15 How Do I Get a Book Publisher?
Nora could hardly believe it. After submitting her manuscript to publisher after publisher, and either not getting any response or getting outright rejections, Nora had received a publication offer. The offer wasn’t from a big publishing house. It was instead from a boutique publisher. But the publisher had several other attractive books already published in the same vein as Nora’s manuscript. And at the point that she’d reached, Nora was ready to accept just about any publication offer. To celebrate and relish the moment, Nora took her dog for a long walk on the beach. She was about to be a published book author!
Publication
Writing a book is one thing, while publishing a book is another thing. Having a publisher or publishers in mind before writing a book can help you write to their publication standards and parameters. Gaining a specific publisher’s commitment even before you write your book can ensure that you know the publisher’s requirements. Most books, though, don’t start with a publisher. Many authors complete the whole manuscript before submitting a book for publication or before gaining a publisher’s commitment. Don’t hesitate to write your book first and worry about publication later. But if you do so, recognize that you might not find a publisher and may end up self-publishing your book or not publishing it at all. And if you intend to write a book only if it gets published, either gain a publisher’s commitment first, or be ready to accept self-publication as a back-up plan if no publisher expresses interest. In other words, work out your thoughts, plans, and back-up plans about publication before you write your book, unless you just don’t really care and are fine with the chips falling where they may.
Publishers
A half dozen or so major publishing houses publish a large percentage of the trade books sold. Major publishing houses generally do their own book marketing, cover design, manuscript formatting and editing, and other publication, distribution, and sales work. They also generally work with book agents and may, through an agent, commit to publish a credentialed author’s book before the author writes it. But large and small publishers may also accept unsolicited manuscripts from authors who have no agent. Your chances of gaining a prominent publisher’s acceptance of your unsolicited manuscript without an agent are slim. With diligence, though, you may find a smaller publisher willing to extend a publication offer, particularly a boutique publisher who publishes in the niche into which your book fits, and especially if your manuscript is of high quality and if your credentials set you apart from other previously unpublished authors. Give it a try. What’s to lose, other than the time and effort that you put into writing your manuscript?
Agents
Book agents can certainly help in the publication process. Your challenge is attracting a reputable agent. Like publishers, agents prefer to work with published authors who have a reputation for producing high-quality manuscripts and who otherwise have attractive credentials. You face a chicken-and-egg dilemma. To attract an agent and publisher, you need writing credentials and publications. But to get writing credentials and publications, you need an agent and publisher. Agents and publishers know the budding author’s challenge. Beware agents who charge substantial fees up front to review and pitch your manuscript, with no guarantee of publication. They may not be offering a genuine service and may instead be collecting fees from many aspiring authors without gaining many, if any, publications. Likewise, beware publishers who offer publication but require the author to pay up front for publication expenses. They may, in effect, be so-called vanity presses or, more to phrase it more neutrally, subsidy publishers whose business model is simply to get works of any quality into print, never mind any marketing effort or dim prospect for their sale and profit. Book publishing, like music publishing and other fields with many aspiring creative talents, can have shady operators preying on naive creators. You can get your book published, one way or another. Your question is how, by whom, and on what terms.
Services
Publishing services are another option. Several publishing services exist that make no effort to evaluate the quality and marketability of your manuscript. Their role isn’t necessarily to package and market your book at all, although they generally offer wide distribution on their own sales platform or multiple sales platforms, and they may offer various marketing services within those distribution channels or on social media. Their role is instead to get your book into the print, digital, and audio formats that you specify, and to get it into book distribution channels, whether to bookstores, which only buy and stock a fraction of the books published, or online. Publishing services are, in effect, self-publishing options. If you’re fine with self-publishing your book, which the next chapter addresses in greater detail, then investigate your publishing service options. Self-publishing has its advantages and disadvantages but can be an attractive option. Again, see the next chapter.
Submissions
Submitting your manuscript for publication consideration can be an exciting and satisfying process. You’ve finished your manuscript. Now, time to seek publication. Research publishers who publish the kind of book that you wrote, according to the market, segment, format, genre, and niche. Even the large publishers tend to focus their publications on certain markets and segments. Don’t submit your romance novel to a non-fiction publisher. Don’t waste your time in submission processing or the publisher’s time in review. Forget the shotgun approach. Instead, take the rifle approach. Select your target publishers carefully. Ultimately, you only need a single publisher to accept your manuscript for publication. The closer that you can find a match between the book you wrote and the books that a publisher publishes, the better your chances of gaining a publication offer. Publishers will tell you what kind of book they publish, if you simply research them. If you can find one, two, three, or perhaps five publishers to whom to submit, then good for you. Get your submissions out to that handful of publishers. Nothing is quite as satisfying to an aspiring author as having several figurative fishing lines in the water, with manuscript submissions. Enjoy the submissions process, and enjoy waiting for responses even more.
Requirements
Catching a handsome fish with a strong book-publication offer is the point of fishing with manuscript submissions. Once you identify potential publishers, don’t waste anyone’s time with an incomplete submission. When you submit your manuscript to publishers for their review, you should follow their submission requirements closely. Don’t bother submitting outside of their requirements. They’re likely to ignore your submission. If the publisher says to send a chapter and not the whole book, then do so. If the publisher says to use a certain file format such as pdf or manuscript format such as double-spaced lines, then use those formats. Publishers also tend to require that submitting authors complete the publisher’s submission form. The submission form may ask you to name the market, market size, market segment, prime audience, manuscript word count and page length, recommended formats, illustration requirements, copyright license requirements, and other details. If so, then don’t leave those details blank. Do the best that you can to complete the requested information, indicating estimates and ranges if necessary.
Proposals
Some publishers also welcome book proposals. A book proposal is an author’s offer to write a manuscript if the publisher offers in advance to publish it. Most authors would probably prefer to have a publisher before having the manuscript. But most authors don’t. Far more books get publishers after the authors have written them, not before. Gaining a publisher based on a proposal may require not only a great book idea but also great credentials including a record of successful publications. If you prefer to submit proposals before you begin writing your book or while you are doing so, then give it a try, following a similar process that you’d follow for identifying publishers to whom to submit a finished manuscript. Once you find the right publishers publishing books of the kind that you’d like to write, then follow their book-proposal requirements. You’re likely to have to complete their book-proposal form, similar to a book-submission form, projecting the market, segment, audience, and other particulars.
Offers
Your best day as a book author is getting the first print copy of your book in your hands. Your second-best day as a book author is getting a publication offer. Publication offers can be conditional or unconditional. A conditional offer would require that you make changes to the manuscript or your title, format, cover, or whatever other terms and conditions your book submission proposed. An unconditional offer would not make any material changes to your submitted manuscript and accompanying terms, although publishers have their own editing and publication processes, and their own contractual terms and conditions. Just don’t be entirely put out if you get a conditional offer that would require you to substantially rework your manuscript including changing your title, market, audience, or other significant aspects of your creative work. Keep in mind that commercial publishing houses to whom you submit your purportedly finished work may not regard your work as finished at all. From the publisher’s standpoint, a manuscript may only be the bare start of an elaborate reshaping of a book project.
Contracts
If you get a publication offer, keep in mind that you don’t have a publication commitment until you accept the offer. Enforceable contracts, including a publisher’s promise to publish your book, generally require both an offer and an unconditional acceptance. If you get an offer and you reply with your unconditional acceptance, particularly by signing the publisher’s contract, then you’ve got a publication promise. If instead you reply by proposing different terms and conditions, your conditional reply technically rejects the publisher’s offer. Negotiate terms and conditions if you wish. Just know that negotiating over terms and conditions may lead the publisher to withdraw any further offers. Some publishers will negotiate. Others may not. If you’re an aspiring author without publications or credentials, and you really just need to get your first book out on any terms, then beware making demands and requests for material changes in your publisher’s standard book contract. Don’t, as the saying goes, look a gift horse in the mouth. Instead, if you need the ride, then go for it. You may regret various terms of the publishing contract, but at least you got your book out. Otherwise, if terms are important enough to you, stick by your guns and negotiate better terms if you can.
Terms
Control over your book title, cover, subject, editing, format, and market are plainly important publication contract terms. Some publishers, especially larger publication houses but also some specialty publishers with high reputation in their niches, may demand substantial or complete control over your book’s publication. Those publishers may also make substantial changes, some to your liking, while others not. Other publishers, though, may make few if any changes, may let authors approve changes, and may work with their authors in a much more collegial and partnership fashion. Those cooperative publishers would tend to be the ones who invest less in a book’s publication and marketing. Indeed, if you want complete control over your book, then self-publish it. Beyond your book itself, other publication contract terms that may be important to you include royalty rate, expense allocation, royalty calculation before or after expenses, royalty payment schedule, availability of author copies at reduced cost, publisher marketing responsibilities, publisher distribution responsibilities, copyright ownership, and indemnification for copyright violations. Read your publication contract carefully. Get legal advice for any questions.
Reflection
Are you more committed to writing a book or getting a book published? Would you write a book anyway if you knew it wouldn’t get published? Would you write a book that you had to self-publish because you couldn’t attract a commercial publisher? Would publishing a book with a vanity press at modest cost to you satisfy your publication goal? Do you have article, blog, or other publication credits that would attract a book publisher toward publishing your first book manuscript? Do you have other special credentials or expertise that would attract a book publisher, outside of any publishing credits? Does it matter to you if your book sells? Or do you have a use for your book anyway if marketing it doesn’t produce more than negligible sales? If you invested the time and effort into writing a book, would you need a financial return for doing so? Or can you afford to devote the time to writing a book, even if you receive no financial gain from doing so?
Key Points
Publication of your book by a commercial publisher is an achievement.
Publishers range in sizes and publish to different market segments.
Book agents may help gain publication but are also selective.
Publishing services enable self-publication of completed manuscripts.
Submit your book for publication only to qualified publishers.
Meet all submission requirements including completing forms.
Submit a book proposal before writing the manuscript if credentialed.
Examine publication offers carefully for their terms and conditions.
Negotiating over publication terms may be possible and wise.
Examine royalty rates and calculation, and other terms, with advice.
Sign a contract only when understanding and agreeing to terms.