Can You Compete for an Agent’s or Editor’s Time?

Aspiring authors often seem puzzled that their work isn’t read more carefully, or positively, or even at all, when they send their work out to an agent or an editor.

Those would-be authors aren’t thinking enough about the competitive pressure on the gatekeepers’ time. Editors and agents have a lot of hot projects, and to add another to their list means you need to deliver a truly compelling work . . . good enough to make them put aside something else.

Yes, your work may be perfectly fine. Readable and enjoyable. Yeoman plot. Likable hero. All that. But agents and editors have a lot of that already. You need to compete for their attention, and compete hard. You need to knock their socks off.

And quickly. If you are a new author, it had better happen in the first few pages.

Here’s how it looks from a busy editor’s point of view. This is a perspective shared at a WisCon 2009 panel a few weeks ago by James Frenkel, senior editor of science fiction titles for Tor Books.

Frenkel was talking to an audience of mostly would-be authors. He said, okay, it might help to understand my professional priorities as an editor. The top projects on my desk, he said, are sequels by bestselling authors already in the Tor line-up. (Makes a lot of sense, doesn’t it? These are lucrative projects with a built-in audience, likely to sell and also will promote earlier work in the series.)

Then, he said, next in line are new queries or manuscripts by other bestselling authors at Tor, although not necessarily sequels. (Makes a lot of sense; these are proven authors in which Tor already has a relationship and an investment. More work by these good authors will likely pay off.)

Then, Frenkel looks at new work by bestselling authors from the outside, pitched to him by top agents. (Makes sense; these are from authors and agents who have proven themselves, although not at Tor.)

Then, he looks at proposals from new authors . . . sent to him via top agents who also represent bestselling authors. (Makes sense; these agents know the business and have a track record of identifying successful writers and material.)

Then . . . Frenkel paused and looked at the aspiring authors in the room . . . “If I have time, I look at you.”

Clearly, there’s not a lot of time left. That’s the way the business works. Publishers, editors, agents, marketing departments, all are busy working with people who have already shown signs of success. They already have a lot of viable projects on their desks.

Frenkel clearly would love, as does any editor, to discover new talent. But his and others’ time is limited.

No, it’s not impossible to break in. But to do it, you need to gird your loins to compete, and compete hard. If one of those agents or editors does get a few moments to riffle through a slush pile . . . you need to make your manuscript sparkle . . . quickly, convincingly, without any quibbles or concerns or dull spots or wasted words.

We all have to compete, even (as you can see from Frenkel’s hierarchy of attention) those much higher in the queue than you or me.

So . . . make the most of any chance you get. Write a couple of first pages that are teeming with the “wow!” factor, that are really outstanding (not just competent), that fire a reader’s immediate curiosity about what comes next. Make us say, “Hey, that’s remarkably good. I’ll read some more.”

“I’ll read more . . . despite all the pressures on my time . . . despite all the other projects piled on my desk that are so likely to succeed and fund my paycheck.”

Can you do that? The opening lines should be fantastic. The first page must be great. And the following several pages should be brisk and bold and brilliant with the promise of a wonderful story.

Curb Appeal: Staging your Literary Work

What is curb appeal?

According to the real-estate business, curb appeal is what potential buyers see first when they drive up to your property that’s for sale. It “embraces everything between your front door and the street” (per the MyHomeIdeas site).

That site goes on to note: “It doesn’t take much to make dramatic style improvements.” Tips include adding flower boxes or a nicer mailbox, trimming the shrubs, etc.

“With a little faith in your vision, and a few tips from the pros,” they say, “you can transform a dowdy exterior to an inviting, welcoming entranceway.”

Well . . . same for your manuscript.

Like staging a house for sale, to prepare your work to pitch to others, think more about the buyer’s interests. What will draw them in off the street and get them in the door?

Yes, you’re terribly fond of that wildflower patch in the yard, or the abstract painting in the foyer, but will it turn off a group of potential buyers before they get far inside? Will they really love your herb garden . . . or see it as a nightmare to maintain? That family photo means so much to you . . . but take it down . . . if you want to let buyers enter and imagine themselves in the home as their own.

We’re talking metaphorically, about your writing.

What are common techniques to “stage” your work for curb appeal?

1. For god’s sake, clean up the place. Fix the most visible problems!

2. Consider: what is the likely audience? And what do they want in a reading experience?

3. How do I attract the quick look online, the drive-by eyeballing of the place, the noncommittal “check-it-out” tour?

4. Are you able to stage it yourself? Or would you benefit from the help of a professional?
Literary agents, book doctors, and editorial consultants – like me – do a lot of “staging”; we think about how your work will appeal to readers (other than you!) and how to put its best foot forward.

To stage your manuscript, here are a few quick ideas.

1. Does the tentative title appeal to your audience?
Have you tested it vs. other possible titles with a small group? Seriously, the best title isn’t the one you like, but the one that attracts others who don’t know anything about what’s inside the work. I often go to a bookstore for this; bookstore staff, if they have a minute, often have great insight into which title might appeal more than another.

2. Have you written a compelling, brief – but confident and impressive – bio of you as author?

3. Do you have any evidence of testimonials or feedback from typical users/readers, any indication of interest from others?
Or evidence of comparable sales of nearby, truly similar properties?

4. How compelling is the first page or two, really?
Would you buy the book, or invest more time to examine it, based on the first paragraphs?

5. If nonfiction, is the table of contents clear and revealing of what’s inside?
Maybe it’s just me, but I shy away from cute chapter titles; I think it shows a lack of understanding of how a book sells and what a reader wants in a table of contents . . . not to be amused by your cleverness . . . they want to know what the book’s about and be able to find things in it!

6. Personally, I am a fan of the good epigraph quote.
These are placed at the front of the book. The epigraph to Dostoevsky’s The Brothers Karamazov is from the Bible. “Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone: but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit.”

A clever epigraph, maybe an intriguing, pertinent quote from a literary giant of the past, is like that trim and colorful flowerbox . . . it doesn’t turn anyone off, but attracts those who enjoy those things.

7. A preface, by a famous person, is generally a good thing.
People know they can skip it, that it’s not essential to the work and was written afterward by someone else. It will impress some, and be quickly skipped by others.

8. A prologue by the author, on the other hand, is not always as good an idea as it seems (especially for fiction).
If it’s there, it should be brief, and very intriguing. If it’s too long, it’s hard to skip, but slows things down from the start instead of plunging the reader into the work. To me, it just raises the question of why you feel the reader needs to know some background before starting the real story.

9. A great pitch paragraph is always appreciated by everyone.
Can you sum up your book in 3-4 paragraphs? Or your story or article in a line or two? A good pitch identifies the neighborhood (genre) of the work, and the style, and mentions a couple of great features that everyone is sure to love. Is it a bungalow or a ranch-style or a brownstone? And how many bathrooms?

Buyers don’t want to hear: “it’s hard to describe” or “it’s a unique combo Tudor/bungalow/ranch.” Most buyers will say “Yikes!” and look elsewhere.

So . . . pretend for a moment that you’re starting to consider buying a house. What do you scan for? When you’re ready to check out a specific property, what do you want to see as you approach?

A nice description of the property? A good neighborhood? A successful broker showing it? A well-kept front yard? A few points of appeal as you enter? A welcoming feel? Nothing to turn you off before you get too far? A sense that the place might fit you?

Now, think of your manuscript as that property.

What the literary curb appeal?

Yes, eventually, it’s a matter of the quality of your writing. But if you don’t get them to look at the place, you aren’t going to sell it.

You Need to Beat the Competition

Here’s a tough-love news flash:
To Get Published, You Need to Beat the Competition!

It’s a fundamental problem I see in a lot of aspiring, emerging writers. First, their work is pretty good. Second, their work isn’t good enough.

Why not? Well, it isn’t original or appealing enough to draw a reader away from other well-known books & authors already existing and successful in your field or genre.

You need to recognize and try to beat the competition.

To succeed, your work has to be appealing enough to make someone who doesn’t know you from Adam (or Eve) grab their wallet (or metaphysical wallet of time and attention) and spend it on you and your writing.

In the real world, you’re asking a reader to turn away from other, let’s face it, compelling and well-marketed work, to buy yours instead.

Instead. That’s a key word.

Beginning authors don’t think enough about the high bar of existing competition.

Take a moment to think seriously about how you go about buying a book. What’s your threshold to open your wallet and hand over real cash?

Imaging yourself going into a bookstore, or shopping for a book online. Better yet, go ahead. Do it. Shop for a book in your field. (Thinking all the time of why someone would choose your work over it and others.)

What makes you a) select a book to look more closely at, and b) decide to buy it?

Really. What does the trick?

• You need to encounter it first. How did you find it? Is it visible in the “aisles” you travel?
• You quickly eyeball the cover.
• You ask, “Have I heard good things about that book or that author?”
• You look at it a bit more. You read the back cover.
• Does the back cover deliver: Great summary? Great reviews? Is it clearly what I like/want to read?
• You might read the first page.
• Or you open it at random in the middle and scan a paragraph or two.
• If it’s a nonfiction book. you might check the table of contents, or the index.

All through the process, you’re asking: What is so special about this book that I should buy it and not the bestselling, recommended, well-reviewed book next to it?

It’s a very high bar. The catch: It isn’t good enough to write something that people will like after they’ve read it. You need to get them to like it before they’ve read it . . . to get them to buy it.

So . . . can you tell me in 1, 2, 3 sentences, why your work is intriguing, appealing, different, dramatic?

If nonfiction, can you tell me why it’s well organized, useful, a fresh take on old subject, what niche it fills, how it’s different from other similar books?

Learn to pitch your work to a literary agent or editor or reader in a way that shows that you know the competition, explaining how your book matches up well enough to win readers.

As business consultant Rhonda Adams said in a great short article (“Great Faith. Great Doubt. Great Effort.”) included in The New Writer’s Handbook, Vol 2, and also found on her website), a key factor in your success is Great Doubt.

Great doubt, not about your abilities! . . . but about the marketability of your product.

Why, why, why . . . will they buy my book/literary work? (Instead of another choice?)

Vive la différence! What’s different and most appealing? Find it, and add to it. Boost it. Push it forward. Cut out clichés and common stuff. Be more . . . something! (quirky, suspenseful, well-organized, whatever).

[next post to come soon: Delivering More Appeal]

The Succinct Pitch: Why It Works

“I am a Bear of Very Little Brain, and long words Bother me.”
– A.A. Milne, in Winnie-the-Pooh

Short words and phrases are effective. Whether it’s a query letter to an agent, or a review blurb excerpt, keep it short and sweet, and you’ll impress more than you would with a long version.

Why is the short pitch so effective? Because an appealing, succinct summary of a work is a likely indicator of the nature of the work itself: good focus, clear communication, and good storytelling – all of which we want and expect in our reading materials, whether for pleasure or profession.

This is why the movie or book blurb is so effective:

“Thrilling.” “Great storytelling.” “A real page-turner.” “Essential.”

It’s the shortest version of a pitch. This ultra-short approach is not just a marketing gimmick or a problem of tight space. It’s an effective bit of quick communication.

If you’re a chef, you know the value of what’s called a reduction. For Christmas dinner in our household, we tackle a different country’s holiday menu each year. This year was Spain. I made some tasty seafood crepes. One of the great ingredients was the cooking liquid (mostly wine) in which I’d just poached some red snapper and crab. That pan-full of liquid was then reduced, by boiling it for a while, to a tiny amount, just a half cup. Wow! It was bursting with a savory, delightful flavor – not something you could buy in a store – which I used to flavor the fish and creamy nutmeggy stuffing, with a sherry cream sauce on top . . . yummm!

The same is true for your pitch. Start with a paragraph. Then, boil it down, Reduce it to a couple of sentences. Then, cut those sentences to a shorter form. What are the fewest key words that best sum up your work, in a quick, essential, delightful way?

If you can’t describe a book in one or two pithy sentences that would make you or my mother want to read it, then of course you can’t sell it.
— Michael Korda, editor-in-chief, Simon & Schuster

Why does this work?

1. We’re all busy.
Tell it quickly, make it exciting and brief, then be done. Trying to cram more at me than I want to hear, especially at first when I just want to know if it’s even the type of thing I like, is not going to put me in a better mood about you and your work.

2. You can quickly tell a lot.
By reading just a little bit, using a professional instinct developed over many years, a professional can get a good sense of the potential of a longer work. (It’s fractal theory; the small bits reflect the work as a whole.)

3. It’s a fair test.
Hey, you’re claiming to be a good writer. If so, it’s fair to ask you to find and quickly tell me the core essence – the one- or two- or three-line short description – that will create interest and inspire everyone, from agent to reader, to want to find out more.

4. Less is more.
Fewer words carry more meaning. They are powerful, selective, intriguing. Whatever the length, people like richness, and, like making a great sauce in cooking, that is achieved with concentration, not watering it down.

As one agent said about pitching, “There’s no need for flowery language – I can read between the lines, so the shorter the better.”

Business intuition is a highly evolved set of deep knowledge. The more complex a decision (the less quantifiable or black and white it is), often the more the call is made quickly, based largely on instinct.

So boil it down. Go for that ultimate reduction, bursting with flavor. You’ll impress your readers, and can enjoy seeing them beg for more, like hungry guests and a plate of seafood crepes at Christmas dinner.

It has often been said
there’s so much to be read,
you never can cram
all those words in your head.

So the writer who breeds
more words than he needs
is making a chore
for the reader who reads.

That’s why my belief is
the briefer the brief is,
the greater the sigh
of the reader’s relief is.

– Dr. Seuss (Theodor Seuss Geisel)

Top Ten Books for Writers (recommended book #1)

I’ve decided to review my library of hundreds of books of writing advice and put together a list of a small number of top recommendations for your library. I’ll review my favorites and compile a list of the essential works (IMHO) for writers (to be kept on a permanent page of my blog).

I’ll tell why I think a particular book makes the top list.
Here’s the first (in no particular order) likely candidate:

The First Five Pages
A Writer’s Guide to Staying Out of the Rejection Pile
by Noah Lukeman (1999, paperback 2005)

To order from Amazon.com, click here.

Focus: Fiction, but with application for nonfiction projects
Audience: Emerging writers

Why I’m recommending this: it delivers lucid, crucial knowledge about writing well. But most of all, it drives home the industry imperative: you must make a (nearly) perfect impression in the first several pages. It’s how the industry works. And as a practical principle, it holds water. If the first 5 pages don’t impress, why would the rest? If you doubt this, pick a favorite book from your bookshelf and read the first 5 pages. Are you impressed?

Let’s face it, many books pitch well. A great several-paragraph pitch to an agent can be written for most projects. A bigger test comes in the first reading at the agency (or publisher). This will be done by a very busy person, one who has an incredible quantity of other works at their fingertips to consider.

So the real value of this work on craft is in combining the issues of craft (found elsewhere) with that filter of always keeping in mind the realities of the business: you need to impress the influential people in the middle (agents, editors) . . . and you need to always remember that all readers are busy, easily distracted, unwilling to part with their hard-earned money and precious time, and that there is a ton of competition easily available. Impress (and do it from the beginning), or readers will turn elsewhere.

Furthermore, learning to please and impress and tempt in the first 5 pages is a skill that can be repeated, once you know how, throughout the book.

In a 2000 interview with Catherine Tudor at Prairie Den, Lukeman summarized the rationale:

. . . [W]riters should worry about their craft before plot. I can’t tell you how many queries I receive where writers emphasize what great stories they have; that may be so, but nevertheless, if the craft isn’t there, if the execution isn’t up to par, it doesn’t matter. It’s like someone who has a great idea for a song, but doesn’t know how to play the piano.

Here’s an excerpt from the book’s introduction, explaining why 99% of unsolicited manuscripts end up tossed the reject pile:

When most professional literary agents and book editors hear the title of this book, they grab my arm, look me in the eyes and say, Thank you. I can see their pent-up frustration at wanting to say so many things to so many writers and simply not having the time. I’ve come to understand this frustration over the last few years as I’ve read thousands of manuscripts, all unbelievably with the exact same type of mistakes. From Texas to Oklahoma to California to England to Turkey to Japan, writers are doing the exact same things wrong.

While evaluating more than ten thousand manuscripts in the last few years alone, I was able to group these mistakes into categories; eventually, I was able to set forth a definite criteria, an agenda for rejecting manuscripts. This is the core of The First Five Pages: my criteria revealed to you.

Thus, despite its title, this book is not just about the first five pages of your manuscript. . . . It assumes that if you find one line of extraneous dialogue on page 1, you will likewise find one line of extraneous dialogue on each page to come.  . . . This book will teach you the step-by-step criteria so that you, too, might develop that acute ear and make instant evaluations. . . .

For the rest of this excerpt, click here:

Author Credentials: Noah Lukeman runs Lukeman Literary Management Ltd, a New York–based literary agency, founded in 1996. His clients include winners and finalists of the Pulitzer Prize, American Book Award, National Book Award, Edgar Award, Pacific Rim Prize, and multiple New York Times bestsellers.

Pitching Nonfiction (in a Nutshell)

“If you can’t describe a book in one or two pithy sentences that would make you or my mother want to read it, then of course you can’t sell it.”
— Michael Korda, editor-in-chief, Simon & Schuster, quoted in the Wall Street Journal, June 26, 1984 (and included in The Quotable Writer, ed. by William A. Gordon (MacGraw-Hill, 2000)

We’ve talked about pitching fiction. Well, nonfiction is pitched in a similar way — in 3–4 sentences — especially narrative nonfiction. (What is narrative nonfiction? It’s nonfiction with lots of storytelling and a narrator . . . hence the term. It brings the subject to the personal level; you look over the shoulder of the narrator who discovers or experiences the subject, often in real-time, with some flashbacks, etc., like a travelogue.)

Here are examples of nonfiction pitches from a favorite source: Book-of-the-Month Club (BOMC). Note how each paragraph sells the book in 3 or 4 sentences. It doesn’t matter if you’re the president of the United States, you only get a couple of lines to pitch your book. Note the common structure: a set-up, some interesting details or examples in the middle, and a wrap-up line that expands the idea to something lovable and appealing . . . that everyone (and his mother) would be likely interested in.

GIVING, by Bill Clinton (Knopf)
[from BOMC summary:] Sharing his own experiences and those of others, Bill Clinton reveals to us the extraordinary efforts being made by individuals and organizations to solve problems and save lives both “down the street and around the world.” From Bill and Melinda Gates to a six-year-old California girl who organized a community clean-up program, Clinton introduces us to both well-known and unknown heroes, including:
• Oseola McCarty, who after 75 years of eking out a living by washing and ironing, gave $150,000 to endow a scholarship fund for African American students.
• Heifer International, which donated 12 goats to a Ugandan village. Within a year, Beatrice Biira’s mother earned enough money selling goats milk to pay her school fees and eventually send all her children to school.
Demonstrating that gifts of time, skills and ideas are as important and effective as contributions of money, Giving is an inspiring call to action, and a reminder that we each can easily do our part to make the world a better place.

Okay, Clinton’s book got a bit more space . . . with detailed examples in a bulleted list in the middle. But really it’s basically 3 sentences.

TELL ME WHERE IT HURTS, by Dr. Nick Trout (Broadway Books)
[Dr. Trout is a staff surgeon at the Angell Animal Medical Center in Boston.]

[from BOMC summary:] Trout’s day begins with 2:47 a.m. emergency surgery on a German Shepherd, who is her elderly owner’s sole companion. The operation, a success, kicks off a 24-hour marathon that will test his skills, and his sense of humor—much needed when attempting to treat a man-hating Chihuahua! But it also calls upon his empathy. In his wry, companionable voice, Trout lets us know that while methods have changed since country vet James Herriot’s day, the humanity and compassion remain the same.

First sentence: sets the scene. Second: an interesting detail. Third: a wrap, with the big concepts, the connection to a popular author (James Herriot), etc..

LISTENING IS AN ACT OF LOVE, by David Isay (Penguin)
[from BOMC summary:] Beginning with the idea that everyone has an important story to tell, StoryCorps has grown to become the largest oral history project in the nation. Renowned radio producer David Isay has put together an extraordinary collection of tales—told by the people who lived them to the people they love—in what is nothing less than a celebration of humanity. From the retired country doctor’s hilarious recollections of making rounds with his physician father, to the Korean immigrant, explaining to her daughter with touching candor how she learned to express emotion, Listening is an Act of Love reminds us of the powerful truth that we, the American people, are our history, and through our experiences, we make this country great.

All said and done in 3–4 sentences. Tell it and sell it . . . quickly. If it can’t be done, your project might be too complex. But more likely, you just haven’t stepped back far enough to be able to see the big ideas, the forest that surrounds all of your many, many trees of words, paragraphs, chapters.

And if you can’t sum it up, how will an agent or editor or publisher sum it up to the customers they need to hook quickly? If the great core concepts in the very marketable books above can be summarized in a few sentences, so can your project!

So, pitching your project in a nutshell: show ‘em the shell, crack it open with a sharp blow, and tell them why they’ll like the taste of what’s inside.

Author Platform: 4 Things It Does to Lift You Up

An author platform. To pitch a nonfiction book, you need one . . . because literary agents want you to have one . . . because publishers want you to have one. . . .

But what are author platforms and what do they do?

Let’s tackle the second part of that: what do they do? Think of passing by a room in a hotel convention center with an open door. You peek in and see a speaker up on a platform, ready to speak to a big crowd of people, seated and ready to listen. What’s your impression of that person and their influence? A person on a platform, speaking to an assembled crowd, has many advantages in getting heard compared to a similar person, perhaps with just as much knowledge, sitting in a chair in the hotel lobby.

The person sitting in the lobby can get their message out to a single person who happens to sit down beside them. The person on the platform will quickly get the message out to many more people. And if it’s a good idea, that message might then spread exponentially, much more quickly.

So a platform for a speaker is a tangible, existing, powerful tool. Well, a literary platform for writers does just what a physical platform does. Here’s what it gives you:

1. Visibility. A platform lets you be seen and heard by the people farthest in the back. With a P.A. system, you can be heard in a large auditorium; if outside, across a large public space. With a platform’s amplification, you say what you have to say once . . . and many hear it.

2. Community Experience. A platform lifts you up so many can hear your message all at the same time. This creates a community experience. Think of the buzz in the room after a great speech. People can discuss what they heard with others, verbalizing the core themes, comparing what others valued in the talk. This makes everyone more able and motivated to share the ideas with others not at the speech. This is the heart of buzz . . . knowing that what’s exciting to you is exciting to others. You believe that others want to share what they think about the matter, and you begin to look for more opportunities to talk about it.

3. Aura. Let’s face it, just being seen on a platform probably means some influential people have wanted to promote what you have to say. You’ll instinctively be more impressed by a person welcomed onto a platform, introduced as an official speaker, than a person met at a party or standing on their own little soapbox in a corner of a park or sitting alone in a hotel lobby.

4. Experience. A person who has been on a platform again and again, speaking to crowds, has gotten a big benefit from that experience. They’ve learned how to better craft and deliver a compelling message, how much preparation is needed to engage and sway a crowd . . . and how simple and clear the best-heard messages are. Speaking from a platform to many requires different skills than a good storyteller sitting at a dinner table, telling tales to a small circle of friends or family to pass the time. A large crowd gathers for a talk expecting to hear someone with the skills to deliver a valuable message in a way that it is understood, is convincing, and includes take-aways, the memorable bits that an audience carries away and holds in their minds.

For a writer, “platform” is often more than major speaking venues. It can be a popular blog (Seth Godin and Guy Kawasaki have huge virtual platforms) or a large mailing list of your own or a column in a major magazine or a high post in an influential professional organization.

The need for a platform for a nonfiction book, of course, reflects that publishers buy these works based on a pre-book proposal, long before a full manuscript exists. And on any given topic, any 20-page proposal may look not so much different from the next. The difference is often the author: how much they bring to the table in the way of a proven sphere of influence, with previous succcess in marketing themselves and their ideas — to real networks that will want to hear the newest ideas that person has on his or her topic of expertise.

Sit in the publisher’s chair, and think how you would choose between fairly similar book proposals. If one person has been successful in developing their own big platform, they would seem a better bet as an author to help sell books than an untested speaker. And at it’s core, publishing (from the point of view of publishers) is all about making good bets.

So, the easier you make it for them to bet on you (the better you can help your agent convince an editor to help convince an acquisitions committee), the more likely you are to get that nonfiction book contract.

Let’s All Play the Genre Game (Pitching)

Not sure which genre your novel is? In your mind, hey, it’s a hydrid! Maybe a science fiction/fantasy, or a romance/thriller/time-traveling mystery. Maybe you think that’s a good thing.

But if it’s more than one thing, in terms of genre, that’s a problem.

Specifically, a marketing problem.

Why? Genre is basically a label. It assigns a book to a category. New writers might think this is intrinsically a bad thing, one that somehow limits or restricts them.

But pause and think why a label might be helpful for a customer browsing in a book store. It’s a finding aid. They go to a section where the shelves are filled with the kind of books they like to read or are looking for.

For a fiction reader, a genre label means even more than just a spot on a shelf. Calling a book a Romance or Mystery or Fantasy or Thriller is an assurance to the customer of some sort of basic, familiar, time-tested form for the story.

Very few readers want to hear: “It’s hard to categorize.” Yikes! They want to know it’s within a category they like.

This problem flows all the way down the chain. Booksellers won’t know where to shelve it. Publishers won’t know what to call it or which category buyer to pitch it to. Agents won’t know what to call it in a brief conversation with an editor. And that’s a problem – for you.

Sure, they could figure it out for you. But that’s not their job. They instead will turn to other books that are more solidly centered in a known, popular genre. By and large, they prefer to work with writers who know the right labels to use in summarizing their book in a brief, succinct pitch.

Within any category, there’s lot of variety. So it doesn’t limit literature; it’s just a label, not a definition.

I encourage writers not to quibble. Don’t say “it’s hard to categorize” or “it’s sort of [this] with a bit of [that].” Bite the bullet, show your confidence and experience, and pick the main category it’s mostly in – the one that will put it in the bookstore section you want the book to be shelved in. If it’s a fantasy that involves some sort of mystery, it’s probably still a fantasy. Call it that. Then, in the description, you can mention there’s a mystery involved in the plotline.

If, as a beginning writer, you’re mixing genres so much that you can’t pick one – or you’re intentionally mixing genres – it may reflect a serious underlying problem of not knowing why genres are so popular and satisfying to readers.

Yes, you can mix genres; no one says you can’t. But it will be harder to find an audience. The fallacy for beginning writers is to imagine that mixing two genres will double your audience.

The hard truth: The real audience for a mixed genre work isn’t the sum of all readers in both genres . . . it’s the (much smaller) subset of those readers that like both. (I.e., if you draw two overlapping circles, it’s not the total area of both circles, but only the small section where they overlap.)

For ideas on how to label your work, visit this Wikipedia discussion of types of genre fiction.

Or AgentQuery.com has this description of fiction genres, from Chick Lit to Commercial Fiction to Literary Fiction to the main genres of Fantasy, Historical Fiction, Horror, Mystery, Romance, Science Fiction, Thriller/Suspense, and such.

Also, here’s a good article by Anna Genoese on genre.

So, what if you pick the wrong label? If it’s done with confidence, and it’s generally in the right ballpark, an agent or editor will correct the label if they feel it is helpful for marketing. But it’s better to show confidence and pick one, then let the story speak for itself.

If in doubt, rely on this rule of thumb: go to a major bookstore, and pick the category with the books that are similar to yours.

If it’s not in any of the so-called “genre fiction” categories (mystery, fantasy, etc.), the safe choice is General Fiction. But what if the person you’re pitching to prefers the term Literary Fiction, for instance. How to tell? Check their website. If an agent says they represent Literary Fiction or Women’s Fiction, for instance, those are good choices for labels – if they fit your story.

Are there books that cross genres? Sure. Take one like The Time Traveler’s Wife, by Audrey Niffeneger. “A dazzling novel in the most untraditional fashion . . .” starts the publisher’s (Harcourt) description.

It continues “this is the remarkable story of Henry DeTamble, a dashing, adventuresome librarian who travels involuntarily through time, and Clare Abshire, an artist whose life takes a natural sequential course. Henry and Clare’s passionate love affair endures across a sea of time and captures the two lovers in an impossibly romantic trap, and it is Audrey Niffenegger’s cinematic storytelling that makes the novel’s unconventional chronology so vibrantly triumphant.

“An enchanting debut and a spellbinding tale of fate and belief in the bonds of love, The Time Traveler’s Wife is destined to captivate readers for years to come.”

For marketing categories (in its catalog), Harcourt picked: Fiction – General, and Fiction – Romance/Time Travel

Note: no mention of science fiction (the classic time-travel genre). Instead, Harcourt went with General Fiction. With a hint of Romance, but probably not to be shelved there.

Pitch Like a Movie Producer

Want to learn how to pitch?

Try visiting one of the top movie sites: The Internet Movie Database.

Check on any movies, forthcoming or in release, that are similar in any fashion to something you’re writing. Let’s say you want to check out the coming Narnia movie, Prince Caspian.

You’ll see a summary of the movie, including its “tagline”:

A New Age Has Begun.
Everything you know is about to change forever.

Or check out the Plot Outline, to see 3 versions, by various writers:

“Prince Caspian” finds the Pevensie siblings pulled back into the land of Narnia, where a thousand years have passed since they left. The children are once again enlisted to join the colorful creatures of Narnia in combating an evil villain who prevents the rightful Prince from ruling the land. (Written by Max Davison {RockyHexorcist2785} )

The four Pevensie children return to Narnia, only to discover that hundreds of years have passed since they ruled there, and the evil King Miraz has taken charge. With the help of a heroic mouse called Reepicheep, and the exiled heir to the throne, Prince Caspian, they set out to overthrow the King, once again with Aslan’s help. (Written by comicfan)

A year after their first adventure in Narnia, Peter, Susan, Edmund, and Lucy are pulled back in by Susan’s magic horn. They find that hundreds of years have passed, and Narnia is now ruled by the bloodthirsty General Miraz, uncle to the true heir, Prince Caspian, now in exile. Now the children must find Caspian and help him depose Miraz . . . but how will they get home after it’s done? (Written by rmlohner)

Nice! Or for The Other Boleyn Girl, check out these great taglines:

The only thing that could come between these sisters… is a kingdom.

Two sisters divided for the love for a king.

In an age where a woman’s destiny was determined by her father, one sister followed the rules. The other defied them.

What if you could have everything you ever wanted? What if all you had to do was betray the sister you loved?

They were the closest of sisters, until the most powerful man in the world made them rivals.

Learn to write punchy prose like that, and your pitch letters will sparkle like the Narnian sea . . . or the jewels on a Tudor crown.

The New Writer’s Handbook 2007

The New Writer

What people are saying about The New Writer’s Handbook 2007:
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