In general, for a major publisher, you will get an advance. Publishers know approximately the minimum number of copies a book by a first-time author will sell, and will give you an advance accordingly. Of course, they will lowball you, but if you have an agent, you can negotiate a bigger advance than their first offer.
The advance is often paid in two parts – half on signing the contract and the other half when you deliver the finished manuscript (there will always be editorial changes).
Small presses sometimes pay royalties only, though.
Unpublished writers have to submit completed novels. Everybody can start a novel, but few can successfully finish one. Publishers want to be sure they’ll have the complete book and not get burned. Nonfiction is different. The usual procedure is a sample chapter(s) and a full outline. People who can produce that are highly likely to be able to write the rest.
That certainly makes sense. I was just wondering how the advances worked. If publishers were willing to take a chance on giving an advance to an untried writer or if they were going to wait and see how the book actually sold before paying royalties.
You want depressing, look at David Palmer. He wrote a couple of really good science fiction novels back in the eighties. They were highly regarded and presumably sold reasonably well. He intended to write more books.
But he then said he had to quit writing. It took too much time. He couldn’t write and hold down his regular job. And writing just wouldn’t pay enough for him to make a living at it. So he had to pick his regular job.
Which meant that a talented and popular author was working five days a week as a court reporter, one of those guys who sits in the courtroom and records all of the testimony during a trial.
Publishers have a good idea how well a first novel by an unknown author will sell and set the advance accordingly. If it sells better than they expected, then they just start sending more royalty checks. If it sells worse, it’s just the cost of doing business (note that it’s possible for a book to return a profit to the publisher even if it doesn’t cover the advance. It all depends on how the costs are structured.)
The author gets the money much quicker. If it were royalties only, the author probably won’t see any cash for at least a year and a half (the time it takes to get the book printed* and royalties to be calculated).
*The gap is so long because publishers always have books in the pipeline. They’d rather have their book schedule planned out for a year than discover they have nothing to publish this month. Plus your book may be bumped back if they have reason to release another book in your slot.
Which is why Amazon has stuff listed that won’t be printed for quite awhile. “Pre-order the new Harry Turtledove - “Guns of the Etruscans” (December 6, 2125).”
Well, since it has been my dream as long as I can remember to be a writer, yes… yes I can. I have several finished pieces and another almost finished, but can’t find a publisher. Everyone that has read my writing thinks it’s very good, but I can’t get anyone tht MATTERS t look at it. And after reading this thread, I have to wonder… would it even matter? Doesn’t sound like I’d be able to make a living at it anyway.
So… how DOES someone break into it/ Just dumb luck? Because, I gotta tell ya… I’ve read some pure crap that’s published.
You break in by actually finishing what you write and sending it out to markets.
For a novel these days, that requires sending it to an agent. You look up agents who handle the type of book you’re writing and send them queries. If one asks for the book, send it to them. If they think they can sell it, they’ll take you on.
And while you’re doing that, you’re writing another book.
It’s just Heinlein’s five rules:
You must write.
You must finish what you write.
You must refrain from rewriting except for editorial request (Note: this is often misinterpreted; what Heinlein meant was not “don’t rewrite,” but refrain from it – don’t get caught up in second guessing yourself and constantly tweaking the work for no purpose.*)
You must put the work on the market.
You must keep it on the market until it sells.
Do this, and you will succeed.
As for the “pure crap” that gets published – it’s published because even though by your standards it’s pure crap, by the standards of the people who buy that type of book, it’s not. I’ve been reading a few paranormal romances lately. They lack imagination, have thin characters and cliched plots where you know how things will resolve. But they give what readers of that genre want to read, and I realized it would be very hard for me to write that way successfully, since I would want to do things with the concepts that the readers weren’t interesting in reading (for instance, vampires always had the same characteristics all vampires do; I prefer vampires that don’t draw from the same laundry list of powers).
*I’m reminded of a person in a writer’s group of mine who actually rewrote stores long after they had been published and submitted them for comments by the group. :rolleyes:
Even the big mainstream publishers publish hundreds of new authors every year. It’s always possible to break in.
How? Same as every other art: talent, perseverance, and luck.
When you say that you can’t get anyone who matters to look at it, what have you done? Have you taken a book out of the library or searched online for agents who specialize in that kind of writing? Have you made sure that your manuscript is in proper manuscript format? Have you had people copyedit it to ensure that no typos or other mistakes are obvious? Have you checked to see what each individual agent requires in terms of cover letters or additional materials? Have you looked to see whether there are small presses that accept manuscripts directly and what their submission requirements are? Have you posted it online? (If so, take it down. That’s considered publishing and normally no publisher will touch it.) IOW, how much work have you put in to being a professional writer and learning the basics of the business?
Looking like a professional will immediately put you ahead of 90% of the people who submit. That won’t vault you into the final 1% by itself, but it will get you considered and that’s a big step. Anyone experienced in the industry knows that most manuscripts can be tossed as soon as the first page is read. The gap is that obvious. Writing is a business and a profession. If you don’t try to be a professional you’ll never become one.
When I sold my first book, I got a pretty good advance. My husband sat down and figured out how much it would take for me to earn out–in other words, at what point I would have paid my advance back and could start collecting royalties.
About three times more books than they actually printed, as it turned out.
Your publisher doesn’t care if you don’t get royalties.
I have friends who write romance novels. They typically write three a year, and make about $15,000 per book, of which $5,000 is advance and the rest is royalties. Royalties are paid twice a year, so there are lean periods and there are fat periods for these people. After 10 or so books, some of them are now getting a somewhat bigger advance. They are all hoping for that breakthrough book, but meanwhile they have to feed the machine by writing the category romance, which doesn’t leave them time or energy for the Big Book. But it IS a living.
Too late to edit: With my first novel, I figured out roughly what I spent, in terms of writing it, and rewriting it, and marketing it, and how much that translated to in terms of $ per hour, and it was a very depressing $4/hour. (From the advance, which was all I ever got, I deducted things like reams of paper, toner cartridges, the new hard drive, the bookmarks, the business cards, and the transportation costs of doing signings, along with the actual time spent.)
I can’t remember where I read this, but Neil Gaiman (who’s done fairly well for himself as a writer) said that if you manage to finish and sell a novel you’ll probably make about as much money from it as you would have if you’d been working at McDonald’s instead of writing – and far less than you’d make if you managed to work your way up to a management position at McDonald’s during that time.
Actually, I find pure crap very inspiring. As in, “If that stuff can get published, MY stuff can get published.” I remember the exact novel that inspired me to finish one and send it off (but I am not going to name it here). It not only got published, it won some awards. I thought it was terrible dreck and its author a poseur.
And I was right, my stuff did get published. It didn’t win any awards. I guess it could be out there inspiring other writers right now.
I started to think I could get published when I realized what was actually being published. One person in particular kept annoying me over and over again. Her writing was flat and boring. She showed up on a respected writing message board and I couldn’t believe she’d been published. Yet she has credits from the New York Times and half a dozen other respected publications. Oh and a fellowship from a prestigious journalism organization.
I have a book contract with a co-author on this board. Our combined advance? A thousand dollars. Roughly a quarter an hour by the time I’m finished. I don’t care because I am deeply committed to this book and my stance on this particular subject.
If you really want to make money in writing there are ways you can do it (business writing, content mills and the like) and make enough to at least support yourself in a semi-comfortable lifestyle.
