Hello friends. I want to address what I consider to be some incorrectness circulating online about what it takes to get a novel traditionally published. I am not talking memoir or nonfiction here. Just novel-length fiction. And not self- or hybrid- or even small press publishing. Trad pub only. Okay? Now that we’re clear—
Publishing is a fickle, opaque, and sometimes cruel business, but over my years navigating it, writing manuscripts, getting rejected, shelving manuscripts, rewriting, signing with an agent and a Big 5 publisher, writing some more manuscripts, getting rejected again, writing some more… okay you get the idea… Over all that time, if I have learned one important thing about the business that has not changed, and about which I regularly see well-meaning but wrong information, it is this:
If you want to get a novel traditionally published, the thing that will give you the best chance of making it happen by a mile is not platform, or connections, or a degree, or previous publication history, or being young and cute, or winning prizes, or any of that stuff. It’s really simple. It is a great story which people will buy.
Let me say that again. A great story that people will buy.
I know, I know. I can hear it already—No! That can’t be true! There is so much profoundly mediocre shit out there! Terrible novels are published all the time! I totally agree. I’m not talking absolutes here. On balance, all that other stuff probably helps. But I am willing to bet money that the reason the vast majority of those mediocre novels got published is because someone, somewhere along the line thought, this is a great story that people will buy. Maybe they were wrong and the novel is selling poorly. Maybe they were right and the bad novel is selling like gangbusters. But I stand by my point.
Now, a couple of nuances I want to make clear:
A Great Story
Let’s start with “a great story.” You’ll notice, I’m not saying a great book. Those are different things in my mind. A great book is a great story plus great execution. I.e. good bones, deep characters, setting you can smell and taste, prose that sings. Obviously, there are a lot of not great books out there. A great story though, only requires a gripping narrative.
It can be argued that Colleen Hoover comes up with great stories that grab readers by the neck and drag them from page one to the end. I can’t tolerate their weaknesses as books, but I’m obviously not representative of popular taste. So be it.
And great stories are built as much as they are written. It’s not just sitting down and entering into the flow state and writing one beautiful sentence after another. Not bashing the flow state here, it’s just that at some point in the process, you must develop the DNA of a hot premise into a skeleton that will support a novel-length story.
Let me address for a moment the “high concept” premise. A lot of agents and editors are looking for this. Mine definitely is, and she spent the better part of last year trying to drill into my thick head what “high concept” means. And when I finally figured it out, I understood why agents and editors want it: It makes their jobs easier. Their primary job is not to create books, it’s to sell books, and if they can say, “I have this awesome book about [one-sentence-punchy-description that makes the listener go wow! That sounds cool.]” then everyone’s job just got much, much easier.
That’s it. A one- or two-sentence description that has a wow-factor. As far as I can tell, that’s all “high concept” really is. And yes, it’s very convenient if you have one. In a very short time—which is generally all you get—it can help show the agent or editor that you have the “great story” piece. So at some point in the drafting process (or at many points) it’s worth seeing if you can conceptualize your story in a tight couple of sentences.
However, a high concept premise does not make the book any easier to write well. It’s one hook. A book is 300+ pages long. That’s a lot more stuff to write than the “concept” you’re pitching in those couple of sentences. For me, that was the big let-down when I figured out what “high concept” really was. Yay me! I have a high-concept pitch! I still have to write a whole fucking book.
Okay moving on.
That People Will Buy
Who fucking knows what people will buy? Nobody, that’s who. And yet that’s the entire ballgame of traditional traditional publishing. “Do we see a ‘market’ for this book?” I.e. will people buy it. Of course, we the authors think, Of course people will buy it. This book is great! But agents, who sell to editors, and editors, who sell to internal teams, and publishers, who sell to booksellers, and booksellers who sell to people—all need to get on board with the idea that this is a story people will want to buy. So some knowledge of what people are buying is important for an author.
But, I would argue that for the author, too much focus on whether your book is like other books that are selling well can be a bad thing. It can cause you to either a) want to crawl in a hole and die, or worse, b) quench the unique fire of your creative spirit.
So, know roughly where the major boundaries of your genre are, and be conscious of where you respect them, and where you break them. And please, please break them. Even just a little. Do it lovingly and with care for the delight of the reader, but do break them. Your unique creative spark is what will make your work stand out in a market full of sameness and repetition.
The Most Important Thing is not the only thing that’s important.
It's kind of funny writing this piece this week, because Kathleen Schmidt, for whom I have great respect, just put out a good piece talking about why authors need a platform. And I agree with much of what’s in that piece. A platform certainly won’t hurt, and it’s not as miserably hard as many might think to build one.
If an agent or editor is looking at two equally great stories that they think people will buy, do big social media numbers, or a side gig as a pop-culture journalist, or whatever tip the scales? Maybe. But those factors are not essential to getting an agent or a book deal. And they are by far not the most important thing.
(To be clear, I am talking normal-person social media numbers or notoriety. If you have 14 million followers on TikTok or your name is Millie Bobby Brown or you have a ginormous track record of sales as a self-published author, then for sure the calculation is different. You’re also not reading this newsletter.)
Anyone who tells you you have to have a big social media platform to get an agent, or that no agent will sign you unless they think they can sell your book for six figures is just wrong. Examples abound of authors who didn’t have much, if any platform, who had no publishing history and no degree, but who wrote great stories that people wanted to buy and went on to be bestsellers. Unless you are a real celebrity, a great story that people will want to buy is the one non-negotiable. And fortunately—and this is my one little point of optimism about my own future as an author—it is the thing most firmly in the writer’s control.
So put the book first, learn the platform and publishing-biz stuff as best you can, and forge onward.
As always, you have my absolute best wishes coming your way as your work all this shit out.
Now go write.
The sweet spot is ringing the overlap between what you want to write/paint and what people want to buy :)
Timing in this industry matters, too. My agent shared that 2023 was a tough year for acquisitions due to a backlog from the earlier post-pandemic years. Sometimes we do everything we can and then many factors are outside of our control. Also, greatly appreciate the point that stories are built, they don't just flow. When they're building as well as flowing, well, that's pure magic! Thanks for posting this!