When Are You Ready? Part 1 of 2 (or more!)

A recent commenter, Emily, asked me a wonderfully tough question: “For me, …I know I've been rejected because the book isn't ready yet. I admire your confidence in yours. How do you know your book is ready?” I realized this wasn’t something I could answer in a few lines, so I wanted to post in reply.

I’m actually going to split this answer into two parts. First I want to take that question and twist it a bit. Since I have decided to self-publish, the first question is not so much “How do you know your book is ready,” as “How do you know the publishing industry will never be ready for you?”

Reason number one is that I used to work in publishing. I don’t want to come off as being bitter about the publishing industry just because I haven’t been accepted by it. I actually never thought traditional publishing was the way to go, but the sensible part of myself told the other part of myself, “Oh just try it. If you fail, I give you permission to go another way.”

Anyway, I spent 18 months as a reader, editor, and marketing manager at a small independent publisher in Baltimore. It was my dream job. I had always wanted to be a book editor, even more than I wanted to be an author. There is something extremely appealing about making other people’s dreams come true. However, I was forced to leave because of the volatility of the industry. As a recent college grad, I needed something more stable—and indie publishing is anything but. I could tell you loads of stories about slush piles taller than me and what it’s like to be on the sending end of a rejection letter. I had to reject books of extremely high quality, simply due to lack of financing to put them into print. Our house only put out about 12 books a year, and we received over 1000 manuscripts in the same time period. The experience gave me a perspective that not many writers are privy to, and it was a major reality check.

But one story stands out in my mind. With one particular novel, Like We Care by Tom Matthews, I saw it from slush pile, through acquisition and negotiation, the editing funnel, exterior and interior layout, and ultimately publication and marketing. (Look for my name in the acknowledgments when you purchase this terrific little book.) Tom is an extremely talented writer, with strong credentials in both journalism and Hollywood. Like We Care is excellent, and Tom has great connections and a name for himself. School Library Journal compared it to Fight Club. Booklist gave it a favorable review, too. We thought this was a recipe for a breakout novel.

But the breakout just didn’t happen like we’d imagined … and it broke my heart.

My takeaway from this is that publishing success is almost completely arbitrary. It frankly doesn’t matter whether Secernere is wonderful or terrible, because whether it sells enough to make back the money put into it hinges on so many unpredictable factors that I can’t control from my end, with my pen and imagination. And frankly, that’s all I want to control.

But I also firmly believe it will never be accepted by an agent or publishing house because it doesn’t fit into a neat little box. Selling in the publishing industry is all about packaging—Who’s your market? What’s the genre? What books are comparable? What kind of “platform” do you have? What’s your 100-word synopsis? (Might I add that 100 words is about .001% of the entire novel. Even a 2-minute movie trailer is over .02% of a 90-minute movie. You’re going to judge and reject me based on .001% of my novel?) Publishing professionals simply do not have the time anymore to read a book from cover to cover and make a judgment based on that. Personally, I think that any judgment based on anything less than that has no merit.

Reason number two is that the traditional publishing model is dying. eBooks and POD books are gaining on traditional large-run, offset printed books. This has have opened the market to anyone who wants others to read their books. Amazon has tons of free eBooks—proof that many authors would rather have a slightly imperfect product actually read, than have a polished, homogenized, rewritten for the workshop, rewritten for the agent, rewritten for the editor, rewritten for the editor’s boss, packaged, agented, marketable, marketed, pretty little book perhaps sit on a shelf, or perhaps sell a little—with the lion’s share of the money going to the publisher.

So my feelings about the publishing industry are what made me know I was ready to go the self-publishing route. As for how I know the actual writing is ready for public consumption … I’ll tackle that in my next post.

More on Rejection

I don't want to sound like a whiner. I'm trying really hard not to sound bitter. Mostly I'm trying to justify my choice--maybe to others, maybe to myself. I feel like both publishing roads--self and traditional--are both difficult, fraught with risk and potential ego-shattering disappointment.

A lot of publishing professionals tout rejections as a way to get tough, to learn to improve your writing, to be vetted against others who know what they're doing. My creative writing teacher at Goucher, the esteemed Madison Smartt Bell, said we all have to grow rhinoceros skin--egos thick and impenetrable. But I think it's a flawed and failed system. I've been rejected a ton of times. I should state also that I've been published multiple times. I don't want anyone to think I don't know what I'm doing. I've had half a dozen short stories published, as well as multiple non-fiction pieces.

But it's a losing game, and the house is collecting way more than I am. That's because of the way the system is set up.

This is a screen cap of my agent spreadsheet. Dark red means form rejection. Light red means personalized rejection. Gray means never bothered to get back to me. Blue was a request for pages, and white are ones I haven't approached yet.

Now, notice I said "agent spreadsheet." The agents are the first gatekeepers. In fact, I would argue that the agents have their own gatekeepers--interns and junior assistants. Who knows how many of the form rejections I got were from these assistants, some/many of whom (I say bitterly with tongue planted firmly in cheek [I was once a publishing intern, too]) are young, naive, unsophisticated, perhaps fans of Twilight, perhaps bitter at their own low rung on the ladder or lack of publishing cred.

So there are gatekeepers before gatekeepers. Perhaps one or more of my queries got past the intern to an actual agent, and then was rejected. Say an agent finally did accept my manuscript. Then they must go through their own submission ringer. The idea is that they have contacts and friends and they know how to shmooze and they know how to pitch--it's their job. But still, they're working with the same manuscript. No matter how good a salesman they are, the product doesn't change. So they're going to get rejected again--possibly by another bitter intern, possibly by a big-name editor. There are many more gatekeepers to pass.

Then the editors have to convince their own houses, make a business case, secure financing. Then the book gets published. But then there are still more gatekeepers--distributors, bookstore and library acquisitions managers, book clubs, reviewers, and ultimately the readers themselves. There are layers upon layers of people just waiting to say, "no thanks."

People in publishing say that passing through all these gates ensure that a fine quality product is put out for the reading masses. Is that so? Then why is there so much crap on the shelves? Why do I still find typos in books when I'm not even looking for them? Why isn't everything a bestseller?

The thing is, I get rejected all the time in my day job. I manage proposals for a government contractor, and sometimes we win them, but more often we lose. This is industry standard; the average win rate for companies in this business is well below 50%. So I'm used to playing a losing game, 40-50 hours a week. But I think that's a big part of the reason why I can't play the same losing game at home, with my writing.

I have the choice to take a different path, and I'm taking it. I'll take unknown odds over known bad odds any day. And if I can load my own dice, so much the better.

Become a Patron

There are centuries of history behind patronage of the arts, with the most detailed recorded history of it occurring from the Medieval to the Renaissance periods. Shakespeare, Da Vinci, and Mozart all benefitted from the assistance of sponsors in the creation of their art.

As it was then, however, patronage now is concentrated in small, powerful, elitist centers—mostly corporations, government, and educational institutions. Whenever control over decisions is concentrated, the art output is purposely or inadvertently homogenized, with a bent towards return-on-investment. This does not bode well for the independent artist, from whose mind commercialization is often far away.

Those arts which can be reproduced, packaged, and commoditized—namely, books and music—are extremely susceptible to death by lack of perceived commercial appeal. Large upfront costs for said packaging and reproduction, combined with the paradox of economies of scale, make independence in these media cost prohibitive for the so-called “starving artist.”

But thanks to the power of the internet, social networking, and (dare I use the term) crowdsourcing, the decision-making power can be spread across the masses and the risk/reward model changes. The risk for the patron is diluted to almost nothing. The reward for the artist is that she foregoes being a (financial, intellectual, creative) debtor and remains the artist, with requisite artistic control.

Over the summer, I will be finalizing my first novel, Secernere, preparing it for print. In autumn 2011, I will be opening a Kickstarter campaign to fund the publication of Secernere, and will be soliciting patronage to help defray the costs related to professional proofreading, printing, and shipping & handling costs. In return, my patrons will receive a variety of rewards, including autographed copies of Secernere, original artwork from the book design, handmade bookmarks, and special acknowledgments in the book.

For a nominal cost—what one might pay for two Frappacinos, or a hardcover of Twilight, or a blu-ray disc—the patron can now directly contribute to the creation and distribution of a new work. Once, the publisher would put out tens of thousands of dollars in what was essentially a gamble, expecting, no, hoping for that return on investment. Now, the investment is small, and the expected return is not financial; it is creative, intellectual, soulful. The patron is not commercial consumer, but a part of the creation myth.

Watch here for more information as we move toward the Kickstarter campaign. If you want to contribute early, please feel free. Your name will be recorded for a reward once they have been determined.

A Glimpse of the Future

One of my beta readers, Jes, loaded up her Kindle with the draft of Secernere and sent me this shot last night. It makes me giddy to see myself in print--well, in e-ink anyway!

Something's Brewing

I'm about to embark on an adventure.

I've decided I'm going to be published before I turn 30. That means I have a little under 6 months.

Come with me. This is going to be fun.

The Best Year Ever?

I was originally going to post this on New Year's Eve, but got caught up, unsurprisingly, in the festivities that come with that celebration, and subsequently with a bizarrely busy beginning of the year at work. Due to a large project being taken off my hands, I've finally gotten a chance to breathe and ruminate about 2010.

I have come to the not-so-light conclusion that it was my best year ever. I do feel like I should qualify this: obviously this was not a good year as a whole--for the country, for the world, etc. But it was wonderful for me, personally, as a personal person, as an individual. I achieved some of my greatest lifelong accomplishments in the past year. Here's a quick rundown of what made this year so good, in no particular order:

• Romantic accomplishment: I moved in with my best friend, love-of-my-life, and partner, Chris, and our three cats, to a really beautiful apartment in Mount Vernon. We're kind of sloppy, but other than that I simply adore living with him. It's pretty darn blissful. Also, we have a working fireplace and TWO bathrooms.
• Athletic accomplishment: I began and completed a running training program and subsequently ran a 5k race. Never having been athletically inclined (or able), and being exceptionally lazy, this was a huge accomplishment. I didn't come in last, or even close to last.
• Intellectual accomplishment: I finished writing my novel. I actually finished. The whole thing is written, front to back, and I wrote "the end." I honestly never thought it would happen. Some weird, psychological "fear of failure/success" often keeps me from finishing ANYTHING.
• Geographical accomplishment: I finally made it to Europe! Ireland counts, right? Next stop: the Continent.
• Professional accomplishment: I trained, studied, took an exam, and became professionally certified in my field. I am better at my job and got a raise.
• Financial accomplishment: In addition to increasing both my 401(k) and Roth contributions, I have began putting money regularly into the stock market and am becoming much more educated on how to make my money work. My portfolio has made returns of 55% and I should have a $25,000 down payment for a house in advance of my 5-year goal. I'm not debt-free (still have that dang car payment) but I will be within a year (the possibility of student loans notwithstanding)
• Educational accomplishment-in-progress: I've chosen a graduate school and program, and have finished 90% of my application. The accomplishment of actually applying will have to go on 2011's list.
• Artistic accomplishmentette (a little accomplishment): I've continued to draw and paint, and I attended multiple--not single--multiple--art sessions with artistically inclined friends.
• Philanthropic accomplishment: I began donating to charities in earnest, with planned purpose. I've succeeded in getting at least some of my friends/family to donate to charity instead of giving me presents for birthdays/holidays.

Of course not EVERYTHING was an accomplishment. My partner went through some significantly rough professional times that has added a lot of stress to our otherwise blissful romance. I had a falling out with some family members that has created a rift wider than I like to think about. I still find myself scattered among too many desires and pleasures, and still don't know exactly how to spend my time and energy. I am still struggling with spiritual and religious questions.

But I know that 2010 was a stepping stone for even better things to come. This is my last year as a 20-something, and I feel like I have the whole world to look forward to.

Ahh! Bag Monsters!

This has a little of everything I love: random public art, trash recycled as awesomeness, monsters.