What Are You Worth Per Hour?

Maybe you can’t make a living wage from your fiction or poems or essays. But you CAN make money using the array of skills you employ when you do creative writing. Here are some of your skills. Not everyone can say they have them! How good are you at each of these, and how experienced? Do you know what they are worth? Can you set a price on them? That’s the first step toward getting paid.

-copyediting $_____ per hour

-evaluation of manuscripts/critical feedback $____per hour

-teaching or leading a workshop $____ per hour

-writing queries, proposals, or synopses $____per hour

-researching potential publication venues $____per hour

-navigating and gathering information from websites helpful to writers, such as litmags.org or duotrope.com, and preparing to impart this information to those who want it $____per hour

-generating “content”: writing articles for publication or the web $____per hour

Those are just some of the skills you are probably undervaluing! More later, plus actual figures you SHOULD be charging.

Thanks to Becky Ellis of the blog cherrypiepress.blogspot.com for finding litmags.org.

Query Letter Review

A query letter is a business letter and your first contact with anyone: an agent, an editor. They are determined to discourage the riffraff; your job is to not be the riffraff. Do your best to write a sane and dignified business letter:

Name, Address and Salutation

First paragraph: Describe/summarize in your most interesting fashion the book you have finished (agents look at completed books only) or the article you plan (magazine editors will consider "pitches" for articles not yet written if yours is a good idea. Now that you've given away your idea, you must quickly...)

Second paragraph: Tell why you are the person qualified to write this. If it's your first book, don't say so. As proud as you are of your book -- and you should be! -- in the business of publishing, being a first-timer is a strike against you. Latest cool idea for first-timers: Be able to tell the agent or editor that a professional (writer, editor) has read it and declared it publishable.

Third paragraph: About the manuscript (how many words, genre, such as "a 35,000-word western romance novel"). Its working title (chances are they will not like your title, no matter what it is, so call it a working title).

Fourth paragraph: Tell, briefly, why you are querying this particular agent or publisher. Tell the truth. (Perhaps the one time in the business world when you absolutely must tell the truth and scrupulously avoid b---s---. )"I noticed that you are the agent for XX, who is my favorite romance author," or "Writer's Digest says you specialize in historical narrative nonfiction." If you're sending a snail mail, add: an SASE for your reply is enclosed.

Sincerely,

Signature and all possible contact information: Name address phone numbers fax number email.

One Whine Away from Success

Good news: "Let's see your manuscript" from the most recent book publisher I queried. That was the query letter I didn't feel like writing, had 10 excuses for not writing, that I wished would write and mail itself. Not only that, but it got a really quick response and refreshingly polite "Look forward to reading the ms."

The effort was all worth it! All worth it!

Lessons learned:
1. I should do any chore that has even a remote possibility of helping me toward my goals.
2. Fourth time's the charm.
3. If a publisher's interested, they'll respond ASAP!

Query Letters Are of the Devil

Today realized that queries are icky because they must be masterpieces of artifice. Show me all five writers who can do this flawlessly:

1. Find a potential publisher. (This is rather more involved than it sounds, like Step One of installing a new sink: "Remove old sink.")
2. Direct your query to the appropriate editor, using gender-appropriate salutation for any editor named "Kelly," "Tracey," "Casey," "Cameron," "Willie," "Micah," or "Kim." Phone if you must. Get it wrong and your butt is grass.
3. In the first paragraph, entice the editor with your proposal, hooking him/her within a sentence or two, but without giving too much away. Also give the editor a sense of what your writing is like.
4. Next paragraph, tell the editor in great detail why your idea is just right for his or her magazine or publishing firm. Be convincing.
5. Next, tell the editor what qualifies you as an author. Be convincing.
6. Do this all on a single page, with flawless format, spelling and punctuation.
7. Please don't mention payment!!! Only amateurs mention money!!!
8. Expect a rejection -- plan on it -- and when it comes, take it like a man, gird yourself up and do this all over again.

Writers, it's not us, but the system! Unite to overthrow it!

Please, Query Letter, Write and Send Yourself!

Realized I'm avoiding querying the last of 4 publishers who might consider my interview book. I have "outed" my reasons for stalling, and here they are in all their glory:

1. Mercury is retrograde; I'll write the query after Feb. 19 when Mercury goes direct.
2. That's the last press on my list. I'm afraid I'll get torpedoed and won't recover.
3. Their manuscript review process can take up to a year -- they said so. Who wants to wait for a year to hear yes or no? Better to have the manuscript sit for a year in a file drawer.
4. They might say no to the query, as the last 3 publishers did, and I am not in the mood (in mid-winter) to hear "no" right now.
5. I'll have to research and find more publishers and that is dull, hard work that no one appreciates.
6. If it's accepted, I don't have another book manuscript ready and will have to work on one.
7. I'm having to face facts and I just hate that.
8. Why risk failure by trying?

This query is haunting me. Seems my creativity is going into making up excuses, so I'd better just write it and get it over with.

Keeping Writers at Arm's Length

I spent December through March querying agents for our writing group's second book. Score zero. Or, better for my mental health, I can say, "I didn't find the agent who wanted us."

We're now sending the book proposal directly to publishers. More than ever, publishers' listings say, "We don't take "un-agented" submissions, or look at unsolicited submissions." No, not even a glance at a two-page book proposal.

It looks as if publishers think they benefit from a setup that keeps them apart from writers. Now, think: Does that make any sense?