for their own books. Thousands today make decent money, using the many platforms around to sell their books—whether printed, electronic, or audio. You don’t even have to use conventional channels (Amazon, etc.). Instead, you can print your book, go online or get in your car, and find your audiences and sell directly to them. You’re going to have to pay somebody to prepare your manuscript for production: copyediting, typesetting, proofreading, printing, and (perhaps) storage. But if you’re willing to go that route, you retain complete control over the process (including time) and you reap all of the rewards, minus the costs of production and any discounts you give to organizations or businesses that sell the book for you. If you’re good at promoting yourself, like to travel, or are very “online,” then self-publishing may be the best way to get your work out there. For such purposes, you might look at my blog on crowdfunding.

Publishing without an Agent

The job of the agent is to protect their client, and to get them as good a deal as possible. That may mean the correct publishing house for their book, the most appropriate editor, the biggest advance, the highest royalty rate, or the largest publicity budget—or some or all of these. For small presses, such as the ones I’ve worked with, agents are a pain in the neck. Profits are very slim and budgets very tight in such publishers; an agent throwing their weight around making unrealistic demands can be irritating, and may even dissuade an editor from taking that author on. Most publishers are not out to stiff their authors; so, if you’re writing for a niche market, then you may want to avoid looking for an agent altogether.

When approaching publishers without an agent, make sure you know what that publisher wants: a query letter, or a full proposal, or a complete manuscript. Does that publisher produce books in your area, genre, and style (are they academic or trade publishers; adult or children’s market; fiction or nonfiction)? In other words, do your research and match your project as closely as possible with the publisher. Here’s some advice on writing a good book proposal.

Academic Publishing

One area where agents are scarce is in academic publishing. As I wrote earlier, academics have obligations to publish books. But Caveat magister! Many academic publishers—Brill, Taylor & Francis, Lexington, Palgrave/Macmillan, and others—charge the reader a lot of money for their titles (even e-books). On the one hand, that’s understandable: many monographs have very narrowly defined markets. On the other, the price-point for such books means that few students will be able to afford them, let alone actually buy them. And even university libraries may balk at ordering copies. Now, at the risk of sounding cynical, some academics may not care if anyone reads, let alone buys, their book: they can put it on their resume, and perhaps get tenure because of it. That’s too bad: the result of such a compact is that knowledge is not only siloed but embargoed.

However, if you’re an academic who’d like people to read your book, make sure beforehand that you have an idea of the press’s pricing structure (although you may not have much ability to push back against it), that you get a decent number of free books to use as publicity, and you have a handy discount (40 or 50 percent) for the copies you purchase from the press. Oh yes, you should also advocate for a proper royalty rate—around 8 to 10 percent of the net receipts from the sale of the book.

Children’s Publishing

I have little experience of children’s publishing. (Thankfully, there are lots of people who do. You can start here.) What I do know is that publishers expect you to know the age-group you’re writing for, and to adjust accordingly. They are likely to have their own illustrators, unless you are also an illustrator for the book. My gut feeling is that children don’t like to be preached at, and can smell someone telling them what to think a mile away. So, make sure your book is genuinely kid-centered (think Captain Underpants!). Beyond the tone and age-group, the children’s publishing industry is as tough a nut to crack as books for adults. You require real tenacity and talent to create books that kids relate to—as well as a startling visual imagination.

I Have an Agent!

Who gets an agent? Famous people do; and already published writers do, too. So, what does an agent do? Apart from all the stuff listed above, they handle all the money stuff you’d prefer not to deal with. They can give you great advice and take you to the next level of visibility. The good/bad news is that once you get an agent, each of you can dump the other if your project doesn’t sell (usually after six months). Alternatively, you can develop a lifelong and profitable friendship with someone who is your champion and should (hopefully) tell you if your manuscript stinks. Once you sell a book via an agent, you shouldn’t have to write a full manuscript again before you think of publishing. Instead, you’ll be able to write a proposal that the agent will sell in advance, and all will be hunky-dory. For that, the agent will receive 15 percent of the advance against the royalties, 15 percent of the royalties once the advance has been made back, and 15 percent of all the proceeds for as long as the book remains in print. (They may receive a larger share of royalties for film and other subsidiary rights.)

All well and good. But (you knew there’d be a “but,” didn’t you?) . . . You might wait for months to land an agent. And even when one agrees to take you on, it might be months before they persuade an editor to read your manuscript. And then it may be months before an editor agrees to publish the manuscript. And then it may be months before the book is published—assuming that is, of course, you’ve finished it! If you’re patient, resilient, and possessed with a preternatural ability to withstand rejection after rejection after rejection, you won’t mind the wait. Most of us aren’t that Zen.

I’m Still So Confused . . .

I understand. It’s a baffling business. On the one hand, books have value: they are the essence of what it means to be civilized; they are transformative yet robust vehicles of knowledge; they provide the writer with authority (literally), and they can advance careers, bring fame, and (occasionally) even make good money. On the other hand, books of all kinds are so ubiquitous, and now published on so many platforms and in such volume, that it’s impossible to read even a tiny fraction of the ones produced each year, let alone those still available from years gone by. The vast majority of authors remain unread, unremunerated, and unknown. Do you really want to join them? It’s the best and worst of times: it’s never been harder to break through the barriers that protect the Big Five from the mass of scruffy writers; on the other hand, it’s never been easier to get your words into print, or onto your iPhone, or into someone’s ears through Spotify.

In the end, I think it’s best to approach the publication of your book as a set of hard-nosed decisions. You balance the amount of time and effort it takes with the likelihood of rejection (both before your magnum opus is published and, alas, by the readership afterward). You weigh up how valuable having a volume with your name on it would be to you—beyond any fantasies about huge royalties or being invited to visit Oprah for the weekend—to help you move along in your life and career. And you consider whether you can say what you want to say more efficiently, expeditiously, and effectively in another medium.

If you cannot imagine not saying what you want to say in any form outside of a book, and you want to start writing tomorrow, here is some inspiration. Good luck!