What To Do After You Write A Book

Now, what the heck do you do?


When I first started writing, I did it for myself. I didn't want people to read it. And then, when I did let someone read it, she told me it was amazing and it could be published. I was speechless.

 But it was my mom.

Try to get someone a little more critical to read your work first. But still, after that, what do you do? How do you even get your book published? I'll tell you what I did. I googled, "book publishers." And then I read that if you want a publisher to look at your book, you have to get an agent. Yes, there are small publishers that will probably publish your book, but you have to be very, very careful and do your research and make sure they are legit. That brings me back to 2010, when I found a publisher online and I sent him some of my work. I think like the first couple chapters. The website made them seem legit, but after a little more research I figured out it was from a guy's house (google is great for researching people, BTW) and it would cost me money for him...yes, just him, to print my book. Way more money than I would even get for a book that was (at the time) riddled with errors.

So, after more research, I found if I wanted a good publishing house to publish my book, I needed an agent. To find agencies, you have to research them. Now, there are lots of websites where you can find agencies or you can use google. And when you find an agent that represents your genre, you need to research them even more and get a feel for them. You can do this by reading their bios on their agency's page, checking out their Twitter, blog, and interviews. Are they someone you would want to work with? Do they love the same books you do? What are they looking for and is it in your book?  After you get a good list of agents, you need to write a query letter to send them.

Before you query an agent makes sure you have all of these:

A COMPLETE manuscript

A query letter

A synopsis

First three chapters revised a million times

A critique partner

Beta reader

Not sure what some of these are? Don't fret. I will have posts on each and every one soon. Check them out.

Now, if an agent is interested, they will write you and ask for a partial request, or if you're lucky,  a full request. A partial depends on exactly what the agent wants, but most of the time it's the first three chapters. A full is--you guess it! They want to see the full manuscript. All of this has sometimes long waiting periods. Most agencies respond to queries 4-8 weeks. Partials are 2-6 months and that's about the same for fulls. But again, it all depends on the agency. And if they don't like your query? They don't respond, or they send an automatic response politely rejecting your work. It's not very pretty. But if you even think you want to be a writer, you have to completely toughen your skin. Criticism is your best friend.