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How to Build a Writing Career: The Basics(The text below is the collected wisdom of several years' worth of writing teachers, distilled into a single lecture for your edification. This essay was last updated September 7, 2006. It is copyright 2006 by Jennifer Pelland, and cannot be redistributed without my express permission.) The most important things to remember when trying to build a writing career are:
1. Be good Here's some details on each. 1. Be good: This one's the most obvious one. To be published, you need to write good stories. Sexual favors will only get you so far. You can sleep with your editor, but can you really sleep with all your potential readers? And while money can get you a vanity publisher, that vanity publisher certainly won't get your book into stores, and no legitimate reviewer will bother giving it a write-up. Being good is really the best way to go. And to be good, you may very well need a writing teacher. Don't know how to find one? Here's how to go about it. Within the SF/F community: The SF/F community is very good at taking care of its own, and I'd encourage you to start looking here. The first place to look is at your nearest science fiction convention, preferably one with a literary bent (media cons are great fun, but generally offer no little to no writing programming). Most of the literary SF conventions have free one-day workshops. The workshop will probably just be a critique circle, but it will be led by a professional writer. A few of the workshops will also have craft discussion. If yours doesn't, don't be afraid to ask pertinent craft questions either between each story critique, or at the end of the workshop. If you want something more substantial, you're in luck. There are many great SF/F workshops, the best-known being Clarion, which is a six-week residential workshop taking place every year in Seattle, Washington and East Lansing, Michigan, and every other year in Brisbane, Australia. A similar six-week workshop is Odyssey, which runs in New Hampshire. Both Odyssey and Clarion have top-notch instructors and will put you through writing boot-camp. But if you're like me, you're thinking, "Six weeks? You've got to be kidding me!" Thankfully, there are shorter workshops. The two that leap to mind are Viable Paradise, which is a one-week workshop that takes place each fall on Martha's Vineyard, and the Oregon Coast Writers Workshops which is a series of three-day workshops this year (in the past, they've offered one- and two-week programs). These workshops also bring in great instructors. How do you vet a workshop? Check out the instructor list and see if you recognize any of the names. Then try to find out if those instructors have taught at other workshops. If someone's name shows up as both a Clarion instructor and an Oregon Coast instructor, then they're going to be good. Word gets around about bad instructors, and if someone bombed at Clarion, then they wouldn't be invited to teach at Oregon Coast. Every workshop that I've named has a web page, and each of those pages has a contact email address. If you have questions that aren't addressed on the workshop's web page, they'll be happy to answer them via email. Outside the SF/F community: This is where the actual writing classes live. If you're in a major metropolitan area, check out the local night schools. Many of them will have fiction writing classes. Find something that looks like it might be up your alley, and then find the instructor's email address. At this point, you should email the instructor and explain what genre you write in. This is important! There's a perception among some in the literary world that genre writing is "lazy" writing, and there are mainstream writing teachers who will not allow you to submit genre work in their classes. I speak from personal experience, and I've heard of it happening to other people as well. If you get anything other than a positive response, don't take the course. You should also determine if the instructor has taught writing before, and maybe try to hunt down a little of their work to see if you feel that they have something to teach you. A mainstream writing class will teach you wonders about plot and characterization, but probably won't be so great at helping with genre world-building, so you'll want to supplement your education with additional reading. There are many good books on the specifics of writing science fiction, so at some point, you'll need to hit your local library to bone up. Another trick you can try is to go to your local bookstore and see if anyone's put out flyers for writing classes. It'll be harder to vet these instructors, because they're likely teaching at a café or out of their home, so there's no greater institution supporting them. If a flyer sounds promising, call or email the instructor, again asking if they'll accept genre work, and if they say yes, ask about trying out the workshop without committing to the full run (and the full fee). They might say no, and that's fine, but you might get lucky and be able to sit on in one class for free or for a small fee. 2. Be persistent: This is the step that starts losing people. You can't send one story out twice, and another out once, then quit when you get three rejections (like I initially did). You have to keep sending your stories out, and you need to keep writing new ones. Make sure they're as good as they can be, and then get them in the mail. If you get one rejection on a piece, don't pull it from circulation to revise it. Wait until you have several rejections on the piece, or better yet, leave it alone unless a rejection gives you specific feedback that you agree with. You'll do better to write a new story than to revise an old one. Also, resolve to get a rejected story back into circulation within 24 hours. If you hang onto it, you'll mope. If you get it back out there, then you're back in hopeful mode. And you're more likely to be able to work on a new story if you're feeling hopeful rather than mopeful. Here's some stats from my own career that might help illustrate this point:
And what has all of this gotten me? I've sold 20 stories and made 6 reprint sales. That's an 9% sale rate, which I've been told is not too shabby for a new writer. And remember: shoot for the top! Send the story out to the very best market first, then start working your way down to the less-known markets. Before you send a new story out for the first time, write up the list of markets you're going to try, ordering them by prestige, and work your way down the list as the rejections inevitably come in. If you find yourself running low on markets for a piece, that means it's time to do some research. 3. Be knowledgeable: So how did I find 26 good markets for the story I mentioned above? By knowing where to look. I routinely check www.ralan.com for new markets, and I subscribe to their free newsletter. I also read the boards at webnews.sff.net for new market info, as well as those at www.speculations.com. I'm a member of several LiveJournal communities devoted to genre writing and markets, and I network with writers and editors online and at conventions (more on that in #5). Other things to be knowledgeable about are each market's requirements. Strange Horizons caps submissions at 9,000 words, so don't send them a novella. Analog publishes science fiction, so don't send them high fantasy. Aurealis won't accept submissions from non-Australian writers without a query, so don't send an unsolicited story if you live in the U.S. For most markets, you also need to understand what standard manuscript format is and know how to do a manuscript word count (articles on both can be found at www.sfwa.org/writing/ along with some other really good advice). The more you seem to know about a market and about manuscript submission, the better your story will be received. Slush readers read dozens, sometimes hundreds of stories at a time, and they'll be looking for any reason to stop reading yours as quickly as possible. Don't give them one. You also want to keep alert for scams. The one thing to always keep in mind is Yog's Law: "Money always flows towards the writer." If anyone asks you for money to publish something of yours, they're not legitimate. Run away as quickly as you can. It's better not to be published than to be published by a scammer. And if the only people interested in your work are scam artists, then perhaps it's a sign that you need to work on step 1 a little longer. 4. Be professional: This ties in strongly to #3. You will seem professional if you understand a market's requirements. But you will also seem professional if you don't try any fancy stuff. For instance, your cover letter should be brief and to the point, like so:
See? Nice and simple. You can also add something like "It was great talking with you at Readercon" if indeed you did speak at Readercon, and you didn't do something crazy (see #5). Your cover letter should not do any of the following (numbers indicate footnotes):
Oh, the problems in that letter. (1) Never be overly-familiar with an editor in your cover letter unless you are actually over-familiar with the person in question. And even then, it can't hurt to refer to them by Mr./Ms. Lastname. There are very few editors who I refer to by first name, and they're all people who I chat with outside of the submissions process. (2) Don't presume to know the editor's tastes. And don't remind them how many rejection letters they've sent you. (3) The editor only cares what s/he thinks about the story, not what your writing group thinks, or what your mother thinks, or what your cat thinks. The only time you should mention something like this is if a Big Name has read your story and says to drop their name in the cover letter. In that case, keep it humble: "Jim Kelly read this story and told me I should send it your way." (4) Never never never tell an editor that their taste in stories is bad. Yes, this happens. (5) Don't list all your credits, just the best few. (6) The only awards worth mentioning in a cover letter are things like the Nebula and the Hugo. If an editor's never heard of the award, then they won't care about it. (7) See point #1. Other ways to seem professional are to print your manuscript on white paper in standard manuscript format (no fancy colors, no fancy fonts), to provide sufficient postage on your return envelope, and to refrain from putting confetti or gifts in with your manuscript (this happens all the time). Oh, and make sure your spelling and grammar are impeccable. You want your story to stand out for its prose and nothing else when you submit it. 5. Be social: It really helps to network with other writers, especially ones farther along the path to publication than you are. Networking with agents and editors can be really helpful too. But don't be pushy about it. You'll do much better if you chat with someone simply to be social than if you chat with them to try to get them to look at your manuscript. So how do you meet these people? Conventions: these will give you face to face time with writers and editors. You can chat with them at panels, in the con suite, at parties, or in the hall. Some conventions will have kaffeklatsches and literary beers where you can sign up to spend time with the editor or writer of your choice for an hour. I highly recommend doing this if you get the opportunity. This is time that the writer/editor in question has set aside specifically to talk to people that they don't normally get a chance to talk to. Workshops: Again, this is time that the pros have set aside to work with budding writers, so they're great for face-to-face time. Just don't go into a workshop hoping that the pro will say, "This manuscript is brilliant! I must publish it/introduce you to my agent immediately!" It's a lovely fantasy, but it so rarely comes true. Online: If you live in the middle of nowhere and can't afford the airfare to a workshop or a convention, the Internet is the great equalizer. The Online Writer's Workshop and Critters are online crit groups that attract SF/F professionals, so posting work there can sometimes help your career (a friend of mine got her agent that way). Look for writing communities on LiveJournal, or spend time reading and posting at webnews.sff.net and www.speculations.com. If you're a Baen-style writer, spend time at their message boards. A friend of mine got a "get out of slush free" card that way. Spend time reading the Nielsen Hayden's blog—you'll recognize a lot of big names in writing in the comments. Science fiction writers love the Internet. You can do a lot of networking without ever taking your butt out of your chair. But no matter what you do, remember, be sane. Don't be a stalker, don't push your MS on someone the first time you speak to them, don't expect an editor to become your best friend just because you both breathe oxygen. Be a sane human being, respect people's boundaries and free time restrictions, and relax and be social. You could land an agent that way, but more likely, you'll meet a bunch of fellow writers who can tell you about new markets and give you advice on your stories. Now, if you get a little face time with an editor, and you do have a manuscript, and you'd like to try to see if they're open for a pitch, here's what you say:
If they say, "Well, you'll need to have your agent send it" or "Instructions are on our web site," then thank them and don't say another word about your manuscript. If, however, they ask:
this is when you launch into a very short pitch. Do not offer to hand them the manuscript on the spot, do not go into a 10-minute speech, do not stutter and blush and freeze up (although this is the best option of the three). Keep it short and sweet. You might get lucky and they might ask to see it (don't pull it out of your backpack on the spot—mail it), but if they don't, that means they're not interested, and you should stop your pitch. Crazy authors don't attract editors. Remember, if they sign you, they have to work with you. Editors would much rather work with someone who understands and respects boundaries. And those are the five basics to keep in mind when trying to build a writing career. I can't guarantee that you'll become published if you follow them all, but it will certainly improve your chances, and you'll have a much easier and more pleasant time of it.
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