Thank you! It's our discontent with tradpub that led us to try things this way. AI has just compounded the situation. Tradpub has become more and more automated and formulaic. We need to be more human.
I love your approach to publishing! Such a breath of fresh air. I am weary of all the hard work spent personalising query letters to publishers and agents who either don't reply or send a few lines of a form response. I agree with letting the work speak for itself. We need more of a human touch, and your method provides that.
Thank you, Malina. It's really a big experiment to see how far we can push back against the damage that commercialisation has had on publishing. It's amazing how many of the hoops that agents and publishers make you jump through are all driven by money not quality and originality. The fact that more and more publishers are now incorporating AI proves that, I think. And how many agents will be using it to help them sift the "slush pile"? I bet more than a few will be tempted...!
Yeah, that's scary to think of. Sending the same form response to hundreds of authors is close enough as it is. I want to find publishers driven by the search for quality and originality.
Thanks, Kate! I just wanted to take out as much of the filtering process as possible, which is mostly commercially driven. Let's look for artistic value instead. I'm toying with doing away with samples altogether, and just have people submit fulls. Then we just keep reading until we stop being interested (if that point comes). What do you think?
My experience is that when reading any sample text I know in the first page or two if it's a dud, and it can take a chapter or so to decide that a maybe is in fact a dud. A definite yes will shout at me pretty soon, even a maybe yes, and that's what publishers need to go on because that's how the average reader will be responding too (probably). You want them to be caught up in the story or the writing very quickly, especially if they're standing at a bookshop table, or considering a blurb online, about to be distracted elsewhere. I also know that being asked for the first 5 pages/5000 words/2 chapters REALLY concentrates the author's attention on those precious pages (I recently submitted the first PAGE to an agent, which I call really efficient), and they will make big efforts to respruce them up, often leading to significant self-edits that they had not hitherto considered. A publisher is the first serious beta reader, and that prospect should put the fear of god into the author and make them deliver their best work. I don't think that will happen when asked for a full, because most authors will think 'it's done, they'll love it / I don't have the time to check the whole thing / I'm too exhausted to check the whole thing'. FWIW!
I worry about the emphasis on grabbing and keeping attention, because that would seem to imply that this is a book's main job. Sure, it's the job of a certain type of book - a thriller, e.g. - but does that mean we have to make all books thriller-like in order to be palatable? A book should be interesting, of course, but you don't have to go all out to hook the reader in a gimmicky way. I can think of books with great beginnings that don't sustain that, and those without that more slowly draw you in. So for me it's not always about the beginning, and I wonder if the emphasis on that is just the effect of the attention economy, social media, commercialism, etc. Judging a book on a single page seems to be the equivalent of the elevator pitch - which is something I want to get away from.
The start of a book tends to be most polished, because that's the bit that's been reworked the most. Every time you start redrafting, you polish the beginning. If you say, "Send us your whole manuscript", does that mean that they won't care so much about beginnings? And, conversely, a polished sample doesn't mean a polished manuscript. I suspect that those who just throw their unpolished manuscript at you because it's "done" will be quite apparent from lots of things – the general quality of the writing, and other things. Asking them to submit the first 5k or 10k isn't going to change that, I don't think - and even if it did, there's no guarantee that the increased polish will apply also to the whole manuscript.
I did not always practice what I preach! I did publish books that took a bit of getting into, because I knew they were fabulous, and sometimes the sales figures showed that readers agreed. But as a general principle, it IS good to publish books that will sell, even if it will take a while to get there. Boilerhouse Books, run by the fabulous Brad Bigelow of The Neglected Books Page, sells amazing books that I cannot ever read, they are so not my taste, so that's also a wrinkle. How can you assess what is good unless you trust your own judgement and hope that others will share your assessment? In that case, the 'succeed or fail on the first page' argument doesn't work. You're right about the quality of the polish sliding as the MS progresses. But it might be an idea to state in the submissions guide what you expect in the way of polish.
That's a good point about polish and communicating expectations to the author. I think I'm probably looking for diamonds in the rough (to a certain extent). So I'm happy to look past clunkiness or other issues if there's talent there, and if the book as a whole has something of interest about it, because it'll go through dev editing, copy-editing and proofreading before it's published. What I want to move away from is what I feel is the overly restrictive filtering that seems to be the norm now for agents and publishers. It's not enough to have a polished sample. You also need to fit that niche in the market that is currently on trend (or some plausible variation on that). I'm not against selling books - this isn't an avant garde literary vanity project - I'm just fed up of the extent to which these prescriptive filters are dictating what gets published. And not always for the best, from what I can tell.
Oh I know. We’ve gone through the retelling of Greek myths, and now we’re wading through romantasy. And there’s also the anticipated market. When my novel was out on query to US editors they had no idea what to make of it because it was set in Shetland, in dialect, and nobody wanted it, so I blame my agent. (We broke up, I did the ditching though she claimed she did.) You want a novel out of the blue, like Doggerland, or The Goblin Emperor, or Leonrd and Hungry Paul, or perhaps a quiet little work about building little armies of amiguri in the attic to battle against Warhammer and Airfix armies. The nice thing is, you don’t have a marketing or a sales team to convince at the weekly meeting, when they want more romantasy and you’re trying to sell them a philosophical fantasy about mice and rope-making.
Thank you, Nikki. The more we thought about it, the more the various steps seemed obvious. Once your main goal isn't money, then the whole way you approach things starts to shift.
Yes, precisely. I get that publishers need to make money but many main stream titles are so formulaic. It’s a case of, we know what works, let’s do that.
You're right. It's hugely depressing. They're terrified of not making money. It's the same story in Hollywood, which is why you get so many reboots and remakes.
Exactly. There is an argument for reinterpreting the classics for each age - such as new translations of Homer's Odyssey, or whatever - but we're talking about Spiderman, FFS!
Thank you, Jane! I think you may be right, judging by the sudden uptick in interest. I suspect this will be mostly fiction, but we'll see. I will keep everyone posted!
There are two main factors: money and the quality of submissions. There is funding available, which we have a decent chance at obtaining, and the press itself will offer publishing services to help fund the main publishing initiatives, which will hopefully grow as our rep does (we have some great freelancers). But it will still be tight, though I think we'll get there. But even if the money is in place that assumes we can find the right titles, and given that fiction submissions are likely to outstrip non-fiction ones by quite a margin, this might take a while. But that's OK. It's not a race.
I don't really have a preference. I'd like us to move forward on both fronts if possible. At least, that was the founding concept of the press: speculative fiction and non-fiction.
I know quite a few authors who will be either subbing or watching progress with interest. People like me who have spec fic that just makes agents’ eyes roll and say WTF?
Thanks, Shane. To submit, you create a Duotrope account (simple and free), and then the submissions process is handled by Duosuma, which anonymises everything. Just follow the link to Duosuma on the submissions page: https://woodpigpress.com/submissions/
What a fresh breeze of an attitude to publishing, this. And here I was about to give up on tradpub altogether.
Thank you! It's our discontent with tradpub that led us to try things this way. AI has just compounded the situation. Tradpub has become more and more automated and formulaic. We need to be more human.
Wow, what a great take on submissions.
Thanks, Kathryn!
I love your approach to publishing! Such a breath of fresh air. I am weary of all the hard work spent personalising query letters to publishers and agents who either don't reply or send a few lines of a form response. I agree with letting the work speak for itself. We need more of a human touch, and your method provides that.
Thank you, Malina. It's really a big experiment to see how far we can push back against the damage that commercialisation has had on publishing. It's amazing how many of the hoops that agents and publishers make you jump through are all driven by money not quality and originality. The fact that more and more publishers are now incorporating AI proves that, I think. And how many agents will be using it to help them sift the "slush pile"? I bet more than a few will be tempted...!
Yeah, that's scary to think of. Sending the same form response to hundreds of authors is close enough as it is. I want to find publishers driven by the search for quality and originality.
Exactly! Well, let's see how it goes. :)
Hope all goes from strength to strength
Thank you, Steve!
Huzzah! This sounds so sensible and workable. I hope you get something marvellous.
Thanks, Kate! I just wanted to take out as much of the filtering process as possible, which is mostly commercially driven. Let's look for artistic value instead. I'm toying with doing away with samples altogether, and just have people submit fulls. Then we just keep reading until we stop being interested (if that point comes). What do you think?
My experience is that when reading any sample text I know in the first page or two if it's a dud, and it can take a chapter or so to decide that a maybe is in fact a dud. A definite yes will shout at me pretty soon, even a maybe yes, and that's what publishers need to go on because that's how the average reader will be responding too (probably). You want them to be caught up in the story or the writing very quickly, especially if they're standing at a bookshop table, or considering a blurb online, about to be distracted elsewhere. I also know that being asked for the first 5 pages/5000 words/2 chapters REALLY concentrates the author's attention on those precious pages (I recently submitted the first PAGE to an agent, which I call really efficient), and they will make big efforts to respruce them up, often leading to significant self-edits that they had not hitherto considered. A publisher is the first serious beta reader, and that prospect should put the fear of god into the author and make them deliver their best work. I don't think that will happen when asked for a full, because most authors will think 'it's done, they'll love it / I don't have the time to check the whole thing / I'm too exhausted to check the whole thing'. FWIW!
I worry about the emphasis on grabbing and keeping attention, because that would seem to imply that this is a book's main job. Sure, it's the job of a certain type of book - a thriller, e.g. - but does that mean we have to make all books thriller-like in order to be palatable? A book should be interesting, of course, but you don't have to go all out to hook the reader in a gimmicky way. I can think of books with great beginnings that don't sustain that, and those without that more slowly draw you in. So for me it's not always about the beginning, and I wonder if the emphasis on that is just the effect of the attention economy, social media, commercialism, etc. Judging a book on a single page seems to be the equivalent of the elevator pitch - which is something I want to get away from.
The start of a book tends to be most polished, because that's the bit that's been reworked the most. Every time you start redrafting, you polish the beginning. If you say, "Send us your whole manuscript", does that mean that they won't care so much about beginnings? And, conversely, a polished sample doesn't mean a polished manuscript. I suspect that those who just throw their unpolished manuscript at you because it's "done" will be quite apparent from lots of things – the general quality of the writing, and other things. Asking them to submit the first 5k or 10k isn't going to change that, I don't think - and even if it did, there's no guarantee that the increased polish will apply also to the whole manuscript.
I did not always practice what I preach! I did publish books that took a bit of getting into, because I knew they were fabulous, and sometimes the sales figures showed that readers agreed. But as a general principle, it IS good to publish books that will sell, even if it will take a while to get there. Boilerhouse Books, run by the fabulous Brad Bigelow of The Neglected Books Page, sells amazing books that I cannot ever read, they are so not my taste, so that's also a wrinkle. How can you assess what is good unless you trust your own judgement and hope that others will share your assessment? In that case, the 'succeed or fail on the first page' argument doesn't work. You're right about the quality of the polish sliding as the MS progresses. But it might be an idea to state in the submissions guide what you expect in the way of polish.
That's a good point about polish and communicating expectations to the author. I think I'm probably looking for diamonds in the rough (to a certain extent). So I'm happy to look past clunkiness or other issues if there's talent there, and if the book as a whole has something of interest about it, because it'll go through dev editing, copy-editing and proofreading before it's published. What I want to move away from is what I feel is the overly restrictive filtering that seems to be the norm now for agents and publishers. It's not enough to have a polished sample. You also need to fit that niche in the market that is currently on trend (or some plausible variation on that). I'm not against selling books - this isn't an avant garde literary vanity project - I'm just fed up of the extent to which these prescriptive filters are dictating what gets published. And not always for the best, from what I can tell.
Oh I know. We’ve gone through the retelling of Greek myths, and now we’re wading through romantasy. And there’s also the anticipated market. When my novel was out on query to US editors they had no idea what to make of it because it was set in Shetland, in dialect, and nobody wanted it, so I blame my agent. (We broke up, I did the ditching though she claimed she did.) You want a novel out of the blue, like Doggerland, or The Goblin Emperor, or Leonrd and Hungry Paul, or perhaps a quiet little work about building little armies of amiguri in the attic to battle against Warhammer and Airfix armies. The nice thing is, you don’t have a marketing or a sales team to convince at the weekly meeting, when they want more romantasy and you’re trying to sell them a philosophical fantasy about mice and rope-making.
This is very interesting. I love how you’re approaching this.
Thank you, Nikki. The more we thought about it, the more the various steps seemed obvious. Once your main goal isn't money, then the whole way you approach things starts to shift.
Yes, precisely. I get that publishers need to make money but many main stream titles are so formulaic. It’s a case of, we know what works, let’s do that.
You're right. It's hugely depressing. They're terrified of not making money. It's the same story in Hollywood, which is why you get so many reboots and remakes.
That’s true, actually. How many times do you need to re make Wuthering Heights?!
Exactly. There is an argument for reinterpreting the classics for each age - such as new translations of Homer's Odyssey, or whatever - but we're talking about Spiderman, FFS!
🤣
Best of luck! I'm sure you'll get your first 50 in next to no time.
Thank you, Jane! I think you may be right, judging by the sudden uptick in interest. I suspect this will be mostly fiction, but we'll see. I will keep everyone posted!
I don’t know, but if you’re only taking in a couple of books, it might be best to stick with either fiction or non-fiction to begin with.
There are two main factors: money and the quality of submissions. There is funding available, which we have a decent chance at obtaining, and the press itself will offer publishing services to help fund the main publishing initiatives, which will hopefully grow as our rep does (we have some great freelancers). But it will still be tight, though I think we'll get there. But even if the money is in place that assumes we can find the right titles, and given that fiction submissions are likely to outstrip non-fiction ones by quite a margin, this might take a while. But that's OK. It's not a race.
So you’d rather non-fiction subs than fiction?
I don't really have a preference. I'd like us to move forward on both fronts if possible. At least, that was the founding concept of the press: speculative fiction and non-fiction.
I know quite a few authors who will be either subbing or watching progress with interest. People like me who have spec fic that just makes agents’ eyes roll and say WTF?
Love everything about this. Sorely needed, I'd say. So all we'll need to know is the email address?
Thanks, Shane. To submit, you create a Duotrope account (simple and free), and then the submissions process is handled by Duosuma, which anonymises everything. Just follow the link to Duosuma on the submissions page: https://woodpigpress.com/submissions/
Ah, got it. Thanks!
You’re welcome. Let me know if any issues.