In six days, authors seeking representation or publication of their fantasy/sci-fi manuscripts will have the chance to pitch them (on Twitter) to agents and editors. This is the first #SFFpit event, and I’m happy to tell you that the response has already been tremendous. At the time of writing, four small/medium press editors and agents […]
Articles on Agents and Publishing
Welcome! Here you'll find articles on the traditional route of publishing: querying and landing a literary agent, revising, editing, going on submission, and getting published. These also cover the state of the publishing industry and my guesses about its future.
#SFFpit Warmup Exercise: Pitching Practice
One week from tomorrow is #SFFpit, a Twitter pitching event for writers of science fiction & fantasy. Those authors will be perfecting their 140-character pitches, in hopes of catching the eye of an agent or editor. I hope they start early, because encapsulating your novel into a brief, engaging, and unique pitch is hard. To […]
Breakdown of New Leaf Literary’s #NLpitchperfect
Authors love Twitter pitching contests. There’s no question of that, given the fantastic participation in events like #PitMad. How do already-pressed-for-time literary agents feel about them? Apparently, some agents like Twitter pitching enough to host an event of their own. On May 23, the assistants at New Leaf Literary & Media hosted #NLpitchperfect, a two-hour window […]
The Problem with Prologues
Prologues are a long-running tradition in some genres of fiction, especially epic fantasy. Those of us who grew up reading Robert Jordan and George RR Martin have almost come to expect them at the start of the tome-sized fantasy novel. Most of those who write SFF are also readers of SFF. We’re under the spell; […]
How and Why to Write A Good Opening
It’s a simple fact that people are busy, and have shorter attention spans than ever. We have many things to thank for this: video games, television, and most of all, Twitter. Because books must compete with all of these other forms of entertainment, it’s no longer enough to write a novel that, overall, is good. […]
