This is something most moderately-successful commercial authors get asked about frequently. In fact, I think it's the thing I'm asked about most frequently after "where do you get your ideas?" and "are there going to be more books in this series?" Even more than "will you read my book?" and "Why don't you have a TV show like Charlaine Harris?" (to both of which the answer is an inarticulate mumble--more about that another time.)

In the interest of doing this only once for the many many people who've asked, here's the skinny:

First off a caveat: any given writer can only tell you what their path was or what they've learned personally from missteps or conversation with others. The latter is second-hand info and it can be misleading. The first-hand info is only helpful so long as it's kept in perspective. That is to say, it's the experiential info-dump of one example. That said, here goes...

Before you go looking for an agent, finish and revise your novel. Fiction agents don't rep unfinished work or short stories as a rule, nor are most of them interested in helping you revise. You need to have a complete, readable, and interesting manuscript that is not less than 50,000 words long for the Young Adult market and not less than 70,000 for the regular adult market. (Non-fiction and published authors who already have representation and work in print may be exceptions, but that's not the point for this discussion. We're talking about getting you an agent for your first novel.) Got your MS? Revised, sexy, complete, and all ready to go? OK, let's proceed.

Next, you have to know what genre your book falls into. Is it a Romance? SF/F? Literary Fiction? Mystery? Historical? Whatever genre is most prevalent in the book is likely to be where it will sell, so you'll need an agent who's familiar with that genre (and yes, "Literary" is a genre) and has made successful sales to reputable publishers in that genre (or is working for a reputable agency with sales to major publishers, preferably in that genre.)

Now you're wondering how to find these agents in the first place, aren't you? There are several routes and I recommend looking at all of them:

• You can search the print or online versions of Writers Market (WM) or Literary Market Place (LMP) for agents who list your genres as interests. This is easy with the online data bases and it's pretty cheap (about $3-6/month for a subscription to the site), or a bit harder and more time consuming with the print versions, but you can use them at the library for free. Either way, you get a nice list of possible agents who handle your genre or genres (if you are writing in a cross-genre niche or interested in writing more than one type of genre, you may want an agent who represents several of the genres you're interested in.)


• Search the Internet for "literary agent" and the genres you're interested in. Save the resulting search list.


• Go to conferences or conventions about writing or the genre you are interested in and check the presenter/panelist information for agents who work in your genre of interest. Make notes.


• Look at the dedication pages and websites of authors who write in the genre(s) you're interested in. Chances are good they mention their agent. Write those names down and note which author/book is associated with that agent.


• Check the lists at Agent Query for the names of agents who are "actively looking" and filter by genre.

So, now you have lists of agents. Pretty long lists. Now comes the "vetting" stage. This is where you look at the list and start eliminating people and prioritizing the ones who remain. The easiest way to check out agents at this level is online. Search for their website--every agent or agency has one and they are easy to find by searching for the agent's name or the agency name if you have it. If you are writing SF/F or Mystery, you should also check Preditors and Editors and Writer Beware, two related and wonderful sites that have already done a lot of the hard work for you.

When running these searches, you are looking for agents who:

• Handle your genre(s) of interest.


• Are actively in the business (not retired or out of business).


• Have made recent sales to reputable publishers in your genre.


• Are operating in the country you desire to be published in (sounds silly, but with the exception of Canadian agents who sell into US and UK markets, you really do need an agent in the US of you want to make a US sale, or in the UK if you want make your initial sale there.)


• Have a clean reputation and are not listed as "not recommended" with P&E or under investigation as scam artists with Writer Beware.


• Are actively looking or open for queries. (more on this later)


• Do not charge "reading fees," "editorial fees," or act as a front for editorial services, promotion services, or vanity/POD presses. (Nothing against POD or Vanity press, but they aren't agents.)


• Are AAR members or abide by the AAR Canon of Ethics (my own agent is not a member of AAR, but he does abide by their CoE guidelines.)


• Don't give you the creeps or leave a bad impression with you with respect to their professionalism or actions. (If something the agent espouses, does, or is offends you or makes you lack confidence in their ability to represent your book fairly and professionally, they aren't the agent for you.)

Once you've vetted your list and thrown out the scam artists, closed agencies, inappropriate agencies, and agents who just give you a bad feeling, you'll probably have a list of anywhere from 6-60 agents. Consider who they represent and what their recent track record is and prioritize them with the "dream agent" on top and the rest down the list from there.

Now, if you have the opportunity, you may be able to meet some of these agents in person or on online and get to know more about them and what they are looking for. Writer's and genre conventions are great places to meet agents and find out more about them, but unless you have an appointment or an invitation to do so, don't "pitch". Just make the connection, get their card, and gather info for later.

If you ask an author about their agent or which agents they might recommend, the author's response is not a personal referral. After all, the author doesn't know you or your work so can't--and won't--refer/recommend you to their agent. That implies some kind of positive support. What you will get, if the author responds, is simply a name or list of agents the author thinks are professional, reliable, appropriate for the genre, and probably open for queries. That's all. Just a list. Just "these guys are good/don't suck."

A tip: younger/newer agents are often a better bet for first-time novelists than older/more established agents. They usually have more room in their client list and are more aggressive about selling their client's work since they work on commission and have fewer possible revenue streams. They also tend to have more time to spend with each client to help explain the vagueries of publishing and contracts to their writers. If they are junior agents at an established agency, they have the benefit of the agency's older, wiser heads to consult with. Older agents have more contacts and longer track records, but they often are not accepting new clients, so the junior agent of your dream agency may be a very good bet. New independent agents are rare, but many of them have prior experience as assistants, editors, book packagers, or publicists and thus have good contacts and relationships with the industry, even though they may have few clients. These young agents often have another job somewhere to pay the bills, but that doesn't mean they aren't on your side and won't make time for you. Vet them first, but don't write off the youngsters just because they are new.

Back to the main point...

Querying (formally, in writing) and pitching (informally, in person) must be done with a professional attitude and approach. Pitching in inappropriate situations (like... convention bathrooms, workout rooms, parking lots, airport shuttle buses etc.) or forcing your material on agents and editors by slipping it under doors and into briefcases or hands, will only hurt you. (Yes, I have seen/heard all these things and no one likes it, so don't do it!)

The same goes for blogs, Facebook, MySpace, and Twitter. Everyone has one or two of these accounts these days, but pitching in those venues, unless the agent has made public or private invitation to do so, is just as tacky as cornering them in the loo. Just don't. Ask questions about their agency, their query requirements, their current client list, their professional interests, their favorite (non-client) writer, and so on, but don't pitch until they say "OK, tell me about your book." Once you have a personal contact, you can use that in your actual query to remind the agent who you are and this may help move you up their reading pile a little faster, but if you made a bad impression you stand a better chance of ending up in "the round file." Keep it professional.

If you have the opportunity--and I mean a gracious and professional opportunity, not the above--to pitch in person at a conference or meeting (even in an elevator if you can do it well), be prepared: practice ahead of time, do it clean and fast, get the agent's card and give them yours, and go on your way as soon as the session is over. Don't linger around unless invited to and do follow up as soon as possible if the agent has asked you to.

If you can't pitch in person (or if you've been asked to follow up on an in-person pitch) you'll have to query by mail. Whether you have a contact or not, once you have the names and addresses of the agents you want to query, check their website to be sure they are open for queries and what form they want those queries in. (If you've been lucky enough to be invited to query, you can do that even if the agent is officially "closed" to queries, but only with such an invitation will you escape the dreaded rejection.) Compose a really fantastic query letter (there are lots of sites that will help you with that, so I'm not getting into that here) and send it as per the instructions on the site or agent's information sheet (if you met them at a conference). Do exactly what they tell you, and send only the materials they tell you to send in the format they tell you to send them in. If they say "no e-mail queries" that applies to you, too, no matter how much you think it doesn't (unless the agent told you otherwise, directly to your face.) Don't get creative with the formats and materials.

A note about "closed to queries": this is usually a temporary situation due to overload. Don't despair. If Dream Agent is closed to queries, they will reopen eventually. Many of them update on Twitter or FaceBook or other social network sites as well as on their websites and blogs, so keep checking. And if you happen to meet the agent, it's all right to ask, politely, when they think they might be open again.

Part of the purpose of the query process is demonstrating that you are a professional who can follow directions (as a commercial author, you'll have a lot of instructions to follow in your career and you need to start out well) as well as being a heck of a fine writer with a really cool story whose time in now and which is ready to go. It's not a sexy, fun, or cool process, but it demonstrates: your control of language (you don't have a lot of words to get your idea across); your clear understanding of your story and ability to express that to others; your ability to write and submit materials to requirements; and your willingness to put yourself out and work your buns off while maintaining a professional demeanor in public.

Personalize each query. Don't send a mass-produced, identical packet to every agent on your list and don't use an automated query system. Send the agent what they asked for and include their name and why you are contacting them (you met them at Writer Con, or your book is in the same category as their client So-and-So's, or you talked to them on Twitter during #askanagent last Wednesday). So now you have your query ready to go. It's just the first of many. Send it out right away. Then send some more. Queries are not the same as "submissions" so you can send out as many as you like at one time. Just don't send more than one to any one agency--agents do talk and discuss their queries within agencies and a flood of queries from the same person is very much a bad idea. If Agent 1 thinks it's good but can't take it, he or she may pass it on to Agent 2, so don't query Agent 2 at the same time.

Track all your queries and know where they went and when. Track your results too. Writer's Market and LMP both have areas their subscribers can use for manuscript tracking, so you don't even have to make your own spreadsheet unless you want to. But whatever you do, track them all. It's really embarrassing to send a new query to someone who already rejected it. Trust me: agents remember this stuff because they keep spreadsheets too.

When you get a rejection, don't take it personally. Just log it and go on. Most rejections have little to do with you or your project and a lot to do with timing, market forces, agency business and so on. None of them are personal attacks on you--at least they shouldn't be. If you get notes from the agent about the submission, that's great--take heed. Otherwise, just keep on querying your way down your list and if you run out of list, look again.

At some point you may be asked to submit a full or partial manuscript. If this happens, you should do so immediately and in the requested format. The agent's website will usually tell you how long it will take for them to get back to you. Whatever it is, double it--people get busy and pestering the agent with "did you get it/what do you think?" will piss them off. If the usual response time has elapsed, then you can--gently and only once--ask if the requested materials arrived. The agent will say yes or no and so it goes....

If you get very lucky, you may have several agents ask for submissions. This is the infamous "simultaneous submission" situation. In the past lots of agents have stated they didn't want simultaneous submissions--it means someone else is looking at your material at the same time, so there's competition--but in the digital age and with fewer people reading more manuscripts sent via e-mail and so on, most agents are looser about this now. However, as the writer, you should check the website to see what the agent's policy on sim-subs is, then send a note saying that you already have materials on submission with Agent X and asking if Agent Y minds accepting a simultaneous submission. Usually the answer is "that's fine, send it," but if not, say thank you and that you'll send materials as soon as Agent X is done with them. And that's what you'll do. If you do have your material out with several agents simultaneously, you should let each agent know that other agents are looking at your material. If they find out through the grapevine, they may be a little upset and that is something you want to avoid.

Once your material is "on submission," you wait until it's either rejected or the agent calls you (they always call or e-mail, never snail mail) to offer you representation, or conditional representation (that is to say, they'll represent you if something is changed that is giving them pause.) If you're very, very lucky, you might have more than one agent to choose from, but that's rare. If your manuscript is rejected, you go back to the query process. But if it's accepted, you now have an interesting situation....

Now this is where things get a little strange. Your first response to "I'd like to represent you/your book" will probably be "Yipeeeee!" which is cool--congratulations! But before you sign a representation agreement, there are a couple of considerations.

You've already vetted the agent before you sent your query, so you know he/she is a pro who can do a good job, but are they the right pro for you? An agent is your adviser, representative, and professional guide to this crazy industry, but the are also your employee and as such you need to feel comfortable with them and with the contract you are being offered. If you find you really don't like/trust/agree with/feel comfortable with/understand the agent, or you've changed your mind about what your requirements are for representation, you may be better off refusing representation with this particular agent. Then you will have to start over, but it's better to have no agent than a bad one. If you love the agent, then it's on to the contract stage.

If you're in the happy situation of having more than one offer of representation, congratulations: you're in the catbird seat! But whether you have one offer or three, consider both the agent and their contract with care. You want to pick an agent with whom you have rapport and in whom you have confidence. Someone with enthusiasm for your book, not a reluctant willingness to show it around. You should also look hard at the contract. If it demands the right to control all rights-licensing connected to any sold project in perpetuity with no reversion for unsold rights, if it demands fees up front, if it demands representation of all works regardless of sale, if it gives the agent rights to sever the agreement but doesn't give them to you, or similar clauses, then it isn't a good deal. Ask questions about anything that's unclear or makes you uncomfortable. If you aren't happy with the answers, look elsewhere for representation.

Agents are very useful to writers, but bear in mind that they are supposed to help and advise you, not dictate to you or intimidate you. Don't think you have to work with someone if you're uncomfortable, just because they're the only one who offered. Keep trying until you find someone who is not only good at their job, but good for you.

Last notes about acquiring an agent: The publishing world is very small and close-knit. Word gets around, so act like a pro. Don't rant in public when you're rejected (it'll happen), don't call names or say mean things about the agent or editor who rejected you, don't send them rude notes, and don't take things personally. Stiff upper lip and all that jazz. After all, you wouldn't want to hire someone who doesn't really like your book or who doesn't like you. Would you?

I'm just so happy I have to post: My internet buddy Kaz Mahoney is now...

Under contract to be published!

Flux is taking her book, The Iron Witch, and the as-yet unwritten sequel and I'm so happy for her! She's a sweetie and a class act who's had a very rough year and I can't say enough good things about her and she certainly deserves this.

Hurray for Karen!

My editor reports happy ending to the title controversy: After much discussion, the title LABYRINTH is being reinstated for Greywalker #5. Kudos to the publisher for taking the risk on possible confusion in exchange for a title to die for. Thanks to sales and marketing departments for feeling confident they can sell it, and to publication team for going the extra mile.

I need to send cookies.

Many, many thanks to my editor, Anne Sowards--Anne rocks--and to Susan, the editorial director, for going to bat on this one for me.

I'm still kind of in a daze about the tour. Some of it was fantastic, some was so-so, and I'm still not sure how it all went.

But I'm home, rested, and back in the writing saddle. Have been granted a short extension of deadline and am doing 2K+ per day on the word count, so all is good there. Alas, the proposed (and we though approved) title for Greywalker #5 got the boot due to possible confusion with Kate Mosse's historical novel, Labyrinth, so my editor and the publication crew are going back to the drawing board for a new title. This makes me sad, since Labyrinth was the title I preferred, but this is the way publishing gets at times and something will work out eventually. I have confidence in my editor and the publication team to come up with something that's not only marketable, but good. They have not let me down yet.

Now I need some dinner, because today's writing session scared the hoo-ha out of me and wore me out and now I'm shaking. I think that's probably good, but it does feel a bit freaky. And when I can't find a monster that works for me, I make one up, so I now have birthed a creeping thing of mist and shadow that spawns in graveyards and such....

The timing on the Google Settlement opt-out/objection deadline. I put it off before since I was at the tail end of copyedits, proofs, first conventions, and taxes. Now it has come back around and the deadline to say "fuck off and die" or "I'm going along with this, but I think it stinks" are coming up in 4 days. And I have a million things to do that are more immediate than the filing of yet more paperwork.

I don't have a problem with the initial urge behind Google Books--really I don't. What's wrong with a highly detailed and accessible index? I've benefited from Google Books as a research tool, being able to look into the specific pages of a book that I thought might have been useful without having to buy it or toddle off to the library in person and waste everyone's time only to discover the book was useless, or to reject a book that sounded useless only to discover later it had the info I needed, but had no way of discovering without reading every page. The index I don't have a problem with and I don't have a problem with the idea of a company who's done a huge amount of work to make this index happen and functional making some money off their effort. I make (or hope to make) money off my efforts, too.

What I really don't like is the way the index then morphed into an electronic sales and distribution net that has more rights and privileges over the material than the creator or copyright holder does. This is largely due to the settlement clauses introduced by the Author's Guild, not by the action of Google. The immediate problem now is that there are only 4 days left to file the paperwork to say "this sucks" or opt out and be screwed until someone else takes Google to court (but not the AG for their ham-handed way of trying to "settle" the issue.)

I'm still not sure how I feel about the options, except that I don't see how this can be legal: the Authors Guild does not represent me, I never gave them my proxy to act in my behalf on this, and "opt in by default" is not a legal standard. How can I be held to agreements to which I was no party and in which I had no proxy? How can the court legally defend giving my rights away to a group I don't belong to and do not support nor receive any support from? I don't want to be stuck in a bad business relationship with a pair of companies who have, without my permission or participation, effectively redefined copyright license and exercise in perpetuity, to their benefit and not to mine and without any consent or agreement from me. I can only hope the judicial review of the settlement in January throws the abomination out.

I have, and always have had, strong reservations about the Authors Guild. I'm not a member; I've never felt they truly had my interests at heart, and I've rarely seen them go after the issues that most worry me while they are still small--they tend to let it slide until the big money is on the line and then grandstand just like they have here (eg: they ignored the "audio" issue when it rested with Kurzweil in the late 1980s, but not when it was Amazon in 2009 and they still ignore that issue with Adobe's Acrobat reader for Mac). Google I used to like quite a bit, but this situation is out of hand and they started it and then acted like royal tits when confronted with the ramifications of where they were headed. There just is no good end to this situation short of the judicial review throwing the settlement out as untenable, illegal, illconceived, and unconstitutional. Unfortunately, I don't think they will, but if they don't they will have handed the defining and licensing of copyright to two commercial entities with special interests.

Looks like I'll be getting even less done this week than I'd hoped....

I got the news from Eddie at the agency when I got home from Portland that the new releases are doing quite well. It's not the NYT bestseller list, but it doesn't suck for Vanished to be #4 Hardcover Fantasy novel on the Bookscan list and #30 Fantasy over all, with the mass market of Underground being #28 Fantasy mmp. Not shabby at all! (Hurray little books! Go, go! and Thank you Eddie!)

So... John Pitts sent me a note to let me know that Vanished has an ad on the front page of Locus Magazine's site! W00t! My publisher has made me very, very happy and so has John! *smoochies* (note that there is a big, fat ad for my book on the publisher's site, too.)

How could I forget? I'm also going to be at Dragon*con in Atlanta Georgia over Labor Day weekend! W00t!

I'm trying to spend less time online and more working. Book 5 is a bit behind. I know it's not due until October 1, but August has just become The Busiest Month of My Life, so I'm trying to get more done ahead of time. My publicists and I are waiting on confirmations for some things before we can set a few more in place. Things actually start in July and then heat up. Although some things are still in flux, right now we have confirmed or conditionally confirmed:

Interviews online with AmberKatze's Book Blog (date TBA) and Bitten By Books (interactive chat and fun stuff at BBB May 28)

Mass signing in Salem Oregon at Escape Fiction July 18

Comic Con, San Diego, July 23-26. Pro status not yet confirmed, but I will be signing books with Roc/Ace group and with the book room's Mysterious Galaxy (Vanished is unlikely to be available but we'll see.. The rest of the new paperbacks will be there though.)

Pacific Northwest Writers' Summer Conference, Seattle Airport, July 30-Aug 2 (working on getting pre-release copies of Vanished.)

U-Books, Seattle WA, Aug 4 (Vanished launch date!)

Seattle Mystery Bookshop, Aug 8

Powells in Beaverton Aug 11 (and casual hanging around)

Midnight Brew Interview Online Aug 13

Murder by the Book, Houston TX, Aug 14 (note this is a change from the original announced date of Saturday, Aug 15) drop-ins and hanging out will happen on Saturday until I have to head for the airport in the late afternoon/early evening.

Barnes and Noble at The Grove, Los Angeles CA, Aug 21

Booksoup, Los Angeles CA, Aug 24

Connie Martinson Talks Books (cable TV show taping, air date not yet known)

National daytime TV! Date is not set yet, but we're hoping for earlier rather than later in the month. (I'm so excited!)

Various radio interviews, including markets in the Northeast, Chicago, Toronto, NPR, and the Southeast Specifics are still being arranged.

Also still in the works, signings at: San Francisco CA; La Jolla CA; Santa Barbara CA. Maybe a few other things... not sure yet. On the fence about: Bouchercon, Indianapolis IN, mid-October; World Fantasy Convention, San Jose CA, Hallowe'en Weekend.

So far the hiring of independent publicist Josh Jason seems to be paying off. And my Penguin publicist, Roseanne Romanello, has been fantastic, too. Everyone's busy as a hive full of bees, but it's all good stuff so far!

Now... back to work!

My husband sent me this link to TitleZ: Book trends for publishers today. Looks interesting--and it's free to use while in beta--but I wonder... is it really useful in the long run? Does Amazon tracking data really show me anything about the macroverse of book buying trends? What do you guys think?

While I know a lot of authors, I also know a lot of folks who aspire to be published authors and run around madly one month out of the year after being a hermit who lives with their laptop the other eleven. So for the people who are still pitching, here's a little news.

Cheerios cereal is sponsoring a Children's Book contest. The Prize being $5,000 and a possible contract with Simon and Schuster Children's Books division. Now, you do have to be a little wary, since S&S is the company that continues to try and slide in a contractual clause that keeps your book "in print" (and therefore in their control) so long as any copy exists in their system, including the electronic archive in their database. However, they are a legit company with major distribution so if you're a children's story writer, check it out:

Cheerio's Spoonfuls of Stories contest info and forms.

As an author, you know you have "arrived" when editors (especially editors you don't work with) ask you to blurb other people's books. This is a big step up from when your friends ask you to blurb their books (they are your friends--of course they ask!) and especially a big step up from when strangers ask you to read their manuscripts and give free critiques (and blurbs against the day said book finally gets published, which speaks more to where you happen to be standing at the time.) Among other things, an editorial request for blurb implies that your profesional opinion is valuable and carries some weight with readers and that you have enough readers to be significant in sales terms. This makes the author feel very warm and happy. But the giving of blurbs is much more treacherous territory than it at first seems....

The whole point of a blurb--or "sell quote"--is to link a book by a new or breaking author with the fan base of a more successful author in the same or similar genre/niche/sub-niche, etc. The idea being that Better-known Author's fans might also like this similar book by New/Breaking Author and therefore buy it. And that is the key: basic similarity and association. It's not just a matter of any-old-body saying nice things in print about the book, but of presenting the formula </begin mock-forumla here>:

[X likes Y; U like X; QED: U will like Y!]
which is followed by the assumption [U will buy Y].

Writers, agents, and editors scramble about like bugs escaping from an overturned rock looking for good blurbs that will persuade all the U out there to buy their Y. The tricky bit comes in getting the right association of Better-Known Author to Brand New Y.

You can't get just anyone, as I've noted; you have to have the right someone. It doesn't matter how much Neil Gaiman likes your book if it's not a fantasy/horror/comic in a similar niche and vein to Gaiman's work. It doesn't matter how much your mother or friends like it either, even if they are also writers, unless they have big writer-names in your genre. Nor does it matter how much I like your book if it's a bosom-heaving romance novel since I don't write those. If the book in question isn't a good fit for the audience associated with the writer giving the blurb, a quote from that writer may do more harm than good. At best, it just looks odd and people ignore it, which was a waste of everyone's time.

Editors do try to get the best quotes they can from the highest-profile, best-fit writers they can persuade. They may ask a lot of writers for quotes because they know some won't come in or won't come in on time for the press run. The editor may have to ask a dozen writers to blurb in order to get three or four useable quotes. Sometimes, unfortunately, the connection between blurber and blurbee isn't as good as might be wished.

I have blurbed two books I wish I hadn't. Not because I didn't like the books, but because my audience and the audience for the new books didn't have a great overlap. It associated the book with a sub-niche that isn't representative of the author's focus, and me with a book that I'm no kind of authority on. That's a disservice to the author of the new book and it makes me look like a blurb whore--which isn't good for my repuation either.

This is why, even though I love Katie MacAlister's Aisling Grey novels, I'd never blurb a similar book; I'm not a paranormal romance writer, but that's the audience the book would really need to be successful. While it's true that some of my fans are also ParaRom readers, that's not the core of my audience, nor what they expect from my books. So a quote from me on the cover of a frothy, funny, sexy book like that would mislead the readers into thinking they were getting something darker. They might still like it a lot, but some would be very upset and the chances are good they'd take it out on the new book. A few might send me a snotty note saying I misled them, but for the most part, once I've given the quote, I'm off the hook and it's New Author who will get the bad Amazon reviews and rude emails about how much their book isn't like mine.

Now, I think pretty hard whenever I'm asked to blurb a book. It may be a great book and I may like it a lot, but if the subject, tone, or general direction of the book is at odds with what I'm known for, I may refuse to provide a quote. Not because I'm a bitch, but because I don't want to mislead readers. Would you feel confident about a hard SF book with a cover blurb from me on it? Probably not. At least not at this stage in my career when I have no reputation as a hard SF writer or reviewer. I don't think it's appropriate for me to blurb pure, high-fanatasy novels either, since I don't write them. That's not to say I don't like them: I enjoyed The Name of the Wind and Lamentation very much, but a blurb from me does nothing for those books (my apologies to Pat on that score.)

There is also the associated problem of the "blurb-whore"--and you've seen this, I know. This is the writer who appears willing to provide a boffo quote that means absolutely nothing to damn near anyone who asks. Their quotes are everywhere as a result and it devalues the reputation of the author providing the quote while reflecting badly on the author receiving it (what... they couldn't get anyone else?) It's kind of like those Amazon reviewers who never give anything but five-star ratings and manage to review seven books out of every dozen. Readers just stop believing in these authors' blurbs and it reflects badly on their work as a result.

So, when giving blurbs, thoughtful authors need to consider if their quote:

1. Will bring the New Author an appropriate audience or steer readers to a wrong assumption;
2. Will reflect well on themselves and their brand by association with the New Author's book and niche;
3. Will add value by being selectively given or devalue their author-meme by over-saturation of the blurb market;
4. Says anything that will pull a reader into purchasing/reading the book.

When you ask for a quote, consider the same points--after all, what others say about you on the cover is intended to sell the book, not just say nice things about you or prove that you know cool writers.

When you provide a quote, you're not just doing New Author a favor, you're associating yourself with their future fan base in hopes of spreading your own author-meme into a potential pool of new readers for your books, too. It's a sort of reciprocal promotion. You say good things about them and when they get new readers, those readers notice you, too and (we all hope) buy your books because U like Y! (And Y likes you back.)

My fellow SFNovelist, Simon Haynes has a very interesting interview with himself up on his site about DRM and free ebooks. See... Simon has a thriving series of comic SF books in Australia, Hal Spacejock, whose success outside Oz has been largely due to his publisher giving his first book away for free in ebook format. (It's still available too, so if you want to read something dryly funny that takes a lot of good solid jabs at Space Opera conventions, go get it and get hooked.) Sounds kind of screwy in this age of financial depression and copyright malfunction, but it's working very well for Simon and Freemantle Press. By making his books into inexpensive, DRM-free ebooks (only the first one is free; sorry but you'll have to help Simon pay his bills if you want the rest), Simon and Freemantle have been able to penetrate the worldwide English language market with minimal cost and promotion. This is not only good for Simon, it's good for his publisher and readers and it's a very nice model I'd like to see expanded.

I am very much in favor of DRM-free ebooks, even though they are easier for commercial pirates to copy and distribute (I have waived DRM on my audio books with Recorded Books for the sake of library access, but the option is not available to me on the ebooks). The basic idea of DRM-free ebooks (and audio books) pleases me, not because I don't care if I make money on my work--I do care a lot!--but because it cleaves to the standard of trust and reason I prefer. I like to think that most people are reasonable and ethical, or will be if you make it easier for them to do things in reasonable and ethical ways than in unreasonable, illegal, unethical ways. And I think that giving a few things away, keeping prices reasonable, treating your readers and customers well, and behaving in a generous manner will earn you more readers and customers in the long run.

I don't rail against used book stores or libraries for letting people get their hands on my books without my getting a cut. So it makes no sense to me to tie up the electronic versions so that the majority of customers are hamstrung and treated like criminals to restrict the activities of the few who are criminals. I'm very disappointed in the tigerish stance of some organizations in the name of protecting copyright. I'm reasonably sure that the current copyright system is broken and needs a total replacement, or at least a major overhaul, and taking draconian steps that only alienate and restrict customers and readers is not going to help preserve the earnings of writers as much as it keeps control in the hands of corporations. We don't need to treat customers and readers like cows to be milked.

Readers are rare enough beasts that we should encourage them. Selling or giving them something (an ebook or audio book in this case) without strings attached, that they can keep and share with others is much better than squeezing them for every penny and restricting what they can do with the book they just paid for. If they like your books, they will tell others, or pass their copy along to someone else who may be equally pleased and buy some for themselves and pass the word along, and so on.... That's part of how the review process works. It's the reason publishers give away thousands of copies of books every year to conventions and publications. Word of mouth is the single strongest promotional tool writers can have on their side. Locking up the electronic forms of books so readers are captive to a proprietary format hurts that potential word of mouth by restricting readership conditions. It also insults the buyer of your book with the supposition that they can't be trusted. While it's not the writer who makes that decision, it's the writer who will suffer most when the books don't sell.

DRM is largely a tool for maintaining industry control; it doesn't help writers. It would be nice if writers were guaranteed to get money every time anyone read our books in any format and from any source. But that has never and will never happen. I'm not sure what changes we need to make to the way we manage intellectual propery in this electronic age, and how we give writers and other intellectual creators a reasonable chance to profit from their work, but I am sure that draconian DRMs aren't them.

Now, go read Simon's book. It's much funnier than I am.

In support of my Never Give Up! Never Surrender post, take a look at this post by agent Colleen Lindsey about patience. This is another facet of the "don't give up" paradigm: hope and success require patience as well as preparation.

Now that I've upset and annoyed half the internet by yelling at the non-fiction tweakers, here's another bit of Kat-wisdom for you writer types: Don't invest in this gloom and doom shit that's all over the place lately. Please.

I'm hearing some people say "What's the point? Maybe I should quit. The economy/biz is such a mess, what chance do I have?" Yeah, yeah, the economy is ugly, the industry is floundering around like a floundering flounder with only one good eye and a broken tail and things look grim, but here are a few things I want you to think about before you throw up your hands and cry "I'm giving up! I'll never be published/make the cut/get a new contract/stay in the biz!":

1. Fiction reading rose significantly in 2008, especially among the most-coveted 18-24 age bracket (21%!)


2. Major chains closed their fourth quarter with more volumes sold than the previous year's fourth quarter--profits were down due to buyers taking more small, cheap mmpbs and fewer hardcovers, but the important thing is more people bought more books! And bookstores are asking for mmpb and trade paperbacks instead of hardcover (bad news for me, good for you.)


3. February is traditionally the worst month of the year for booksales in the US. This one's not any different.


4. Although some small publishers have gone out of business and some big publishers are laying people off, dropping low-return contracts and canceling low-sales series, few imprints are being discarded and printing schedules for 2009-2010 are full. Manuscripts will still be needed to fill those print schedules in 2011 and beyond.


5. More agents and publishers are doing their business electronically, thus lowering the costs and time for querying and editorial process for all involved.

What does this mean for you, my aspiring or struggling writer friends? It means you still stand a chance. If you stop writing or submitting or querying now, you will be behind the curve when the pieces start being picked up. You will be worse off than if you keep on doing what you are doing right now. Yes, starting-level advances won't be as large and a lot of things are uncertain and in flux, but it costs you less to query electronically and it costs you nothing to keep on honing your art and trying. Lost opportunities cost more.

Start looking for things that are free or cheap to do. Like... Flycon, forming a crit group with your online writer crowd, querying agents who accept email queries, sharing a subscription to Publisher's Weekly, taking piece work to hone your skills while getting paid, bid on an open eLance writing job, post short stories for free to build your audience, challenge another writer to a blogging contest, take a research trip around your town or county for interesting things to use in your next story, create an online photo essay of things you are writing about... whatever you can do that keeps your writer juices flowing and helps you stay in the game. Because one of the keys to success is being prepared to jump up and grab it when it knocks on your door or passes on the virtual street. If you give up, you will not be in the right place at the right time.

I really do believe the book industry will have to make some big, sweeping, scary changes to stay in business in the next couple of years, but while they are doing that, they will still need new books to sell. Don't hide under a rock because things are a little crazy right now--it's always crazy in this business. Maybe you can be the next Cory Doctorow or Jonathan Coulton. But not if you don't stick to this wretched, crazy, wonderful thing called writing.

In the immortal words of Commander Peter Quincy Taggart, "Never give up! Never surrender!"

Blargh... I have a cold which is making me lose time on the proof--it's exhausting concentrating on the words and punctuation and the smaller type on the mass market galley forces me to squint even with my reading glasses on, so I feel a bit dizzy after an hour or so. But it's mostly done, so I don't feel too bad, though I've only found 2 typos... so maybe I'm just missing things.

But just in case, if any of you have noticed typos in the text of Greywalker, let me know which page and the context of the typo and I'll go check on it in the new format.

Meanwhile, I'm finding myself a bit worried about things bookish. I keep hearing from other authors that their books are being moved from hardcover to tpb or mmpb (or from tpb to mmpb) due to demands from bookstores for cheaper books. There seems to be concern that the more expensive hardcovers won't sell in the current financial freak out. But my books were moved up to hardcover last year. So... will they drop back down to tpb? or mmpb? And if so will that leave Underground as the one orphan in the bunch that came out in hardcovers? I also find the absence of the book from chain store shelves worrying. If they stay in hardcover, will all the successive books face the same 8-month absence during which they don't make money for anyone? And if they don't make money in the first year (when they will actually be less available since they'll be off shelves for 8-9 months before mmpbs come out) will my publisher decide I don't make them enough money and drop my contract...? All these little worries run around in my snot-clogged brain and make me want to hide under the boat. And I imagine a few other authors have similar panicky thoughts right now, though they probably don't include huddling underwater.

One of the tricky things about being an author is that you really don't know how well your books are doing most of the time. If you have access to Bookscan (the chain retail sales tracker) through your agency or something like that, you have a weekly spot-check of how well the book has sold in the chains and big online outlets but no idea how they are doing elsewhere. Chain store sales represent anywhere from 50-80% of fiction sales and that percentage tends to get bigger as the books age. (Why this is true I don't really know, since a lot of chains drop older books to make room for newer ones where an indie might hold on to all the books in a series just to be "completist.") But anyhow. Even when you can see the Bookscan numbers, you don't really know how the book is doing until the publisher sends you a royalty report. However, that, also, is a bit misleading, since most publishers hold a percentage of the sales "against future returns." So, you never really do know how many books you've sold, only how many the publisher is willing to pay you for or how many the retail chains have sold.

Now if you make a list--like the NYT or USA Today Best Seller lists or the Ingrahm warehouse top seller list, or a chain store best seller list--then you can be pretty sure you're doing all right. But if you don't... well, you don't know dick. And this lack of dick-knowledge can be mightily unsettling when it's contract time. Or time to pay the bills. Great reviews won't save your bacon if the sales numbers stink.

Oh Publishing Gods... please let my bacon be self-sustaining....

And send me softer Kleenex: this brand is turning my nose into a tomato.

Woe, woe, woe....

OMGOMGOMG!! Wolfsbane and Mistletoe made the NYT extended list! We're #31! I've never been in anything that made the NYT list, extended or not!

SQUEEE! (see Kat: see Kat flail away madly in pure glee!)

First: I can no longer say I don't own a car. After 14.5 years without one, I finally broke down and bought a 16-year-old Toyota so I can manage the groceries and errands for the boat and get to a lot of my appointments, signings, friends, and so on without either begging rides, taking the bus, or dealing with issues related to the motorcycle's limited carrying capacity and weather protection. I'm keeping the bike, and I think it'll still be primary transport for a lot of things, but... I do finally have a car. ~sigh~


Second: Amazon UK is coming under pressure from the Hachette Group--which happens to be the parent of my UK publisher--for making unreasonable demands for discounts much larger than those enjoyed by any other book retailer in their market (they already buy at 51% or more off cover price while other booksellers buy at less than 50% off cover--usually 40-45% off.) This isn't limited to the UK, but as of yet, no one else has pitched a bitch and told Amazon they won't play by those rules. I'm pleased that someone is telling them to back down--I think Amazon has been increasingly arrogant and abusive of their suppliers (publishers and--ultimately--writers) in the book market--both US and UK--and nothing has been said. Last year they bought Audible and earlier this year, they laid down an ultimatum to POD publishers that they could no longer manage their own stock if sold by Amazon, but must allow Amazon's POD subsidiary, BookSurge, to do all the printing, binding, and distributing of their POD books sold through Amazon. I can't help wondering when they will make the same demand for all audio books. They already have quite stiff requirements for electronic books being made available for Kindle while Amazon does the conversion to other formats--not the original publisher. Practices like these remove market choice and place the producers at Amazon's mercy with a result that the producers of the materials get less and less money while Amazon--under the guise of offering lower prices to consumers--makes more and more.

I'm not against profit--hell no!--but I am against being abused by someone in the single-minded pursuit of same. Since I make less money per book when my publisher makes less money per book, I don't care for the discount. But more than that, I despise the tactics and the attempt at monopoly and control that Amazon seems to be pursuing. Online bookselling is a lovely idea and it ought to lower overhead, allowing booksellers to make more profit by selling at normal price, or to discount prices while still making the same profit per book. What Amazon is asking for is not a reasonable approach to the market and suppliers, or even to readers.

I hope Amazon UK and its parent will reconsider their demands.