Writers & Authors

stimpsonslostson

Over the past year I've written two children's novels. 
Both aimed at "middle grade" level (7-12 year olds), they're modern fantasy adventure stories & I'm pretty happy with them. 
I've always made up stories for my children & mrslostson has been nagging me to put them on paper. The "proper"writing started out as an exercise to keep me entertained while I was in bed for a month recovering from surgery but I've got into it now and try to get 3-500 words written each day.  

I'm in the process of sending my first two novels to agents to try to get representation for publication, but am getting lots of rejection letters. I expected this, but it is still dispiriting. 

I have considered self publishing on Amazon etc, but with the age of my target audience they're much more likely to read physical books than have a Kindle. 

Who else writes either professionally or as a hobby?
Any tips for getting representation or publication deals? 

oh_pollo

I would find the children's author forum equivilent of the Fretboard and maybe get some tips and help there. During lockdown I've written a few short stories  - they fall into the sci-fi/horror camp - and there's quite a few forums for that genre where people post stuff to get feedback etc - sometimes agents pick up stuf from there as well. You could also look at doing an online course and get some feedback from published authors and fellow students. It might be something really small that's causing you to get looked over.

Good luck!

boogieman

Children’s books are one of the hardest to get published, basically because everyone seems to think they’re easy to write. I’ve got an old college mate who’s written several children’s books and gone down the Amazon route. She sells mostly hard copies and is fairly successful as far as I know. A lot of her success revolves around networking...doing online readings, publicity through social media and linking up with local book groups. Her biggest bonus though is she’s an ex-teacher which gives her an in with local schools, which obviously helps a lot with sales to the target age group. 

I should point out that from personal experience it’s very unlikely that you’ll make much, if anything, out of book writing so don’t go into it thinking it’ll be a money earner. Do it for fun by all means but unless you’re the next JK Rowling I wouldn’t plan on buying that Learjet just yet. I co-wrote a non fiction book a good while back that’s sold over a thousand copies in a decade; after paying out for various things I think we’ve just about broken even.  

Good luck whatever happens. It really is a great thrill seeing a book with your name on the cover. 

PolarityMan

Ive done nanwrimo the past 4 years. Last year was also a childrens book so def itnerested in your experience. The other 3 years were all on a single very ambitious sci-fi that I still hope to eventually finish but I have to admit that childrens fiction is a lot more fun to write when you're trying to do it in a month!

Dave_Vader

Hi there, I realised over the last year or so that I was wasting a lot of time trying to get representation/traditionally published, and that if I spent that time working on my marketing skills and getting more writing done my books would proibably do a lot better than they had been.

I was not wrong. Self-publishing is not for everyone, it's a lot of work, but if you're impatient, it's a godsend.

There's loads of advice out there now, lots of it free. I don't know much about Children's books (I write blokey rom-coms and folk horror), but you can do paperbacks through Amazon KDP as well as ebooks, and that's just a different kind of formatting, all learnable skills.

Don't expect to make any money until you're at least 3 books deep, and even then you've got to jizz a load of it learning how ads work. But if you're just doing it for the pleasure of getting your work out there, it's very rewarding.

If you want to go trad and get an agent, you need to read the Writers And Artists Yearbook - I sent an old copy to somebody else on this forum a year or so ago and he might be finished with it now, so you may get a present.

Hope this helps, feel free to hit me up if you need any help, I've been doing this a while now, and I've nearly got the hand of it.

Check my stuff out at https://author.to/daveholwill if you fancy it (couldn't resist a plug, sorry)

more

I have no experience of Children's books . But in general, it is hard work to get published.  It's not that publisher are  not  very willing to   publish new  writers. All of them are looking for  the next big name that will make them lots of money. Have a look here , www.thegrinder.diaboliplots .com 
This will help you do the  research on what the different  publishers are looking for . On their websites it will tell you how to submit your book . Penguin have a web  site dedicated to the subject   www.getpuplished.penguin.co.uk

 About 98% + of books sent to publisher are rejected . Because,  they don't  publish   that  kind of story submitted, the document has too many errors, not formatted correctly and the story  looks like the other  98% .

   

musteatbrain

My friend’s wife is an Author and does ok. I think she was a journalist first for a newspaper so I assume that network helped when she made the transition.

I think she’s had a book made in to a day time TV film in the US. It’s all romance stuff I think but she’s done it full time for a decade or so. I’m pretty sure it’s as much about the connections you make as it is the substance of what you write.

Blueingreen

The only published childrens' author I know worked with an illustrator and they presented their work as a writer/illustrator team.  I don't know enough about the industry to know whether working with an illustrator really improves your chances of publication but it sounds plausible and might be worth checking out.

boogieman

more said:

I have no experience of Children's books . But in general, it is hard work to get published.  It's not that publisher are  not  very willing to   publish new  writers. All of them are looking for  the next big name that will make them lots of money. Have a look here , www.thegrinder.diaboliplots .com 
This will help you do the  research on what the different  publishers are looking for . On their websites it will tell you how to submit your book . Penguin have a web  site dedicated to the subject   www.getpuplished.penguin.co.uk

 About 98% + of books sent to publisher are rejected . Because,  they don't  publish   that  kind of story submitted, the document has too many errors, not formatted correctly and the story  looks like the other  98% .

   

It’s better to get hold of a copy of The Writers and Artists Yearbook that DaveVader mentioned, rather than wading your way through publishing house sites. The book gives you a list of what specific areas that the various publishers specialise in and also the guidelines for how to submit sample work to each one. Worth its weight in gold. 

Otherwise lots of good points there, although I disagree about publishers being willing to take on new writers. In my experience they’re not. Virtually every one that shows the slightest bit of interest will ask one question first; what have you had published before? Which of course is catch 22 for most unpublished writers. That’s for one reason, there’s very little profit in books these days and they can’t/won’t afford to take a risk on an unproven author. They’d much rather put out the latest celeb (ghost-written) biography or the latest Dan Brown tosh than potentially lose money on a newbie. There are exceptions of course but they tend to be the small independent publishing houses with quite specialist output.  

Philly_Q

boogieman said:

Otherwise lots of good points there, although I disagree about publishers being willing to take on new writers. In my experience they’re not. Virtually every one that shows the slightest bit of interest will ask one question first; what have you had published before? Which of course is catch 22 for most unpublished writers. That’s for one reason, there’s very little profit in books these days and they can’t/won’t afford to take a risk on an unproven author. They’d much rather put out the latest celeb (ghost-written) biography or the latest Dan Brown tosh than potentially lose money on a newbie. There are exceptions of course but they tend to be the small independent publishing houses with quite specialist output.  

Blueingreen said:

The only published childrens' author I know worked with an illustrator and they presented their work as a writer/illustrator team.  I don't know enough about the industry to know whether working with an illustrator really improves your chances of publication but it sounds plausible and might be worth checking out.

This isn't meant as a suggestion to the OP, but is there not an option to essentially self-publish? 

My sister - the one who's been giving me so much grief - managed to get a children's book published a couple of years ago.  I don't know what the details of the publishing "deal" itself were, but I do know she and her "co-author" had to pay for the illustrations themselves. 

And there was no evidence of any editorial input - the blurb on the back of the book describes events which don't actually happen in the book, and the plot makes no sense at all....

boogieman

@Philly_Q ;The OP did mention self publishing through Amazon in his first post It’s a decent option if there’s no hope of a deal. The biggest problem with self publishing is getting the book pushed and known about. That needs a hell of a lot of effort and some good networking, something that a decent publisher should do for you.  

I’ve seen a couple of self published efforts. One was a really good book and I was surprised it didn’t get the attention it deserved from a publisher. The other was self indulgent substandard Barbara Cartland romantic piffle, riddled with speeling mistaches and drastically in need of an good edit. 

Dave_Vader

boogieman said:

 The biggest problem with self publishing is getting the book pushed and known about. That needs a hell of a lot of effort and some good networking, something that a decent publisher should do for you. 

What nobody tells you these days is that most publishers still expect you to do an awful lot of the marketing legwork yourself. Even paying for your own ads in a lot of cases.

Again, it's a valid option, and self-pubbed does vary from self-indulgent endless plotless bollocks to really slickly edited, perfect prose. It's a choice these days, and one with a very tempting 70% royalty rate if you do go for it.

But you still need to pay an editor, a cover designer etc. etc. if you don't want to sink in the water.

(or have editing friends and graphic design experience with an eye for the book market)

It's a long haul whichever choice you make.

AlexC

I worked as a writer for many years - albeit scripts. Obviously that’s radically different because it’s something for a client commission and doesn’t involve physical publishing.
However, all of the writers I knew who had books in shops in physical form had an agent. Publishers are a traditional lot and really only want to deal with ‘represented’ people. Sad, but true.
Same with being an actor or a musician (if you want to work outside the hall/pub circuit).
Edit: sorry - forgot to say well done on writing! It’s a tough thing to do. Keep at it. Don’t get despondent by rejection.

boogieman

Dave_Vader said:

boogieman said:

 The biggest problem with self publishing is getting the book pushed and known about. That needs a hell of a lot of effort and some good networking, something that a decent publisher should do for you. 

What nobody tells you these days is that most publishers still expect you to do an awful lot of the marketing legwork yourself. Even paying for your own ads in a lot of cases.

Again, it's a valid option, and self-pubbed does vary from self-indulgent endless plotless bollocks to really slickly edited, perfect prose. It's a choice these days, and one with a very tempting 70% royalty rate if you do go for it.

But you still need to pay an editor, a cover designer etc. etc. if you don't want to sink in the water.

(or have editing friends and graphic design experience with an eye for the book market)

It's a long haul whichever choice you make.

Tell me about it. Our book was published by a very small outfit that specialises in political stuff. There’s about 5 people in the office and they just seemed to concentrate on their biggest star, (Noam Chomsky) while everyone else had to sort things for themselves. When our book came out we had to organise all our own publicity, sort out talks at bookshops, try to find slots at book festivals etc. We even found a venue and footed the bill for the launch do booze and grub ourselves.  

Just remembered. One thing I did learn from another author: sign every copy of your book in a bookshop (obviously ask the owner first!). A lot of bookshops take stuff on sale or return, so if it doesn’t sell after a set period they can send it back. If it’s signed they can’t return it. 

Nitefly

boogieman said:

I’ve seen a couple of self published efforts. One was a really good book and I was surprised it didn’t get the attention it deserved from a publisher. The other was self indulgent substandard Barbara Cartland romantic piffle, riddled with speeling mistaches and drastically in need of an good edit. 

LOL, good work there, @boogieman ;