The Publishing Biz - Episode 5

I finally managed to have a conversation with that editor who passed on my book saying it wasn't prescriptive enough. Seems he meant that my topic is too general, that he is used to self-help books that are very focused. He publishes books on topics like being better at work or achieving financial independence. Happiness, says he, is far too general for him.

At first, I thought I was talking to another publishing robot. But then he explained himself more fully and I learned something. He said that he has to make his decisions about what to publish based upon the market he understands. He's familiar with career self-help books and with financial self-help books. Those are his specialties, so he is informed enough to decide if a prospective book in one of those areas warrants publishing and marketing. As he was speaking, I could feel the light coming on.

Then, he said it. "You really need an agent." It's funny, most times someone says this to me, my response is to ignore them. I've stated before my reservations with getting an agent - they're hard as hell to reach and they can't possibly marshal the passion I have for my book. However, this time, I got it. The value of the agent is in knowing the editors enough to know how to spin the proposal to pique their interest. I always thought it was just the connections to the editors that made agents worthwhile. That's why I have been going directly to publishers. But I've had enough rejection on baseless grounds. It is finally dawning on me that had an agent put my proposal in front of these same publishers, there's a good chance I'd already have a deal.

So, as you might expect, I am now on the hunt for an agent. A guy I met at BEA in the spring gave me some advice on going about this. He first recommended that I write my proposal based upon the book, How To Write A Book Proposal, by Michael Larsen. Check. That book has been recommended again and again, so I have long since completed a Larsen-esque proposal. The next thing is to compile a list of agents that work with writers like myself. The guy helping me happens to have published a psychology/self-help kind of book, so I may get to just use his database. In any case, the idea is to blast my proposal, shotgun style, to an exhaustive list of agents. This is what he did, and it worked. It won't be cheap, though. Postage alone will run well over a grand. But, what choice do I have? I've tried everything else I can think of. We'll see what happens.

In the meantime, I'm working on getting a regular gig writing opinion columns for a major newspaper. That should help with the credibility issue. More to come...