The Hardest Element to Find

      

By Terry Whalin @terrywhalin

Have you ever dropped a needle into a haystack? It is a challenge to find that needle when buried in the hay. The discovery is possible but will take considerable effort and possibly time to find it. Or maybe you’ve accidentally dropped a supplement like a clear vitamin D on your kitchen floor and struggling to find it? As with the needle, it will take time and effort to find that missing pill.

What is the most difficult element to find with our writing? I’m not asking a trick question because the answer is: something which is missing. 

Within the publishing community, I have often heard it said the hardest thing to find in anyone’s manuscript or proposal is something that is not there. It is easy and obvious to work on the elements which are there but how to you find the material which is not there?

Here’s some ideas how to find whatever you are missing:

1. Use a checklist. For example, if it is a book proposal, I’ve created a free book proposal checklist with the elements in a standard proposal. You can use this list to make sure you are not missing something. 

2. Read often and widely. If you read extensively, you will have a better idea what should be included in your writing. 

3. Read your writing aloud to yourself. The ear is less forgiving than the eye and it will be easier to pick up on what is missing or not there. 

4. Have your critique group read it and react to it. Getting feedback from other writers can be helpful to find items which you are missing.

5. Hire an outside editor or proofreader. I encourage you to get recommendations from others. Don’t hire someone blindly because they may or may not have the experience that you need. 

Whether you are writing a book proposal, a manuscript, a query letter or a magazine article, every writer needs feedback before you send it off to an agent or editor.  Which element do you find the hardest to find with your writing? Let me know in the comments below. 

Tweetable:

What is the hardest element to find in your manuscript, book proposal, query or article? This prolific writer and editor explains a detailed answer in this article: something that is not there. (ClickToTweet)

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When You Miss Your Mark

By Terry Whalin @terrywhalin

As writers, we have big goals and dreams. We work at it every day and sometimes we hit it and most often not. What happens when you miss your mark or goal? Do you quit or do you find the courage to continue with new efforts?

 

It's one of the constant tensions in our work. Mistakes happen. Things you want to do, do not get done. Interruptions spring into your day. Or you pitch your heart out and hear nothing. Crickets. Yes it happens to me as well. Your mindset and next action steps when this happens is important.

 

Last week I mentioned the launch of Book Proposals That $ell and how you join my launch team. In this article, I'm going to tell a behind the scenes story that I don't have to tell. I include it here to illustrate an important point for every writer.

Several months ago I rushed through the printing process on this book so I could have copies for a writer's conference. Because of the audience (writers) I sold a number of copies at the event. One of the participants emailed me about some typos in the book. It turns out there were typos and missing words in the first couple of paragraphs. I was chagrined with this news but determined not to ignore it because the details matter and the book had to be right. I reached out to a proofreader who worked through the book and changed a number of things (mostly for consistency). The entire book has re-done. That means the type was completely reflowed into the book so that everything to the best of our ability was fixed before the launch and release date next month.

 

While I was chagrined at the typos, I knew for the life of the book and the readership of the book that it had to be fixed. Yes it cost me extra time and expense. I'll be ordering the revised version of the book to autograph and send with my appreciation to the various authors, literary agents and others who endorsed the book. Revising this error was not easy and took a lot of effort from a number of people but it's important to get it right from the beginning.

 

I wrote about this error and how it was fixed to point out the principle of extreme ownership, which is also the title of a bestselling book that I recently heard.  Fixing these mistakes was a choice. I could have ignored the person who wrote me about the typos. Or I could have learned, fixed and moved forward.  

 

What happens when you miss the mark? Do you ignore it and continue or fix it? Let me know in the comments below.

 

Tweetable:

Sometimes as authors, we miss the mark and have a choice about our response. Learn the details here from this prolific editor and author. (ClickToTweet)

A Single Letter Makes A Difference

Do you ever get stuck on a project where it seems to drag on and never get handled?

Yes it happens to me. As an acquisitions editor at Morgan James Publishing. The bulk of my day is involved answering emails and spending time on the phone with authors about their book projects. I'm working with many different types of authors at different stages in the process for their books. It's a lot of fun and interesting work on a wide variety of types of books for different audiences. If you want to know more detail, I encourage you to hear my recent radio interview where I spoke about the details.

In the middle of my acquisitions work, I have my own book projects and on-going effort to tell people about Jumpstart Your Publishing Dreams. Originally I released this book several years ago and published it through my small press, WTW Press. 

While I have continued to promote my book and teach on the topic, the actual book needed updating in several areas:

—first, I changed companies and moved from Arizona almost two years ago. The Arizona information in the book was outdated.

—several of the resources in the book needed to be changed. Some websites that I wrote about years ago aren't functioning any longer. Change is a constant part of the publishing world.

—Morgan James offered to publish the book and get it out to a broader audience and in many different formats including all of the various types of Ebooks and an audio version of the book. Morgan James is selling their books into 98% of the bookstores in North America including the brick and mortar bookstores.

About a year ago, I signed a contract with Morgan James for this revision. It was exciting. My challenge was finding the time to make the necessary corrections. This sort of time crunch is what almost every writer faces. I went through one round of changes with the designer last March. Yes, it was almost a year ago. I printed my book and carried it to many different places around the country—but never got it handled—until the final portion of December.

Why did I find time during the holidays? Morgan James shuts their offices the last two weeks of the year. While I did answer some email during that time, my correspondence dwindled so I could focus on some other things—like my own writing.

I carefully read through each page of Jumpstart Your Publishing Dreams. Imagine my horror when I reached page 237 and this section, “Most people outside of the publishing community assume they will make money writing books, but the publishing numbers present a different story. Less than 90 percent of nonfiction books ever earn back their advance.”

OK, bear with me for a minute because the last sentence of that paragraph did not say what I wanted it to say. What the revised version says is “More than 90 percent of nonfiction books never earn back their advance.” Yes that is the reality that only 10% of nonfiction books earn their advance.

This change was just one of a number of important changes that happened in the revision process. Also the pagination for the book changed so the index for the book was completely overhauled in this updated version.

I'm excited about the information in this book and how it is helping writers. I continue to promote the material and speak on it. This coming week I will be teaching a Jumpstart Your Publishing Dreams workshop at the San Francisco Writers Conference. Also next month (March 21^st and 22^nd) I will be in Spokane, Washington teaching at the Inland Northwest Christian Writers Conference. I hope to see you at one of these events. I'm working on more speaking events later this year and you can always see my speaking schedule at this location.

And if you can't get to a writers' conference where we connect in person, then I encourage you to pick up a copy of Jumpstart Your Publishing Dreams and begin to study it and apply it to your writing life.

The Basics Count on Submissions

The creativity of writers never ceases to amaze me. Here's one of my true stories with a lesson for you on submissions: You are passionate about your story and sit hour after hour and write that manuscript.

You bring that manuscript in a large binder and hand it to an acquisitions editor during a large conference where the editor (me) is a keynote speaker. I listen to you for a few minutes and thank you and promise to read it and get back to you.

Weeks later I actually have a second to look at this large binder. I'm intrigued with the story and the writing but there is a key missing element—the writer didn't add a title page with her contact information, email, phone number. In fact, her name doesn't appear anywhere obvious inside this binder.

In the interim weeks, I've heard nothing from this author—no follow-up email to see if I've had a chance to read it or reconnecting or anything. I finally read the material and wanted to reconnect with the author so I tracked down her business card. I keep the business cards in a separate place from the manuscripts, then I reconnected the materials and emailed this author to find out the status of her book.

At this time, I still don't know where she is in the publication process but a basis error kept us from connecting weeks earlier.

You would be surprised how often this happens with submissions. 

Whether you hand your submission to an editor or literary agent at a conference—or—you send it electronically—check and double check that you have some basic information on the first page:

Name, mailing address, phone number and email address

Here's the simple reason you need to include your mailing address. As a part of our submission process, we mail each author a printed letter in the postal system. If you don't include this information in your submission, then the editor has to reach out to you to get this information. In the meantime, your submission goes to the side while other things are worked on (not what you want to happen).

As I was writing this article, another author contacted me about her submission. During our conversation, she mentioned that her mother had passed away. I was going to send her a sympathy card so I dug out her business card. The card was beautiful and included her name, email and phone along with her photo—but no mailing address. Next I went to her website and looked around. It was an attractive website but did not include a mailing address. 

One of the most difficult aspects of proofreading is finding something which is not on the page. Many editors will not go to such effort to process your submission but will simply set it aside and begin working on the next one on their submission list. You will be rejected by default.

Don't make the editor or agent have to work hard to reach you. It will work against you rather than for you in this process. The basics are important and make sure you have them covered.