Novel Publish
Start Writing A Novel Today! What’s Stopping You?
By Stephen Rush
When you start writing a novel you may find doing so somewhat more difficult than you expected. You are not alone when you make this discovery, as many novice writers and even published authors find themselves in the very same predicament. Perhaps one of the most difficult things may be trying to discover who, what, where, when, why and how you are going to develop the next “Pulitzer Prize Winning” fiction book. This article will provide you with a number of thoughts and ideas which should make your task not quite so difficult and much more enjoyable.
Your mental attitude, about why you are writing the book of your dreams, may well be the governing factor in the success or failure of your book. A good attitude would be looking at your book as something you have always wanted to do, not necessarily as the one thing which will propel you from rags to riches.
To help you get in the right frame of mind about this, perhaps you should check out some of the statistics about having a book published in the United States. You should know that approximately 162,000 books are published a year. Please don’t let the statistics deter you from your writing. On the contrary, if 162,000 books will be “born”, yours can be too. In other words, you may well be the next “Best Selling Author” just be realistic about the reasons you are writing and the expectations you have for your writing. Doing anything because you love to do it will always make it easier to complete.
You now have the right mental attitude now let’s move on to what you are going to write about.
Obviously, you already have an idea or thoughts on what you want to write about. If you are a first time novelist, it is important for you to consider writing on something which you are passionate and have knowledge of. By doing so you will reduce the chances of you becoming bored and you can rest assured that if you become bored with the topic, it will increase the difficulty of writing your book.
One of the things that ties directly in with the subject of your book, will be the style of writing you elect to use. Let’s presume you are a police officer and have decided you are extremely knowledgeable and passionate about solving murder mysteries. Take a trip to your library and check out as many books, by different authors, about murder mystery as you can. Read every book and while reading take notes about the style of the authors writing. You will soon begin to recognize the style that fits you the best.
As you are well aware there are many other aspects to writing, which can make writing a book difficult, they are beyond the scope of this article at this time. However, by having the right mental attitude, writing about something you know or very passionate about, taking the time to develop your own style, you should be able to start writing a novel which could become the next “best seller” – especially with some solid guidance.
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1. Print it out and read through it with a pen, ensuring it is as perfect as it can be. If you’ve not edited it time and time again it’s not good enough
2. Get a copy of Writer’s Market (US) or Writer’ & Artists’ Yearbook (UK)
3. Look through the lists of agents (NOT publishers) and create a list of a dozen or so that specialise in the genre of book you’ve written
4. Research each of these agents to determine the ones best suited to your work
5. Write an enquiry letter. This must be the best letter you’ve ever written. There’s advice in the above books on how to do it. Don’t try and be clever, just be professional. Very professional.
6. Check your chosen agent’s submission guidelines and follow it to the letter. If they require an enquiry letter only, then only send that. If they want the first three chapters too, don’t send anything other than that. And format it perfectly.
7. Send your letter and/or partial to the agent
8. Wait
9. Receive rejection letter and start again with the next agent on your list. Do not send copies of the same letter to numerous agents, it’s unprofessional and will do you no favours
10. If an agent likes what they see, they will take you on. At that point they will attempt to sell your work to publishers, so it’s just a matter of waiting (again)
If you are not of legal age, your parent or gaurdian has to sign the contracts. It’s really not a problem.
Ignore Katie S – publisher’s clearning house is a magazine selling service NOT a publisher.
Publishing a book takes several years. First you have to write the book. Then edit it, have it reviewed by a beta reader for errors and plot problems, then edit it again. After that, you research agents who handle the genre your book is, query them to see if they are interested in your work (and if they are, they will ask to see it). Once you have signed an areement with the agent, they will offer the work for sale to appropriate editors at publishing houses. If one of them is interested, they will purchase the right to publish your work (called an advance against royalties).
Important things to keep in mind:
Real publishers pay you. Scams make you pay them.
Real publishers can put your book in actual stores. Scams can’t (being listed as available on amazon is NOT the same as a book being on actual shelves).
Real agents get paid they sell your work to a publisher, not before.
Can I publish a novel which characters are similar to a quite popular anime?
Hi there!
I’m a young writer who tends to PUBLISH a novel, but the only problem is that some of my characters are similar to an anime.I personally don’t know if I’m going to have problems after publishing it, in other words, I’d like to know if I’m going against copywrites.Is it really the same, having a novel similar to an anime than having an anime similar to an anime?
Please answer it’s very importand for me.Thanx.
Should I enter my novel in contests before trying to publish?
I’m researching ways to get my novel published, I am a first time author, and I have a work that I really believe in. In an example query letter that I read, the author had mentioned that her story had won a few contests. Is this something I should pursue?
Please don’t listen to Steph-p plagiarism also includes paraphrasing and summarizing. A young author was being sued for doing such a thing her book would say, ‘Becca and I lounged by the pool my bathing suit reminding me that I still hadn’t filled out’. The original said ‘Sandy sat with me by the pool we both felt like we were playing at grown up because we couldn’t fill out our bathingsuits the way the older girls did.’
Totally different wording same ‘gist’, her book is full of these ‘similarities’ and now she has to deal with her publisher who paid out a hefty contract, plus court fees and civil penalties.
—– As a writer you should work at trying to make something your own. The idea could spark from anyone and anything however when you begin working you want yours to be better and wholly your own. Change as much as you can even if the ‘idea’ is similar. Vampires are a legend no one owns it and yet from one novel to the next they appear different with different looks, ways of living, abilities and even names. However they are all similar in that they must consume blood to sustain existance, in most stories they can’t live in daylight, they have no soul, a stake through the heart or beheading will do them in, they have super strength and speed. These are things to start with.
— Look at the characters and ideas. Do they come from a bigger concept a legend or a myth or religion? Those elements you can keep, the others you should want to change.
— For example my witch is a combination of all witch myths. She has some Greek Mythology, wiccan practices, shaman rituals, druid history, voodoo aspects with Asian and Indian aspects. I wanted for her to truly be better and more powerful than any ‘one’ type of witch.
Yes definately, enter contests, let people read what you have created (make sure yuou have a copyright first though!!!) Then when you have some credit to your name, try to get it published!!!
Good luck!
What are the steps to getting a novel publish?
I have a novel that I just finish writing. Does anyone know a good publisher or the steps to finding a publisher to get a book publish. If you need to know the category, my book falls under memoir.
How old do you have to be to publish a novel?
Is there an age restriction? How do you get a novel published?
Just how hard is it to publish a novel?
I’ve heard that it is EXTREMELY difficult to get a novel published. I asked an English teacher at school, and she said that I have a 0% chance of getting a novel published while in high school. According to her, it’s ridiculously difficult…nearly impossible.
So hard is it really? Is it honestly a close-to-zero percent chance for a high school student to get a novel published?
Anyone can be published at any age. You just need to get with your parents and find a literary agent who will work with you and help you find the write (get it write?) publishing company.
don’t go by those websites like Publishing America or Authorhouse, if you do you won’t really be taken serious in the Literary world.