Episodes
Tuesday May 28, 2019
Episode 5: Everyone Here Is So Nice - Interviews from the SFWA Nebula Conference
Tuesday May 28, 2019
Tuesday May 28, 2019
Hey everyone, welcome to another episode of the We Make Books Podcast, a show about writing, publishing and everything in between.
This week’s episode is a little different. We made the perilous journey to the City of Angels and we’re coming to you live from the Nebulas in Los Angeles, California! (Well, Los Angeles adjacent anyway.)
We had an amazing weekend and while we were there, we took some time to talk to some of the people attending the Nebulas and get their advice, insight, and words of wisdom about the ins and outs of attending a con. We talked to so many great people and they all had great stories and sage advice to share us and our audience.
Here are the lovely voices you are going to hear:
James Patrick Cronin (@jamespcronin) – Voice actor and owner of Blue Nose Audio
Michael R. Underwood (@mikerunderwood) – (Amazing!) Author, publishing consultant, and co-host of the @speculatesf podcast.
Lee Harris – Senior Editor for Tor.com and finalist for Best Accent of the Episode.
Joseph R. Lallo (@jrlallo) – Author and one third of the Sci-Fi and Fantasy Marketing Podcast
Arley Sorg (@arleysorg) – Writer, editor, all around amazing person – is there anything he can’t do??
Dan Wood (@danwoodok) – Director of Author Relations at Draft2Digital, and way more than just “ok”.
John Scalzi (@scalzi) – I’m told he’s written some books or something.
Peng Shepherd (@pshepherd) – Author of “The Book of M”.
Mike Anderson (@MAndersonSciFi) – Author and spinner of incredible insights.
Kellan Szpara (@KMSzpara) – Author and inducer of extreme nail envy.
C.L. Polk (@clpolk) – Author, Nebula finalist, and winner of the best convention hack of the episode!
Cat Rambo (@Catrambo) – Writer, educator, SFWA President, and Mistress of The Rambo Academy for Wayward Writers
Caitlin Seal (@CaitSeal) – Author of “Twice Dead” and distributor of boxed wine.
TJ Berry and Dave Liloia (@tjaneberry and @warpdrives) – She’s an author, they both host the Warp Drives podcast, and were just so much fun to talk to!
Elsa Sjunneson-Henry (@snarkbat) – Author of both speculative and non-fiction and Accessibility Coordinator for SFWA
Mark Tompkins (@MLTompkins) – Author and crafter of possibly the most successful elevator pitch in history.
Jonathan Brazee (@jonathanbrazee) – Author, retired Marine colonel, he promises that you’re going to have a great time at the convention.
Emma Osborne (@redscribe) – Author and sunshine incarnate – you will immediately feel better after talking to them. Second finalist for Best Accent of the Episode.
We hope that you are enjoying this and all of our other episodes and as always, feel free to reach out to us on any of the social medias. You can find us @wmbcast and www.wemakebookspodcast.com. Find Rekka @bittybittyzap and Kaelyn @kindofKaelyn.
Thank you for listening!
The SUPREMELY LONG transcript for this episode is available in gdocs
Tuesday May 14, 2019
Episode 4: What Are Your Intentions Toward My Book?
Tuesday May 14, 2019
Tuesday May 14, 2019
Hi everyone, and thank you for listening to the launch episodes of the We Make Books Podcast - A podcast about writing, publishing, and everything in between!
We Make Books is hosted by Rekka Jay and Kaelyn Considine; Rekka is a published author and Kaelyn is an editor and together they are going to take you through what goes into getting a book out of your head, on to paper, in to the hands of a publisher, and finally on to book store shelves.
In this final episode of the launch, Rekka and Kaelyn switch tracks and get real about how an author might worry what a publisher will do to their book after they get the rights.
We Make Books is a podcast for writer and publishers, by writers and publishers and we want to hear from our listeners! Hit us up on our social media, linked below, and send us your questions, comments, concerns, and any theories you may have about the new Continental streaming series, based on John Wick.
Thank you for taking the time to listen to this introduction, the first batch of new episodes drops on May 14th, so be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss it.
A transcription of this episode can be found below.
We hope you enjoy We Make Books!
Twitter: @WMBCast | @KindofKaelyn | @BittyBittyZap
=== Transcript ===
Rekka: 00:01 [laughing] Hey everyone, welcome back to We Make Books–
Kaelyn: 00:04 [laughter]
Rekka: 00:04 –a podcast about writing and publishing and everything in between. I'm Rekka, I write science fiction as RJ Theodore.
Kaelyn: 00:12 And I'm Kaelyn, I publish science fiction and fantasy at Parvus press.
Rekka: 00:17 And in today's episode, we are taking a different tone from the last two episodes of this launch.
Kaelyn: 00:24 We get heavy here, guys. This one's, you know–
Rekka: 00:26 I was couched, I was, I was definitely like, you know, "tell me about how you feel about your publisher."
Kaelyn: 00:33 She's having some flashbacks, you know, and there was
Rekka: 00:35 A bit of shaking.
Kaelyn: 00:36 And how did that make you feel?
Rekka: 00:38 There was a little bit of that.
Kaelyn: 00:40 Yeah. But you know, so after the first couple of episodes where we really just kind of threw a lot at you with "this, then this, then this" kind of format, um, we wanted to take a step back and do something that was going to be a little more in line with what we're going to be doing down the line. So we were talking, we were trying to come up with what we thought would be a good third episode of this batch for the initial launch and uh Rekka, you know, said, "Well publishers can be scary."
Rekka: 01:12 Well, and, that was kind of the whole concept of the podcast. So I was like, all right, so how do we talk about this? Like what do we want to ask the publishers?
Kaelyn: 01:23 And at the same time from the publishers, what do we want to know about the writers and what they're thinking about this? So we kind of came to this agreement of let's talk about relationships between publishers, editors, writers, and what's scary, what each side wishes the other one knew about them or–
Rekka: 01:41 like how did you approach the relationship? What was your expectation?
Kaelyn: 01:44 Yeah, the things that when, especially writers, because they're new at this, whereas editors have done this multiple times previously, going into it going, "What do I do now?" And you know, that is the theme for this podcast, but we thought this would be kind of a good, good jumping off point for the rest of it. So, I mean we're going to have lots of different episodes about different topics coming down the line, which we're really excited about. Um, you know, we'll plug it in at the end of the episode, but you know, please do feel free to interact with us. You are encouraged to do so.
Rekka: 02:12 Yeah. And I think this one will let you know that there's really not anything we aren't willing to tackle.
Kaelyn: 02:18 Yes, we are... I mean, there is like, I joke in the episode, there is the publishing guild's cabal is probably sending an assassin after me as we speak.
Rekka: 02:29 Yeah. Yeah. And if we don't have them, you know, sending an Uber out with their assassin every episode that we record, then we're not doing it right.
Kaelyn: 02:38 We're not doing a good job. Yeah. Spilling all the deep dark secrets.
Rekka: 02:41 The deepest and darkest.
Kaelyn: 02:42 You know, so, um, anyway, so that's, you know, the episode, like I said, it's a little, you know, there's a little more emotion driven and uh, some of the other ones and what we're going to be doing in the future.
Rekka: 02:52 But do me a favor and try not to analyze me.
Kaelyn: 02:56 [laughter] Yeah, Rekka really laid at all, laid it all out there.
Rekka: 02:58 I mean, these are all things I've about before, but not in this context and not so directly related to like this relationship.
Kaelyn: 03:07 Yeah. So anyway, I think it's great. I think it'll, uh, kind of, I think a lot of it will resonate, a lot of people will identify with this. So, uh
Rekka: 03:15 Here it comes.
Kaelyn: 03:15 Yeah. Here it comes. Hope you enjoy.
Piano: 03:17 [music]
Maybe ghosts?: 03:38 [muffled speech and laughter]
Kaelyn: 03:38 The one in control of the button.
Rekka: 03:39 I do like control, speaking of which–
Kaelyn: 03:45 We're recording now aren't we?
Rekka: 03:45 We are recording, and speaking of control that is an excellent segue.
Kaelyn: 03:46 It is an excellent segue. Yeah. That wasn't even intentional.
Rekka: 03:49 Mm-hmm. Good job.
Kaelyn: 03:50 So, uh, you know, as we said in the introduction, what we're talking about here today, it's a little bit of a hard left from the previous two.
Rekka: 03:57 Yeah. The previous two were sort of like the top down view. It was safe. It was, um, a little dr– I don't wanna say dry, but you know, it was–
Kaelyn: 04:06 I think we're entertaining enough.
Rekka: 04:07 more on the functional side,
Kaelyn: 04:11 Yeah. But today we're talking about relationships with editors and taking care of your book; entrusting your book.
Rekka: 04:20 Who's going to take care of your book. If not you?
Kaelyn: 04:24 This is, you know, big hangup that a lot of authors have. And it's scary and it's–
Rekka: 04:29 Even authors I think, who have dreams of getting a publishing deal.
Kaelyn: 04:34 Yeah. And then it's in front of you and it's like, "Oh my God, wait–"
Rekka: 04:37 "Is this the right choice?"
Kaelyn: 04:38 "This person I just met has so many opinions!"
Rekka: 04:41 And it's a partnership. It's, um, it's a marriage of the efforts of the author and this team and there's– [thoughtful exhalation] I don't know if it's media representation showing that they are at odds or if it's just the loud experiences of people who've had less than stellar, you know, interactions.
Kaelyn: 05:05 I'd imagine it's some combination of the two. You know, it's, I think, you know, saying like this depiction of being at odds with your editor is like very detrimental.
Rekka: 05:16 Yes.
Kaelyn: 05:17 You should not be at odds with your editor. But it is, regardless, you could be thrilled to death and it is scary because you don't, you've spent so much time on this, this is your blood, sweat and tears and now someone else is going to come in and you are contractually mandated to pay attention to and take their opinions about your work. And that's terrifying. Yeah.
Rekka: 05:44 And, and there's more to it than– I mean, we're talking partially about editing, but we're also just talking about the publisher. Yeah. As an entity that is now going to gather your book under their wing and you have to be okay with that.
Kaelyn: 06:00 Yeah, no, that's–
Rekka: 06:01 You really have to be okay with that. And if you aren't okay with that, when you're facing down the contract, maybe consider – What did we say was going to be repeating theme? Take a step back, and now, audience, take a shot.
Kaelyn: 06:20 [laughing] That should be in the name of this podcast. "Take a step back."
Rekka: 06:24 Nope. I already have the domain name. Um, the um, the feelings that you have are valid.
Kaelyn: 06:34 Yes.
Rekka: 06:34 Emotions are always valid.
Kaelyn: 06:35 Yes.
Rekka: 06:35 We're not saying you, your fear is wrong, but it might be founded in an absence of understanding of what's going to happen, which is again, the entire point of this podcast as a whole is to make that absence of knowledge.
Kaelyn: 06:53 Yeah.
Rekka: 06:54 The pool a little bit shallower.
Kaelyn: 06:56 Pull the veil back. Make this a little less scary.
Rekka: 06:58 Yeah.
Kaelyn: 06:59 So I'm obviously coming from the publishing side. Rekka is coming from the writing side. So we have, you know, different perspectives on this. Um, one of the things we were talking about before we got started here is: does anyone care about your book as much as you do?
Rekka: 07:18 No.
Kaelyn: 07:19 The answer is no.
Rekka: 07:20 No, no one does, no one ever could.
Kaelyn: 07:24 It's not possible. But your editor is probably a close second.
Rekka: 07:28 And we brought up the discussion like, maybe a parent?
Kaelyn: 07:32 A spouse?
Rekka: 07:33 The argument would be, yeah, they care about you as a person, and they care about your experience.
Kaelyn: 07:40 Your success.
Rekka: 07:41 And your success, and that you're happy.
Kaelyn: 07:43 Yes. But your book as a product,
Rekka: 07:47 Yeah, and what it's about and the world building that went into it and whether people like your character as much as you do like tha– that's probably not forefront of their mind.
Kaelyn: 07:59 No, it's, I mean, as we said, you know, in our previous two episodes, this is a deeply personal thing.
Rekka: 08:06 And aside from the readers and fans that you will hopefully eventually get to meet and get to see them express their experience with your book, there isn't going to be that sort of passionate caring about your book on this end of the process, except with a publisher who's monetarily, emotionally and you know.
Kaelyn: 08:35 Spiritually. [laughter]
Rekka: 08:39 Spiritually invested, by the powers invested in...
Kaelyn: 08:42 Well I mean your pu-, your publisher – really it's your, it's your editor. Your publisher is the one responsible for getting the book out the door and making sure everyone makes money off of it. Um, know obviously they've got an interest in, you know, making sure it's successful, not just for monetary reasons but because publishers want books to be successful, because they want to publish successful books. Um, like at Parvus for instance, we've been really working hard to cultivate and maintain a good reputation because we genuinely care about our books and our authors and that's so important to us. And that's not just us. That's a lot of publishing houses that you want to put a great book out there and you want to hear people talking about it and you want everyone to be excited about it. So, everyone involved in the process wants, [laughter] they want what's best for the book. [laughter] We only want what's best for the book. You? Eh. The book, however.
Rekka: 09:50 Well, and there is a line drawn.
Kaelyn: 09:53 There is, but um, you know, so I'm on, I'm on the publishing end of things, but Rekka you're on the writing end of things. So you actually have some unique perspective and experience in how you came to a traditional publishing situation.
Rekka: 10:08 Yeah, especially the traditional part of that, um. I think it's, it's not going to be secret for long if it's still a secret, but my plan was to self publish Flotsam–
Kaelyn: 10:18 I just assumed everyone knew that at this point.
Rekka: 10:22 I think anyone who knows anything about me, has listened to my other podcasts, or followed me for any amount of time, probably understands that I–and here's going back to the segue that led into the episode–I like to have control of everything. And for me, um, the best way to have control over the content of my book, the presentation of my book, the marketing of my book, the longterm success of my book... was going to be, if I was in complete control of my book. I wanted to accept the responsibility for every step of the process so that I could be proud of it.
Kaelyn: 11:04 Of course, yeah.
Rekka: 11:04 And that it would be the vision that I have from the get go.
Kaelyn: 11:07 And I think that's important is authors really wanting to hold onto their vision. Because I'm uh, you know, we actually discussed this very briefly in the previous episode of like, cover art and that is the true embodiment of an author's vision for the book.
Rekka: 11:21 And funny you should mention that because–you and your segues today! We need a gong.
Kaelyn: 11:27 I've really, I'm nailing it.
Rekka: 11:28 Um, I brought–I mean we're skipping ahead to the part where I decided to go ahead and submit this, but I commissioned...
Kaelyn: 11:36 Well no, because this is, this is one of the hangups that you had.
Rekka: 11:39 Um, I commissioned a cover artist, um, and I didn't just go to, I mean like I don't want to disparage anyone on Fiverr. I'm sure there are very talented people on Fiverr, but I went, um, to the person whose vision matched what I felt the inside of my book–
Kaelyn: 11:56 And you did research.
Rekka: 11:57 and I did a lot of research and I thought I wanted a different artist.
Kaelyn: 12:01 Yeah. So going back to, you know, some of the hang ups you had, some of the worries, one of them was that you already commissioned this beautiful piece of art from Julie Dillon for your cover.
Rekka: 12:11 Yes. So obviously this wasn't a hangup that prevented me from submitting to Parvus. This was a hang up, like once I had submitted, I was like, "[nervous inhale] they're not gonna want to use this. Like I just spent all this money, invested it, in a gorgeous piece of artwork, but I'm not going to be allowed to use this."
Kaelyn: 12:27 So now it's like, that's another thing. Is this worth it?
Rekka: 12:30 Is it like, yeah, like this cover is perfect for my book. Luckily Parvus agreed. But that was–
Kaelyn: 12:36 Well, I mean, have you seen it? What do you think someone's going to be like, "No, that's no good."
Rekka: 12:42 "That's no good at all." Um, uh, I actually have gotten a comment from, from somebody who was like, "I didn't really get it at first, but then I read it and I'm like, Oh yeah, no, that's totally perfect." And anyone who had read any draft of Flotsam, when they saw the cover art was like, "Oh, that is so good."
Kaelyn: 12:59 It's perfect. Really. It really is.
Rekka: 13:01 It captures it, all the, the strangeness of it, the the, the whimsy of it too, and all that. All right, so [laughter]. I'm trying to stay on track here.
Kaelyn: 13:09 No it's just like, because it's so, it's so beautiful and eye-catching that like you just want rant about it for a while.
Rekka: 13:15 I just wanna talk about it forever. Yeah. I haven't gotten to talk about it like it's a new cover in a long time.
Kaelyn: 13:18 It's true. Yeah.
Rekka: 13:20 So I, um, I had other hang-ups about going with a traditional publisher and a lot of them came out of this track that I was on to,
Both: 13:29 To self publish.
Rekka: 13:30 Because, once I decided that, I had podcasts that I could listen to about self publishing, and there was definitely a bias of um, you know, "a traditional publisher does not care about your book as much as you do," which as we started off the episode like, is not quite fair on anyone's part to say.
Kaelyn: 13:51 No, it's, I mean I would, you know, granted–
Rekka: 13:54 The interest is different.
Kaelyn: 13:55 –yeah. Granted I'm coming from the other side of things here, but, um, there I, I lose sleep over books. So, um, to say no one cares about it is, I mean, to me false.
Rekka: 14:09 Right.
Kaelyn: 14:09 Um, but I think there is this fear – and it's an understandable fear – that, "Okay, my dreams have come true. My book has gotten accepted for publication. Oh God, they're going to make me change all of it."
Rekka: 14:25 And not only that, but, "I am a single, small author with no experience. And here comes a team of people who know what they're doing and they have the authority–"
Kaelyn: 14:35 Oh it's so intimidating. Yeah.
Rekka: 14:35 There's, there's definite position of authority that can be abused, if it were desired to be abused.
Kaelyn: 14:42 It's very intimidating. And you know, again, this is part of the reason we want to do this is maybe, you know, you find yourself in this position when you go in with a little bit of knowledge and you know, a little bit goes a long way.
Rekka: 14:51 And just knowing what's coming up and not feeling like, "Well, how do I know that what they're telling me is the process is supposed to be the process?"
Kaelyn: 15:04 Well because Kaelyn and Rekka said so.
Rekka: 15:04 And what we say goes! (Speaking of position from authority).
Kaelyn: 15:10 Yeah. So there's definitely like a fear over the creative side of what's gonna happen. And it's understandable. It's scary. Um. Something that you have spent so much time on and now this person, who you have maybe had a couple conversations about, who you probably never met in person is going to go, "and this and this and change this and move this here." Now, hopefully you never actually have a conversation like that, cause that's awful.
Rekka: 15:36 That was detached and cold and not like–if someone's going to request that you change something in your manuscript, you want some like, explanation of how it's going to improve it.
Kaelyn: 15:49 Well, so... And again, the qualifier: everyone works differently. Every editor's process is a little different. But so I'm going to take it kind of over to my side of things now. I very much believe in a collaborative process in writing. Um. I think most editors and publishers do, because if everyone's miserable then you're not going to make a good book. Um. If there, I am very, you know, have open conversations, talk about your concerns. I'll talk about mine. Let's come to an understanding. Um. There's a, there's a movie, Once Upon a Time in Mexico. [chuckle] Have you seen that?
Rekka: 16:32 Yes
Kaelyn: 16:32 Okay. You remember Johnny Depp's character's like the CIA agent everywhere he goes, he likes, he sits down and orders the same thing.
Rekka: 16:38 Yeah.
Kaelyn: 16:39 In the beginning, he's meeting the informant and he gives him the information and asks him, "Uh, you know, you only asked for $10,000. You knew we would pay a lot more for it." And the guy's like "Yeah, I'm not a greedy man. $10,000 is reasonable. It's a civilized number. It's a number we can both live with. You're not going to kill me over $10,000." And I always kind of look at this as we need to get to a civilized number. [laughter] Um, that's what I always, sometimes I say number, but like "we need to get to a civilized answer here."
Rekka: 17:13 Somewhere in the middle.
Kaelyn: 17:13 "Where we can both walk away feeling good about this." But that's the thing you, your editor is not your opposition. Your editor is your partner in this process. They are the ones who, they are going to spend so much time on your book, thinking about it, mulling it over, isolating areas that could use some work, maybe punch them up a little bit, tighten it. I personally, my favorite part of this whole process is getting on the phone with my authors and talking about their book and talking about the world it's set in. And like, I always ask, are there any parts that you think are, weak? You know, I like to know what their, their mentality going into it is. Um, but that part is so much fun. And for my end, if there's a part of a book or a manuscript that I'm like, "Look, this is not working," and the author is really resisting and it's very important to them, my next question is, "Okay, why is this part's so important?" And it's fascinating because a lot of the times there's a reason and it's like, "Well why didn't you tell me that?" You know, like, "Oh this is important for a later book, or this is setting something up down the line, or there's this character arc that you know," and it's like, "Okay, well, tell me that because then we can work on that. We can flesh these things out." Being up front with your editor is really important, I think.
Rekka: 18:39 Mmm-hmm, and not shutting down emotionally or verbally.
Kaelyn: 18:42 Yeah. Like, I mean, don't take criticism badly. Cause here's the thing: they would not have bought your book if it was a bad book.
Rekka: 18:50 Right.
Kaelyn: 18:50 People don't buy bad books, they buy good books, great, books turn them into awesome books. And I mean, so you have, you know, you went through quite a process with Flotsam, a little back and forth with, you know, to self publish or traditional publish. So what was it like when you were working with an editor then?
Rekka: 19:09 Well, as I said, I hired a contracted editor, um, before I made any sort of such decision. I mean the book wasn't ready yet. I knew it wasn't ready. I did not know why. So most of the heavy lifting with my editor – who turned out to be my editor at Parvus once I signed, [laughter] that's a long, convoluted story. So let's just pretend that I was working on the book with him the entire time in, in the capacity that was the Parvus Press capacity cause it, it blended, really see, you know, like I didn't have to be introduced to my Parvus editor before he worked for Parvus.
Kaelyn: 19:46 Yeah, you were in a little bit of a different spot there.
Rekka: 19:48 I'm like, I am an outlier as far as this goes. Um, so I knew the book wasn't great – or I'm like, I knew the book was great. I knew the concept was great. I knew there was something there that I had to get out in the world. And working on the drafts over four years, I just kept shoving in stuff to fill what I felt was missing.
Kaelyn: 20:13 Okay.
Rekka: 20:14 And I would add stuff and never take anything else out. I would change stuff but make it, I would shoe horn it in around the other things that were already there.
Kaelyn: 20:24 Ah! Classic author move. [laughter]
Rekka: 20:26 And so what my editor said after we met for the first time, um, through Skype, I said, "Well, I've been working on this for 12 years." And he said, "I know, it's all in here. I can tell." And so like that freed me up to realize like, okay, every word was still precious to me.
Kaelyn: 20:44 Of course.
Rekka: 20:44 But that started to help me see that like, every draft was not supposed to be an additive process. [laughter] Sometimes removing stuff is important.
Kaelyn: 20:57 Yeah... yeah... Culling is important.
Rekka: 20:59 So, um, so working with an editor, one, like sort of helped me let go of all these years of work that I'd been putting into this story because I realized, "Oh, so what you're saying is it doesn't all fit in one book." [laughter]
Kaelyn: 21:18 Yeah. And you actually bring up a very good point here, which is, um, I think one of the hardest things for authors to hear right off the bat, when they start working with an editor, is the editor unsheathing the metaphorical machete. Where it's like, "okay, we're going to take care of all of this extraneous stuff." And, "No, no, it's not extraneous, it's important!" And understanding that here's the thing, it's not, and it doesn't mean you're a bad writer.
Rekka: 21:47 It just doesn't belong in the draft, because it is important. It's important pre-work, but not all of that belongs in the final story.
Kaelyn: 21:55 I should say it's not important to the final story. The work you did is important. But that's the big difference is, I'm interested in the work you did to this point in just terms of your process. But for the final product of the book, it doesn't–
Rekka: 22:12 it doesn't mean the book better. The book is not richer because you have layers and layers and layers.
Kaelyn: 22:18 Yeah. So, and I think that's a hard thing for especially first time authors working with an editor to, to in.
Rekka: 22:24 And prior to that I'd been working completely alone on it. You know, I had people who'd read it, some friends who, bless their souls, read it three or four times and various versions. And then I got to the point where I was like, "Everyone I know who's willing to read this has already read it and they know all the other versions and I need fresh perspective on this." And then I had this epiphany, you know, event where I realized like, "I need to move forward on this. And I've been putting a lot of my time into this because I have time for free. Time doesn't cost me any money to invest in the story and rewrite it and rewrite it and rewrite it. I need to stop treating this like I will eventually get there if I just work harder.
Kaelyn: 23:12 Yeah. And you know, we're getting, we're getting very heavy with this conversation. It's, you know, it because, but it does deserve some, um, some gravitas because
Rekka: 23:22 It's a big decision.
Kaelyn: 23:23 It's a big decision. Um, I know from, you know, when I meet an, introduced myself to a new author and I'm in a little bit of a unique position because I'm also the acquisitions editor. So chances are even, you know, you've probably already had a conversation with me probably more than one. Um, and I know how nerve wracking it is. And part of my job, what I see my job as an editor is, I need to put you at ease and reassure you so that you can write the best possible version of the book I can get out of you. And trust me, I will get it out of you. You're going to hate me by the end, but I will get it out of you. [laughter]
Rekka: 24:05 But it's, it's the effort that you're going to draw out of the author.
Kaelyn: 24:10 Yes.
Rekka: 24:10 It's not going to be hated because you're going to change all the fundamental things that make this book the author's own book.
Kaelyn: 24:16 Yeah. When I say, you're going to hate me by the end of it. I mean, because I know what you're capable of. And –
Rekka: 24:23 You're not going to settle for anything less.
Kaelyn: 24:24 – I am not going to let you get away with anything. So, and I mean it's, you should want an editor that does that.
Rekka: 24:32 You should want an editor that is compelled to draw every last drop–
Kaelyn: 24:37 –But here's the thing, I'm doing it because I care about your book a lot. So do I care about as much as you? I can't imagine I do because no one else cares about it as much as you, but I care about it a lot. Um, so you know, having an open and frank relationship with your editor is important. And this was one of the things we were kind of batting around when we were trying to do, figure out what to do with this episode and that was relationships with your editor. Um, it's tricky.
Rekka: 25:10 Yeah.
Kaelyn: 25:11 Because it is a professional relationship, right? But at the same time, it's–
Rekka: 25:18 Fraught with emotion!
Kaelyn: 25:20 –and it's a very vulnerable relationship. Um, I always say, you know, like if you wake up at 1:30 in the morning and you're like, "Oh my God, this idea!" Text me, email me, I want to hear about it. Um, but you know, maybe don't call me. That's, we're not, we're not quite there yet. Um, but it's, it's a tricky relationship to navigate because this is a person that – I won't say they're in a position of authority over you because that's not the case at all. But they are in a position –
Rekka: 25:53 They're serving two parties here.
Kaelyn: 25:55 –Yeah, there's you, and then there's also their publishing house. So it is, it is a difficult relationship to navigate, but at the same time, then, you're going to have absurd conversations with this person. [laughter] And here's the thing, I love them, but like, I definitely get some people that are like, I'm like, "Okay, well this part's not really clear. Can you explain what's going on?" It's like, "Oh, well this person's from here so they can do water magic." "Okay, great. Um, what about this guy?" "Oh, he's from here. So that's that tree magic." It's like, guys, you don't sound stupid to me. And I know that like everyone else that you talk to about this–
Rekka: 26:33 This is the concept we're selling!
Kaelyn: 26:35 Yes! It's like, "I want to hear about this stuff. Tell me about, you know, your armored rabbits charging into battle! Like, I want to know about this." No matter. I mean, did you ever feel like, you know, like, "Oh well, and then–"
Rekka: 26:51 I am always an outlier. I have never felt apologetic for – Like, I wrote Flotsam. [laughter] Like have you read Flotsam?
Kaelyn: 26:58 A couple of times. Yeah. [laughter]
Rekka: 26:59 Yeah. How am I supposed to feel bashful about that book?
Kaelyn: 27:04 It's true. It's definitely true.
Rekka: 27:06 Um, there's not a lot in there I can even pretend is normal.
Kaelyn: 27:10 Especially if you're shy. You're not shy.
Rekka: 27:14 I have been shy in my life. I think I'm done.
Kaelyn: 27:16 I don't believe that for a second but let's keep going. You know, and that part can be intimidating and there's a lot of little things that you know, factor into your relationship. Um. But I think it's good and important to have at least a friendly relationship with your editor.
Rekka: 27:35 Mm-hmm.
Kaelyn: 27:36 Because it's different from– I mean, I think you'd agree it's different from a lot of other regular jobs. Oh yeah. Like making a widget. This isn't going into the office and you know, going, "Steve, you were supposed to get me this by tomorrow. Why isn't it done?" Like it's, you know, it's like, "Okay, so you're stuck on this thing. Let me help you with it."
Rekka: 27:59 Mm-hmm.
Kaelyn: 27:59 And that's great. That's my favorite part. Yeah. So, yeah. Um. It is a little hard, you know, balancing the personal professional.
Rekka: 28:07 Mm-hmm. and you'd have to sort of decide where you're going to put your boundaries before you run into them or over them or through them.
Kaelyn: 28:13 But with social media now it's so much, you know...
Rekka: 28:16 Boundaries fall away all the time.
Kaelyn: 28:18 Yeah, pretty quickly and like, you know, interacting with the people in your writing community, and by extension, your publisher is great. You know, it's, it's a lot of fun and it's a good way to kind of like, you know, have a funny exchange that builds some awareness.
Rekka: 28:32 Yeah. But in in the same sense of like opening boundaries, like if there's a boundary that someone sets, you just respect it. Absolutely. And um, yeah, like my current editor at Parvus doesn't want text messages. Okay. Like that's not going to help him work better on my book, you know?
Kaelyn: 28:50 [laughter]
Rekka: 28:50 So while Kailyn may accept text messages from authors in her stable
Kaelyn: 28:56 Kaelyn encourages text messages. I, I'm fine with all forms of communication, just, you know, communicate with me.
Rekka: 29:01 Yeah. I always prefer to have it in writing. So like if someone calls me up and has the conversation and I have no written record of it, 20 minutes later I'm like, "Oh, what did we say we were going to do? I have no record of it."
Kaelyn: 29:15 I just blacked out for that entire thing. Did I just agree to do a podcast?!
Rekka: 29:17 How does that happen?
Kaelyn: 29:19 Yeah. So boundaries and communication standards are important to establish.
Rekka: 29:23 And working together in the way that works best for everybody.
Kaelyn: 29:25 Yes. And again, this is, you know, the every editor works different. Um. I, I like to get a sense of how an author works well because if I'm doing something and it's just completely going over their head, that's not helping anyone.
Rekka: 29:42 Right.
Kaelyn: 29:42 And I, I can be more flexible. I'm pretty good about that kind of stuff. So like, yeah, you can tell me "Here's how I work best and it's reasonable." No problem.
Rekka: 29:53 Right.
Kaelyn: 29:55 So. Um. Editors are not that scary. I'm not supposed to say that. I'm sure you know the secret cabal of publishing is sending an assassin for me as we speak, so it was nice doing these episodes for everyone, but I think we think that, well, writers kind of have this impression that editors are going to go, "No, nope. Cross this out. Get rid of this. What the heck is this?" If your book needed that much work–
Rekka: 30:28 Or that much vehemence.
Kaelyn: 30:31 Vehemence, yeah. No, they wouldn't have bought it. They buy books, we buy books because we're interested in them and we liked them. And even if it's a little rough, we can sand it down and polish it and make it like amazing.
Rekka: 30:45 Mm-hmm.
Kaelyn: 30:45 You know, we take it to that, like, I am going to get the best book possible out of you because I know you're capable of doing it. That is the core of this. We would not buy a book that we thought like, "Eh, I dunno. I guess it's, it's fine."
Rekka: 30:59 Yeah.
Kaelyn: 31:01 You know, going back to look again why we started this podcast, I really, it's, it's a little bit interesting for me when I go to conventions because you know, a lot of times I'm there by myself mostly, or with a very small party like, you know, I know people, I have friends there and stuff, but like I introduced myself and "Oh, are you a writer?" "Oh No. I work in publishing, I'm an acquisitions editor." And it is like amazing. Like people sit up a little bit
Rekka: 31:26 It's like a wall or something that comes up.
Kaelyn: 31:28 No, it's just kind of like, "Oh!" And I understand, you know, it's like you're not.
Rekka: 31:35 You're a cryptid, you're a mythological figure.
Kaelyn: 31:37 Yeah. It's like "A wild acquisitions editor has appeared!"
Rekka: 31:40 What did I say in the last five minutes that they might've overheard?
Kaelyn: 31:44 Did I summon them? How did they appear here? But it is very funny where I will like, you know, it'd be talking to a group of people and introduce myself and then there is a massive shift in the conversation. Like I can just sense it where it's like, "Oh, we're not surrounded entirely by our own kind." But that's what I kind of want to dispel a little bit. We are also lovers of stories and the craft of writing and spend a lot of time thinking about and working on creative processes and um, you know, addressing the best ways to write and tell stories because we love stories,' were just on the other end of the stories.
Rekka: 32:30 But you are a big part of making them happen.
Kaelyn: 32:33 We Make Books.
Rekka: 32:33 Yes. We Make Books.
Kaelyn: 32:36 We all make books.
Rekka: 32:37 Yes. Together.
Kaelyn: 32:38 Together as team. But, it's true. And that's part of the reason we really wanted to do this.
Rekka: 32:46 And something else that you bring to it. And I mean, I know this, this episode is primarily focused on relationships, uh, with the publisher and the author. But there is the benefit, and a reason that you might choose to seek a publisher for your book, is that they have relationships with lots of people.
Kaelyn: 33:03 We do.
Rekka: 33:03 And those people are probably not accessible to you on your own without a lot of just elbow-rubbing at conventions and stuff. Like eventually you might meet all those people on your own, but the, the publisher has this, um, it's not an army because they, they're mutuals and their peers and stuff, but like they have, they have a reach that you don't necessarily have and they want to leverage that to help you.
Kaelyn: 33:31 We have people that we work with outside of what you would normally encounter because that's just our day-to-day. Like, I mean, do you know a guy who does lay out?
Rekka: 33:44 [indistinguishable noise]
Kaelyn: 33:44 Well, I mean, well you [laughter] You the hypothetical author that I'm running into.
Rekka: 33:49 Oh sorry, yes, not Rekka. The other one.
Kaelyn: 33:49 I mean, do you know a guy who does layout? Do you know? I mean, you can go online and find a copy editor, but I know one that does a good job and that we trust.
Rekka: 34:01 And if I, if I want to put a cover on a space opera and then a cover on a steampunk book and then a cover on a high fantasy book, like do I have a Rolodex with names and numbers of people who do different genre books particularly well? Or–
Kaelyn: 34:16 I mean, part of it, it is, you know, the resources and the information that we collected as sort of like an archive.
Rekka: 34:22 Everything you learn can be use for the next author.
Kaelyn: 34:24 Oh yeah, no, trust me, it's, it's definitely a compounding knowledge situation. Um. So that's, you know, that's another thing that's important in the relationship is what you're getting out of the publisher and you're getting our experience, our resources, our knowledge, our creative teams, and people that we can introduce you to and help you, have them help you with things. And that is really the core of not just your editor but with your publisher. They are there to help you. Their job is to help you get a book published. When I say that, I don't mean like, "oh, maybe" like, no, they're going to publish your book. When I say help you, I mean get you to that step.
Rekka: 35:05 Yes. And they're not reluctantly sharing all this.
Kaelyn: 35:09 No. We're excited about it. You know, like, oh, okay, well you need...
Rekka: 35:12 You get the contract and you're like, "Yes! We can. We're going to do this. This is going to be amazing!"
Kaelyn: 35:16 Yeah. And we're already planning and you know, thinking about what we're going to do for you and you know, we try to keep authors in the loop about these things. It's important that you know what's going on with your book and your work and everything. So it's, it is a relationship. It's a symbiotic relationship and it's important to have a good one. You should have more than one point of contact beyond your editor probably, but that is going to be your primary point of contact. Um, and you know, your author should be – "your author," *my* author, *your editor* is hopefully someone that you have a good working relationship and a good rapport with, and they understand what you're trying to do because that's how you're going to get a good book.
Rekka: 36:00 And you're comfortable enough to ask the clarifying questions. If you're not sure what's going on and you don't just nod and say, "Uh huh, uh huh."
Kaelyn: 36:06 Yeah, and I mean, you know, and this is a touchy subject, I really shouldn't be bringing this up, but I'm going to. If you're having problems with your relationship with your editor – and I am going to qualify all of this by saying, be VERY careful about what you consider to be "insurmountable problems" because "they don't like this scene" is not one.
Rekka: 36:34 Right.
Kaelyn: 36:35 I'm talking about real problems, like you're not getting responses back from them. Like there's a deadline approaching and you haven't heard anything. You can't get in touch with them. Be very careful about what you consider to be irreconcilable differences.
Rekka: 36:54 We're talking like publishing war crimes.
Kaelyn: 36:56 Yeah, pretty much. We're talking about like anything that is potentially a violation of the contract is kind of the thing. But if that happens, you do need to consider, "okay, what do I do here?" And if you have an agent, the first thing you do is go to your agent. If you don't have an agent, then you got to take steps beyond that. You're not. If you just end up in a bad relationship with your publisher – or your editor, excuse me – you're not in a completely helpless position, but again, this is like we're talking again like use, "does this viol– potentially violate the contract" or "is this putting me in a position where I'm going to end up violating the contract?" That should be like –
Rekka: 37:41 The number one concern because that's the piece of paper you signed.
Kaelyn: 37:44 Because if you go to the publisher and you're like, "Well they're making the change this sentence, and I like that sentence the way it is." That's not a good thing to do.
Rekka: 37:56 "Are we seriously having this conversation?"
Kaelyn: 37:58 Yeah, and this is like I said, this is not, you know, it was a little hesitant to bring this up because I don't want to put ideas in anyone's head about this, but I do want to put out there that, you know, like you could be in a position where that happens.
Rekka: 38:12 Yeah.
Kaelyn: 38:12 I'm not saying that never happens because of course it does.
Rekka: 38:15 But it's not the default.
Kaelyn: 38:18 No, no. I don't think it is. Do you? I mean...
Rekka: 38:21 Nothing I've seen. Everyone I know loves their editor.
Kaelyn: 38:27 Good. We're very lovable. As I say, like a robot: "We are very lovable creatures."
Rekka: 38:34 "Be Convinced." [laughter]
Kaelyn: 38:36 Um, yeah, so I won't say there's never a situation in which you are going to have a major problem with an editor. They, they happen, they are rare, few, and far between because people that don't care about these books...
Rekka: 38:51 Don't last long.
Kaelyn: 38:52 Don't – stop working on them, because I mean, can you imagine if you didn't like this?
Rekka: 38:59 it's a lot of work for something you don't like.
Kaelyn: 39:01 Yeah. It would be torture. [laughter] So it's just something you know to keep in mind that the person you're working with. We wouldn't be doing this if they did an enjoy it.
Rekka: 39:13 and chances are the suggestion, even if you don't agree with a proposed solution, the suggestion is valid and the problem area they're identifying is, is something that you need to take another look at anyway.
Kaelyn: 39:27 Yeah. I mean, I always use an example of, um, there was a book, there was a manuscript I was reading and I read it and I came back with a note that I was like, look, this is a huge problem. Um, it was a sensitivity issue and it was like, this is like, "You gotta fix this." And I got back from the author, "Well that's not what is happening in that scene." And my response to that was, "Okay, good. Second, I read it and I didn't know that."
Rekka: 39:56 Yeah. So we need to address what you're communicating in that scene.
Kaelyn: 40:00 "First. Great. I'm really glad to hear that."
Rekka: 40:04 "You cannot understand how relieved I am."
Kaelyn: 40:06 Yes. "Second, let's make sure that no one else ever possibly thinks that because I read it a few times and I'm going, uhhhhhhh," so yeah. Um, yeah, as we said like, if an editor comes back to you with something, even if it's not, um, you know exactly what you're thinking needs to be changed, but they're bringing it up, is valid.
Rekka: 40:31 But I can't tell you how many times I get comments from an editor and I go, "THAT's what was wrong with it! Oh my god! That is what I needed, someone to tell me."
Kaelyn: 40:45 It's an outside fresh set of eyes.
Rekka: 40:47 But it's, it, and trained eyes.
Kaelyn: 40:49 Yes.
Rekka: 40:49 And that is so key and so important and it's not just a trumped up proofreader, you know? And it's not just somebody who's pushing whatever the trends are on the market that the publishers trying to follow.
Kaelyn: 41:04 They don't have an agenda.
Rekka: 41:05 Their agenda is to make your book as good as possible.
Kaelyn: 41:09 Sometimes there's a thing you just can't quite put your finger on, you're like –
Rekka: 41:13 ALL the time there's a thing you can't just put your finger on.
Kaelyn: 41:15 – I know there's something here and –
Rekka: 41:16 It's like, "I love this scene but I know I'm doing it wrong or I know it could be stronger." Or like, "I just read through my book and like there's this part that's like, all these things are important but it's not coming together." And your editor sees that. And probably without even knowing that it's torturing you, can say like, "Hey, just so I know, I noticed in this scene like [plot] and like what if you bring that thing that happens later and you combine those scenes," and then all of a sudden the book is more clear, it's more succinct, things are connecting and like, you know, rockets are going off and lightning is striking.
Kaelyn: 41:54 Yeah. It's a nice feeling when it's nice feeling.
Rekka: 41:57 [whispers] so nice!
Kaelyn: 41:57 It's a nice feeling on the editor side when things come together and like you get a draft back and you're like, "Yes! Nailed it! Kick ass author, this book's gonna rock!
Rekka: 42:06 Play The A-Team theme right here.
Kaelyn: 42:08 Get up, do a little dance. And I'm like, this is the thing that I get just as excited about this when I get a draft back and I'm like, okay, I want to see what they did this thing. And I'm just like [whispers] "Nailed it! Awesome!" [laughter]
Rekka: 42:18 I have comments in my, um, and one of my recent drafts, as all caps. "YESSS!!!!!!!!!" With multiple Ss and many many exclamations points.
Kaelyn: 42:29 [laughter] I have sent stuff back to authors that was like, "You kicked this punk ass paragraph's ass back to–" just incoherent.
Rekka: 42:38 So happy.
Kaelyn: 42:39 "Nailed this! Totally nailed it. Go get a beer, do celebration dance! You earned it!"
Rekka: 42:45 So don't ever let anyone tell you that the publisher's editor does not care about your book.
Kaelyn: 42:49 Oh God, I get, I get so worked up about this stuff. I think I scare people sometimes. [laughter]
Rekka: 42:54 Trust me, you cannot yell loud enough for your author.
Kaelyn: 42:58 [laughter] "You kicked this paragraph's ass showed it who's boss. It's over there in the corner crying about how good it is right now."
Rekka: 43:05 "It just can't take how awesome it is."
Kaelyn: 43:07 Yeah.
Rekka: 43:07 All right, well, we are about out of time...
Kaelyn: 43:08 We are?
Rekka: 43:12 I think we like... Like, we covered a lot. And I looked at the time and I was surprised to see that we were already at the target length and we were going for, I was thinking like, "oh, what else are we going to talk about?" I'm like, no, but I think that is.
Kaelyn: 43:22 Yeah, I mean, so this was a little bit, we wanted to do a little bit more of a free form...
Rekka: 43:28 Touchy feely.
Kaelyn: 43:29 We still love everyone even though we just kind of like did a litany of...
Rekka: 43:34 Well yeah. And, and so this is a pacing issue. [laughter]
Kaelyn: 43:40 The whole point is, at the end of this, both parties –
Rekka: 43:44 –want a book they'll love–
Kaelyn: 43:44 –love this book and are excited about it and would not be working on it if they weren't. So trust your editors, writers, and editors, trust your writers.
Rekka: 43:55 Yes.
Kaelyn: 43:56 And love each other and you know, write good books together.
Rekka: 44:00 And set healthy boundaries.
Kaelyn: 44:01 And set healthy boundaries. Um, so yeah, that's a, that's the episode. Um, This is the end of our, you know, initial batch of rel–
Rekka: 44:10 Launch.
Kaelyn: 44:10 Yeah, Launch, that's the word, right?
Rekka: 44:11 Yeah you'd think the editor would know the term "launch."
Kaelyn: 44:14 Okay, I–you get. You get one of those every episode.
Rekka: 44:17 [cackles] I enjoyed that one.
Kaelyn: 44:17 You get to throw– you get to throw "God, you're an editor" once. I will give you one an episode. Um, so yeah, this is the end of our launch episodes. Um, we hope you enjoyed them. We really enjoyed doing them. Um, but there's going to be more like this to come. This one was like a said a little more free form then we're going to be doing. But we both were kind of like, "oh that was, that was a lot of listing things."
Rekka: 44:44 We put a lot into planning these out so that we could make sure that we addressed everything. And obviously those first two episodes about, um, before acquisition and after acquisition, there was a lot that we wanted to make sure that we covered and didn't forget anything. So we had to really plan those episodes out before we got started.
Kaelyn: 45:02 So there will be, you know, coming somewhere a little more balanced between those. This one was a little, like, "What's a good way to round this out? Okay. Let's talk about writers and editors and publishers."
Rekka: 45:15 Well, it was more of a like, "Okay," you said to me, "Rekka, what did you want to ask?"
Kaelyn: 45:24 [laughter]
Rekka: 45:24 And my question was, "What are your intentions toward my book?"
Kaelyn: 45:28 [laughter]
Rekka: 45:29 But with all the gravitas and um, and like threat and–
Kaelyn: 45:33 Of a father with a shotgun in Oklahoma.
Rekka: 45:33 – Ominous portent. So we wanted to make sure that like, yeah, we are going to address the things that you're asking about. We're going to address the things that you're worried about, that you're unsure about. So this is the, this episode represents the promise that we intend to fulfill. That you're going to find out these things that you don't feel like you can ask.
Kaelyn: 46:00 Yeah. And you know, no question is off limits.
Rekka: 46:04 Yeah. Um, we might, we might be tip-toeing around the way we answer it because you know, we are trying to maintain a level of professionality and we know that maybe you want us to go on a screaming, cursing rant about something.
Kaelyn: 46:16 I mean I will occasionally if it's a –
Rekka: 46:17 We are capable of it.
Kaelyn: 46:18 Really good paragraph.
Rekka: 46:21 Yes. Thank you. And um, but like, do ask us, don't be afraid to ask us. Like we said, you can direct message WMBcast on Twitter if you want to be anonymous. Like we are happy to, to hold your anonymity and um, you know, there's Patreon, you can ask there if you just want it slightly more private, on a comment.
Kaelyn: 46:44 You can email us.
Rekka: 46:44 Or you can email us feedback@wmbcast.com and that's the most super anonymous way to get in touch with us and a long form question, if you're really not even sure how you want to phrase it.
Kaelyn: 46:59 So we really want to hear from everyone.
Rekka: 47:01 We absolutely welcome your questions, your comments, your anecdotes.
Kaelyn: 47:05 Concerns.
Rekka: 47:05 Um, and if you could, if you're just reacting on like a thank you so much level, we would love a review and a rating on iTunes.
Kaelyn: 47:13 Go do it on iTunes
Rekka: 47:14 Please make sure you're subscribed so that you get our future episodes and um, follow us on Twitter. You can find WMBcast on Twitter and Instagram. You can find our individual profiles and you can just interact with us. Let us know what, what nerves we're hitting here and um, what else is on your mind.
Kaelyn: 47:34 Yeah, I know we keep saying this, but we really envision this as: we want to be, want to have any engaging conversation with the people that listen to this.
Rekka: 47:42 Absolutely.
Kaelyn: 47:44 You know, so hopefully, we're gonna have some listeners who want to know some things and want to interact with us.
Rekka: 47:49 And in the future, if you leave a rating or review or a question, we will probably read it out loud on the air.
Kaelyn: 47:54 Yeah, we'll shout it out on here.
Rekka: 47:56 Obviously this is launch day, so we don't have any of those yet, but we will get to a point where we do.
Kaelyn: 48:00 No, but you know, I mean hit us on the socials and the keep in touch. We really, really want to hear from you.
Rekka: 48:05 And we hope that you know, this is a super valuable resource that you come back to again and again.
Kaelyn: 48:11 Yeah, and I promise after this we'll stop ram– every episode we're going to cut down the rambling at the end a little bit.
Rekka: 48:17 Maybe a touch.
Kaelyn: 48:18 Maybe a touch, eventually.
Rekka: 48:21 Someday.
Kaelyn: 48:21 Yeah. It's a wave beating against a rock.
Rekka: 48:24 Wear us down.
Kaelyn: 48:24 Yes.
Rekka: 48:25 Eventually we will run right up against the start of the game of Thrones episode that we're recording up until. Then, it would just be like, okay, we're done. Put down some questions.
Kaelyn: 48:32 Okay. All right. Thanks everyone so much for listening and
Rekka: 48:37 we'll talk to you in two weeks.
Kaelyn: 48:38 Yeah. Two weeks.
Piano: 48:39 [music]
Tuesday May 14, 2019
Episode 3: I Finished My Draft! Now What?! (Part 2 of 2)
Tuesday May 14, 2019
Tuesday May 14, 2019
Hi everyone, and thank you for listening to the launch episodes of the We Make Books Podcast - A podcast about writing, publishing, and everything in between!
We Make Books is hosted by Rekka Jay and Kaelyn Considine; Rekka is a published author and Kaelyn is an editor and together they are going to take you through what goes into getting a book out of your head, on to paper, in to the hands of a publisher, and finally on to book store shelves.
We kick off the podcast series with a discussion of the lifecycle of a book. We're going to cover straight up to the book's release over this episode and the next, and today we talk all the way up to the happy-scary moment when your book is picked up by a publisher.
We Make Books is a podcast for writer and publishers, by writers and publishers and we want to hear from our listeners! Hit us up on our social media, linked below, and send us your questions, comments, and concerns, and any theories you may have about "Spider-Man: Far From Home."
Thank you for taking the time to listen to this introduction, the first batch of new episodes drops on May 14th, so be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss it.
A transcription of this episode can be found below.
We hope you enjoy We Make Books!
Twitter: @WMBCast | @KindofKaelyn | @BittyBittyZap
=== Transcript ===
Kaelyn: 00:00 Hi everyone. Welcome to another episode of the we make books podcast, a podcast about writing, publishing and everything in between. I'm Kaelyn Considine and I am an editor and acquisitions editor at Parvus press.
Rekka: 00:12 And I'm Rekka Jay. I write science fiction as RJ Theodore and one of my books has published through Parvus Press
Kaelyn: 00:18 And we love it. It's such a great book. Should I'll go get it. Um, so this is the second half of our two introductory episodes. Um, we are kind of doing a rough, uh, walk through.
Rekka: 00:30 I think it's more of a tear through
Kaelyn: 00:32 A tear through yeah. Tear through of, um, the publishing process. Same qualifiers. Last time we know this is not a perfect in depth every single part of the process.
Rekka: 00:42 The part you care about. Yeah. We didn't talk about it enough but we will someday.
Kaelyn: 00:45 No, I mean we were like that one. We're leaving that out. But, uh, this is, you know, so the first episode, which hopefully you just finished listening to, we covered, um, from having a finished manuscript up to submissions and broaching into the process of acquisitions here, we're gonna start with acquisitions and walk you all the way up to what happens to get the book on the shelf. If you didn't listen to the first episode I recommend go do that. If you didn't listen to our introductory episode, I also recommend you go do that. Um, just to get an idea of us, what this podcast is about and what we're planning to do here.
Rekka: 01:17 Yeah. Before we're 10 episodes in and you have a lot more to catch up on.
Kaelyn: 01:20 Yeah. And, uh, you know, we're releasing these all back to back. So, you know, this is a,
Rekka: 01:25 This is our launch day, funny we should mention that we get to that.
Kaelyn: 01:29 Yes, yes. So we talk a lot about launch days, um, so you know, just some information, some. Um, and to also give you an idea of topics that we were going to be discussing more in depth with dedicated episodes as we go down the line. Uh, so this is the second half of the two parter. Let's just get to it.
Rekka: 01:46 Yeah.
Kaelyn: 01:46 Hope you enjoy.
Kaelyn: 01:47 [Music]
Kaelyn: 01:54 Okay.
Kaelyn: 02:05 It is kind of what we do.
Rekka: 02:07 So, um, we spent an episode talking about sort of more the writers realm of responsibility.
Kaelyn: 02:14 Yes. Real quick. Welcome back everyone.
Rekka: 02:17 No, no, no, no, no, no, no. They're fine. They've been here. Whatever we said high already, they're binging.
Kaelyn: 02:22 I don't know, you know, it's nice to like,
Rekka: 02:24 Be polite?
Kaelyn: 02:25 I know everyone's going to be just listening, you know. Hopefully everyone's just going to be listening to these two, this batch after the other. But you know, it's nice to say hello again in case they had to walk away from that. But so where last we left you, it was a cliffhanger.
Kaelyn: 02:39 It was a cliffhanger. You just got accepted. Then what happens?
Kaelyn: 02:42 Then what happens?
Rekka: 02:43 Is this a soap opera or is this real life?
Kaelyn: 02:46 Really quick? Tight pan on the face. Giant eyes. [gasp]
Rekka: 02:53 Cut to commercial.
Kaelyn: 02:53 Cut to commercial. Um, no. So where are we last left you, we were ah, you know, so you've gotten a call from an acquisitions editor.
Rekka: 02:59 Yes. In theory, all your hard work has paid off.
Kaelyn: 03:03 That's, hey, look.
Rekka: 03:04 And all your hard work is just beginning.
Kaelyn: 03:06 Yeah. Yeah. I think there's this thing that everyone thinks some about my book. I'm good.
Rekka: 03:12 I'm done. Oh God, that's so wrong.
Kaelyn: 03:14 So wrong.
Rekka: 03:15 Sweet summer child. You are so wrong.
Kaelyn: 03:19 That's good. I'm trying to think of things that could not be farther from the truth.
Rekka: 03:24 Yeah, there's nothing.
Kaelyn: 03:25 Um, so we're going to walk you through what happens after that now. But in order to get to that, we got to talk about acquisitions process a little bit.
Rekka: 03:35 Yeah.
Kaelyn: 03:36 So you Rekka, are someone that has been through it. I myself, uh, in case you have not listened to our intro episode, which go listen to it.
Rekka: 03:43 Yeah. Yeah.
Kaelyn: 03:44 Um, I am an acquisitions editor for Parvus Press, so I, this is–
Rekka: 03:49 This is what you do.
Kaelyn: 03:49 This is what I do among other things, but this is, this is the bread and butter of my, a lot of my job. Um, so again, we're not going to get into too much crazy detail here. Um, this is stuff we're absolutely going to talk about more down the line. Um, but we want to give you sort of a brief run through. So very quickly glossing over all of the, you know, what makes me interested in books because there is no good answer to that.
Rekka: 04:21 Yeah, and it's not a universal.
Kaelyn: 04:22 No, not by any stretch of the imagination. But let's say you've submitted your manuscript script. I've enjoyed it and next thing that's going to happen is you're going to get a call from me or if you've gone through an agent, I'll probably go through your agent and then set up a call with you.
Kaelyn: 04:40 So what's going to happen here is I'm trying to get a good sense of you. I want to see what you envision for the book, what you're like to work with as a writer and how working relationship will be going, but also set your expectations for what we want and what we'd be asking you to do to your book because, and this is a running theme you're going to see through this: there's no such thing as a book that gets accepted and immediately published. It doesn't happen.
Rekka: 05:15 Or should not happen.
Kaelyn: 05:16 Should not happen. If it does happen, don't publish with that publisher.
Rekka: 05:22 That's not your publisher.
Kaelyn: 05:23 That's not someone you should be working with. Um, so we're going to have a couple of conversations. Uh, if there's an, if there's an agent involved, there'll be involved in the conversations. Um, most places, and again, another qualifier everywhere is a little different. Um, but you should be talking to people before you even start talking about a contract. So once everyone's kind of gotten to a place that we've, we've had, you know, had some conversations back and forth, Rekka, what is the one thing you need to stop and do? As excited as you are and as ready to sign the contract as you are? What should you do agent or not?
Rekka: 06:09 Research, this publisher. Research this publisher until you know what the mineral makeup of the ground they're building is built on this, right?
Kaelyn: 06:18 I mean, it's true because a few reasons. One, you know, presumably for working with an agent, they are, they're going to take care of you and look out for you. So you shouldn't be, you know, there's that. But even still, you should still be doing your own research if you not make sure that you're, you know, at minimum ending up in a place that is going to work well for and with you at worst, make sure you're not getting stuck with some kind of predatory publisher that's going to lock up your rights for years.
Rekka: 06:48 Right
Kaelyn: 06:49 So I know it's exciting, it's really exciting.
Rekka: 06:52 It's very exciting. This is exactly what you've been working towards. You know, as far as you're concerned, this is your end goal. I mean, it's probably not your end end goal, but this is a moment that feels like everything hinges on you getting that contract and advance as fast as possible.
Kaelyn: 07:10 Yes
Rekka: 07:10 And that may, you know, it may not be the right publisher.
Kaelyn: 07:13 Don't let it cloud your judgment, you know, for all of the time, all of the time we spent talking in a previous episode about how much blood, sweat and tears went into this, keep in mind how much of your blood, sweat and tears went into this. Don't throw it away.
Rekka: 07:27 Right.
Kaelyn: 07:27 I can't imagine having to make the decision to walk away from something like that. But think how miserable you will be if you don't.
Rekka: 07:33 Right. This is a decision that seems like there's a lot of pressure pushing you in one direction and that saying no to a publisher and walking away, it may be your only chance and you will regret it forever and you will never get your book published if you don't go through them. And they may even say that and you definitely don't want those people.
Kaelyn: 07:52 Yeah.
Rekka: 07:52 Um, but look at the catalog of books that have been put out by this publisher. Those are the lists of names of people that you could potentially reach out to and just say, hey, I have been offered, you know, a purchase of my book by this publisher and I see that you worked with them, could you tell me,
Kaelyn: 08:13 How was the process?
Rekka: 08:14 You know, without divulging the, you know, the,
Kaelyn: 08:17 Were you happy with them is a very easy to answer a question without asking for too much specifics, just yes or no?
Rekka: 08:26 Yup.
Kaelyn: 08:26 Just yes, I'm very happy with them. I have a great relationship or eh, it could have been better.
Rekka: 08:30 And the reason you go to the catalog is because these are the books that the publishers still retains rights to, but they may not be authors that are actively with that publisher. So you may find some more honest answers than others.
Kaelyn: 08:42 Yeah yeah, so, okay. Let's say you've done all your research. This is great. This is the publishing houses of your dreams. You are so excited! Now it's time for the contract.
Rekka: 08:51 Yes.
Kaelyn: 08:51 And ...
Rekka: 08:52 You like legalese? I hope you like legalese.
Kaelyn: 08:55 I really hope you like trying to understand minute details of things that are hopefully never going to apply to you.
Rekka: 09:01 But I have a question. Kaelyn.
Kaelyn: 09:04 Huh?
Rekka: 09:04 I have a question.
Kaelyn: 09:05 Sure.
Rekka: 09:06 Does anyone talk like the language in a contract?
Kaelyn: 09:11 Yes, but only if we're talking about a contract.
Rekka: 09:13 Yeah. What is that? What is the deal with that?
Kaelyn: 09:17 It's you know, it's cover your ass language is really what it is.
Rekka: 09:21 But obfuscated information is not covering your ass if
Kaelyn: 09:25 Well, actually it's ...
Rekka: 09:25 it's well for debating what that even means.
Kaelyn: 09:28 This is actually a good point to bring up is the reason that these very specific and very complicated words and phrases are used is because there have been court cases over the meaning of specific words. So you have to use specific words because they need us
Rekka: 09:45 Because they have court precedents.
Kaelyn: 09:46 Yes. And they translate to a consequence essentially. So yeah, as you're reading through this going like, oh my God, what? And I realize this must be extra torture for writers.
Rekka: 09:57 Yeah.
Kaelyn: 09:58 I just, I have a couple of comments
Rekka: 10:00 I have some feedback. If you're open to it.
Kaelyn: 10:03 The plot of this clause is just all over the place.
Rekka: 10:07 I really don't like how it ends.
Kaelyn: 10:07 I don't know who this subsequent is, but they keep, they keep popping up and then nothing happens.
Rekka: 10:16 So, um, yeah, no, it's, it's, they can be daunting but...
Kaelyn: 10:22 And if you don't understand what they mean, do not sign them. We're going to, we're going to get to that. So if you have an agent, your agent is going to handle a lot of the contract negotiations. They will, I mean, they should be, you know, keeping you involved, talking to you about, well, are you willing to take this? And this or they'll advise you, cause you know, your agents a professional, they know how to navigate this.
Rekka: 10:46 And they're also familiar with these terms and these ...
Kaelyn: 10:47 Yeah. Subsequents. Yes, exactly. Yeah. So if you're doing this on your own, look, I'm not going to say, you know, you must go get a lawyer because it's expensive.
Rekka: 11:01 However,
Kaelyn: 11:02 However,
Rekka: 11:03 So is signing away your rights without understanding what you're signing away.
Kaelyn: 11:06 Yes, exactly. um, if you don't understand what you're reading, if you have questions about it, again, this is your blood, sweat and tears.
Rekka: 11:16 And if this is your first book, it means even more than like your third book or your fourth book.
Kaelyn: 11:20 Exactly, yeah. So think about how much time and effort you put into this and think about if it's the ri - worth the risk of signing a bad contract.
Rekka: 11:32 Mmhmm.
Kaelyn: 11:33 Most places, I won't say they're not out. I will say they're not out to screw you.
Rekka: 11:39 However,
Kaelyn: 11:40 I will go so far as to say they're not trying to take advantage of you, but like every contract, each side is trying to get as much out of the other as they can. Now, I will say like, and I'm not just saying this because it's Parvus, I will say and Rekka, you can attest to this, we write very fair contracts and I think there is definitely an effort on the part of a lot of, especially independent publishers to do that. But it doesn't matter if somebody, if an offer sent it back to me and I said, you read it over, you have any questions? And they said, ah, whatever. I just signed it. I'd just be like, oh boy.
Rekka: 12:14 Actually so funny story.
Kaelyn: 12:18 Um, just read it. If you have any questions, you know, find someone or Google it, look it up. You know, there is, we will, we will do an episode about this. Talk about, you know, things that should be red flags and contracts, but the biggest things that are going to be the most interest to you covered or your advance, your royalties, your rights, uh, deadlines. That's a big one because
Rekka: 12:43 Kind of a big one
Kaelyn: 12:44 Lot's of them will ...
Rekka: 12:44 They're in there in black ink.
Kaelyn: 12:46 Yeah, a lot of times they get written into the contract and you know, you can, you're, you can lose your advance if you don't meet the deadline. And then there's going to be a lot of things like, you know, um, termination, um, you know, sales quotas like different things for longer down the road. And you know, those were the ones that you might gloss over, but you shouldn't. Umm, also in there is going to be any stipulations about what the publisher versus you were going to be doing for marketing. Um, things about your audio books,
Rekka: 13:17 Your author copies.
Kaelyn: 13:18 You're author copies. All different kinds of little things that you should be aware of. Like I said, we're going to do, we're definitely going to do one where we get a little more in depth with this because it's very important. And on, I think the post acquisition side, it's the most intimidating part of the process. Like the, I have no idea how any of this works.
Rekka: 13:41 And what does this word mean? What does it mean if I sign this the way it's written and am I allowed to ask for changes or are they going to withdraw their offer?
Kaelyn: 13:49 Exactly. And you know, honestly they shouldn't.
Rekka: 13:52 Right.
Kaelyn: 13:52 Um, you go back and say, Hey, I'm concerned about this,
Rekka: 13:56 The phrase contract negotiation is a thing.
Kaelyn: 13:58 Yes, yes. And um, yeah. I'm not going to say some people will say never accept the first contract given to you. If that's a good contract and you're happy with it.
Rekka: 14:08 Yeah, if the things that you were most concerned with are addressed to your liking in the contract and you know what everything means and you're, and it's not just because I think I know what everything means, but you actually understand and you've had conversations about what everything means. Then if you like the contract, if the things that mattered to you are, are, set to your satisfaction, there isn't anything that like you would, you would want to clarify or or modify. You can sign that contract.
Kaelyn: 14:39 Yup. There's nothing, you know? Yeah. Just be smart about it is the thing. At the end of the day, the last thing you want is to walk away with a contract that you're unhappy about.
Rekka: 14:50 Right.
Kaelyn: 14:51 So you've got a great contract. You're all excited, you've dug in, you've had conversations with the acquisitions editor or the publisher. Hopefully you've had a conversation with, if not your editor, somebody who is on that team or associated affiliated with them. At least you've talked about what the plans are for the book. They've talked about what your intentions for the book are, how you see the future of the, if it's a series, how you see it going.
Rekka: 15:14 Mmhmm.
Kaelyn: 15:15 So now,
Rekka: 15:17 And some of the changes that they want might have been in your contract, so you may have already had this conversation.
Kaelyn: 15:22 Yes. That's a good point. Yes. There they may say the publication of this book is contingent upon you doing A, B, and C. We'll talk a little bit more about that in the next section about working with your editor, but part of the reason for that is to make it clear what the expectations are with this, because ...
Rekka: 15:45 And that's a good thing.
Kaelyn: 15:46 No, it is.
Rekka: 15:46 And it sounds so firm and so stern, but it really is the more clear that anyone can be the better off for everyone involved because you know what you're getting into.
Kaelyn: 15:55 And I think this is where people, writers start to get nervous about publishers that, and this is a good transition into working with your editor because I think they get nervous about what they're going to make me change everything. Here's the thing. We would not have bought your book if we didn't like it the way it is. You wrote a good book. We would not have bought it if you didn't. We're going to take it and make it a great book together. This is a team process. This isn't, you know, some random person descending from on high with a red pen, marking it up and tossing it back to you. This is, you know, this is a conversation. This is a process,
Rekka: 16:37 And you're still going to be doing the work of the edits. This is still going to be your book at the end of it. Take every challenge as a way to go, okay, how do I make the strong stronger? What do I want to do here? They're going to offer you probably some kind of suggestion,
Kaelyn: 16:50 Oh, you'll have conversations.
Rekka: 16:50 But it's not a fully formed suggestion. It's going to be more of a challenge.
Kaelyn: 16:54 Yeah, you'll have conversations. Yeah. I mean I, one of my favorite things that I get to do and you know, um, apart from acquiring books, they edit our books too. I love getting on the phone with my authors and talking through and having things explained and having a problem and going like, okay, how do we work?
Rekka: 17:11 Um, I planned a bank heist with my editor
Kaelyn: 17:14 And that's honestly, that's my favorite part of this is the first part, the developmental edits. So developmental edits are, you're working on the story, it's the structure, themes, cohesiveness, character arcs, making sure everything makes sense, lines up is a nice neat package at the end of the day or if it's supposed to be a mess at the end, it's an appropriate mess at the end. Um,
Kaelyn: 17:40 So this is where you're going to be having a lot of conversations with your editor and every editor works differently. Um, I know the way I deal with my authors is different from the way Rekka's editor, deals with her and we work at the same company.
Rekka: 17:54 Yes.
Kaelyn: 17:55 And I think part of that also is, you know, making sure the editor fits well with the author. Everyone works differently.
Rekka: 18:01 We knew that Kaelyn would never be able to tolerate spending any amount of time with me,
Kaelyn: 18:05 No, no ...
Rekka: 18:05 So Kaelyn did not become my editor.
Kaelyn: 18:07 Yeah, so we just decided to do this podcast together. [laughter] That seemed like a much better,
Kaelyn: 18:14 So we just, we don't even just email each other back and forth. We're in the same room together,
Rekka: 18:18 Yes.
Kaelyn: 18:18 For long periods of time.
Kaelyn: 18:19 So probably a good idea now not to ever work on a book together, just in case. Oh God, could you imagine? I can't decide if that would be like,
Rekka: 18:27 The best or the worst. Yeah,
Kaelyn: 18:28 Awesome. Or if we'd just be like handing back like a 700 page tome of like, so here's the thing, if you read this, when you get to the end, the book becomes a singularity, [laughter] so make sure you're away from everything when you get to that. Yeah, no, we could, we could possibly do some damage there,
Rekka: 18:52 Or at least, and the podcasts early, [laughter] one or the other.
Kaelyn: 18:58 Either we take over the world or we killing each other. It's going to be okay. So that's, you know, that's going to be what your developmental editor is doing. How many passes, there's no answer to that,
Rekka: 19:07 As many as many as it takes.
Kaelyn: 19:09 As many as it takes.
Rekka: 19:09 Hopefully, like, you know, everyone is cooperating well so that somebody isn't resisting a change in writing around the change.
Kaelyn: 19:16 And that's a great part of the ...
Rekka: 19:20 Admission?
Kaelyn: 19:20 Yeah, well no, that's a great spot to talk about. You know, having conflict with your editor and what we were talking about before about the sphere of like they're going to come in and change everything. Our book, my book, everyone's book. Okay. Having, you know, your editor might come in and tell you that your favorite part of the book isn't working and that's difficult to hear.
Rekka: 19:44 Because it's precious
Kaelyn: 19:45 It's precious. And I will say someone who's had that conversation, it's difficult to say because I personally can tell the parts of the book that they really like.
Rekka: 19:57 Enjoyed and are proud of ...
Kaelyn: 19:57 Yeah, exactly. Um, try not to fight with your editor. It's just, and conversely, your editors should not be picking fights with you, but it's not going to help anyone and it's going to strain the relationship. It's, you know, everyone, every relationship with editors is different. If you disagree on something, try not to look at it as a conflict. Try to look at it as how are we going to sort this out and how can we get to a mutually beneficial conclusion both for us and the sake of the story. Nobody wants to write a book under a black cloud.
Rekka: 20:39 Right.
Kaelyn: 20:39 It's not ....
Rekka: 20:40 Cause you're gonna remember that black cloud, when you look at that book on the shelf later.
Kaelyn: 20:44 And this is, you know, like again as, as an editor, I never want an author to walk away from a section unhappy. Like I've had so many times where I've had to tell writers, yeah, put it down, walk away from it. Because if you write it right, like the way you are right now, and you know this isn't necessarily because we're in disagreement over some things might have just been frustration or writer's block or
Rekka: 21:07 Society or,
Kaelyn: 21:08 Yeah, it's the same thing with having a disagreement over it. You're not going to be happy with the book and you're going to regret that. And part of my job as your editor is to get the book to a place for it is an excellent book and you're both happy with it. So at the end of your developmental edits, everything that we've talked about, your story, your character arcs, the structure, the plot lines, everything should be where you want it to be. Both parties would be happy with it. They're going to say functionally the story's done.
Rekka: 21:36 Yeah.
Kaelyn: 21:36 Yeah. Then comes line edits.
Rekka: 21:38 Okay.
Kaelyn: 21:41 Line edits ...
Rekka: 21:42 Speaking of functionally. functionally this isn't English
Kaelyn: 21:46 Yes, line edits are the part where you start to question your ability to write. Line edits are your editor, and again everywhere is different. It could be your editor that does this, you know, if it's a larger publishing house, maybe the hand off to someone more junior to uh, to take a look at.
Rekka: 22:05 But it's not a bad thing if it goes to somebody else because now you get another
Kaelyn: 22:10 Oh yeah,
Rekka: 22:10 New perspective on this book who's going to catch stuff because they haven't been part of the process so far.
Kaelyn: 22:15 Rekka actually just brought up a kind of potentially key component here that we didn't really bullet point, but it's good to talk about is: Beta readers.
Rekka: 22:25 Mmmhmmm.
Kaelyn: 22:25 Now the use of these.
Rekka: 22:27 They are precious and they're wonderful.
Kaelyn: 22:28 They're precious, they're wonderful. Buy them cookies, give them hugs.
Rekka: 22:31 Build an army.
Kaelyn: 22:31 Build an army that's full of cookies and lots of hugs. Depending on your publishing house or who's publishing you, they may or may not use them. But for the sake of, you know, this here, and by the way, if you're self publishing, Beta readers,
Rekka: 22:48 Are so key,
Kaelyn: 22:49 So key and crucial. Um, but Beta readers are going to do basically what Rekka just said. They're going to look at the book, they're going to, you know, say like, I liked it. I didn't like it. I was confused at this part. Um, this character's storyline doesn't make sense to me. You're going to get large scale feedback from, macro feedback from them, if you will. And that's, you know, depending on how things work, that might be after most of the developmental edits or that might be kind of during,
Rekka: 23:18 Yeah, it's, it's kind of up to you as the author if you were in, you know, working with your own army.
Kaelyn: 23:23 Yeah. The editor will, you know, um, I know a part of this, we have a Beta reader program,
Rekka: 23:30 But if you know, you have heavy lifting to do on your book, you don't want to bring,
Kaelyn: 23:32 No, that's not ...
Rekka: 23:33 In the Beta readers because that, that's wasting their time.
Kaelyn: 23:36 They are for fine tuning.
Rekka: 23:36 They will be reacting to this as a reader would. And that's really a valuable thing.
Kaelyn: 23:41 That is, yeah, it's so important because it's just a great perspective to have. It's an indicator. It's, you know, we've dropped something in this solution. Let's see what color it turns to tell us what it is.
Rekka: 23:55 And if you have more people, it goes from an n equals two to like an n equals 10 maybe. And that's just like, it really, it really multiplies how many reinforcing opinions you get on, like whether it works. Yeah.
Kaelyn: 24:08 So that could be happening either during the process of developmental edits or right after, but then afterwards you going in the line edits, line edits, it's like we were talking about are sentence structure. Um, ma- watching and catching for like repeated words.
Rekka: 24:27 And believe me. You've got repeated words.
Kaelyn: 24:29 Trust me, you have repeated words. I understand they're only so many ways to say the word desk, but,
Rekka: 24:36 But you can write around it.
Kaelyn: 24:37 Yes. So you know line edits, I mean, your editor is going to go in there and they're going to just make the changes and they should track everything and it's not, you must do this a lot of times. Like when I do it, it's like, look, if I'm adding ha- half of the sentence or I'm moving something, this is a suggestion and I'm giving you an idea of how to make this work better.
Rekka: 24:59 Yeah.
Kaelyn: 24:59 Um, you know, some editors are kind of like, nope, you're doing it this way. This is so again, everyone's a little different. It is not a reflection of your command of the English language. It is a reflection of the fact that writing somewhere between 70 and 150,000 words causes fatigue.
Rekka: 25:18 Yes.
Kaelyn: 25:19 And there are only so many ways you can say something differently. Um, so this is the clarity portion of things. This is the making sure that when the reader reads this, they understand what they're reading.
Rekka: 25:32 And a lot of that is making it succinct.
Kaelyn: 25:34 And if I wrote that sentence down, I would make them change it.
Rekka: 25:37 Yeah. [laugter] Yes. Spoken sentences are the worst.
Kaelyn: 25:41 But I mean Rekka, you do you do a read aloud, right?
Rekka: 25:44 I absolutely do a read aloud. I'm still suffering recovery from my, my last real aloud, which ended, um, almost two weeks ago now.
Kaelyn: 25:51 Yeah. Which is, I mean, you know, for, if you're unsure of what it is, it's you get your manuscript, you go through it and yeah, Rekka's pointing at, I'm not joking. It's a two inch binder.
Rekka: 26:03 I'm sorry. That's a three inch binder.
Kaelyn: 26:05 Three inch binder. I was wrong. That was a three inch binder of her printed manuscript and there's all sorts of flags and posted sticking out of it. We'll put a picture of it on the Instagram so you can say can get a look out of it in its full glory.
Rekka: 26:17 Yes.
Kaelyn: 26:18 And you go through and read this out loud because reading it out loud is the way the reader, like you don't understand that because you've written this, you are so familiar with it. You're skipping and skimming and there's stuff in there that you missing.
Rekka: 26:33 Your brain is telling you, it says what you think it says.
Kaelyn: 26:35 Exactly. Yeah. You normalize it in your mind. So then you're gonna get line edits I mean that is a lot of, that's tracked changes that's accept,reject, acccept, reject. Okay, wait yeah, I see this is wrong. alright, she told me to put this in here and change it, you know, so I'm not going to lie. It's a process. It's not, it's not super fun, but it's just,
Rekka: 26:54 Get your favorite beverage.
Kaelyn: 26:56 Get your favorite beverage.
Rekka: 26:57 Wear your favorite pants.
Kaelyn: 26:58 Your favorite, your favorite non alcoholic beverage.
Rekka: 27:01 Yeah.
Kaelyn: 27:01 Because doing this drunk is a bad idea, not going to come out great.
Rekka: 27:05 Yeah. There will be tears or um, yeah, I don't even know.
Kaelyn: 27:09 This is the, this is, I mean this is the, uh, can't even do English good part of the process because then come the copy edits. This is an entirely different person than your editor, generally. The copy editor is the definitive, they are the ones that say no, this is where the comment actually goes. Authors present, company included, have a tendancy
Rekka: 27:37 No, you shush! Commas are a spice.
Kaelyn: 27:42 Commas, commas are not voice.
Rekka: 27:48 [laughter]
Kaelyn: 27:48 They are ...
Rekka: 27:48 I'm sure I spit water for my nose, but I'm,
Kaelyn: 27:52 I swear to God, I'm going to make mugs that every Parvus author, all new authors we sign gets, that says: "Commas are not voice". I understand. It's hard. It's like, no, I want them to see that this is the end of the thought and
Rekka: 28:06 Okay, William Shatner, um,
Kaelyn: 28:11 [laugher] But your copy editor is the one who's going to go through, they're going to, you know, check your grammar, your punctuation. They are also the one who is going to deal with your style guide. So they're going to say, okay, if it's a dash, it's space dash space or there's no space or there's just a space before and they're going to go through and uniformly format all of that stuff. At some point we will absolutely have a copy editor on the show because they're.
Rekka: 28:42 They're special people.
Kaelyn: 28:43 They are, no, I mean they are like, it's, I can't do it. Like I won't even try. I mean there are some times, but like I will copy edit, do a rough copy edit of something real quick, that's like a sample chapter because we just got to get it out the door and it's not ...
Rekka: 29:01 If you look at a final copy edit,
Kaelyn: 29:03 Yeah, and then I'm like, Oh God, I'm stupid. Wow. [laughter]
Rekka: 29:07 I don't know how to comma either.
Kaelyn: 29:10 Um, so you know, that's that. A good copy editor by the way will also go through and, you know, maybe say like, 'Hey, this sentence was a little confusing to me or maybe separate this into two paragraphs. Um, copy editors are special people who deserve all of the hugs and cookies in the world.
Rekka: 29:28 Wait, what happens to the hugs and cookies that were from my Beta readers?
Kaelyn: 29:31 They, they hang out with the copy editors.
Rekka: 29:33 It's like they just picked the crumbs off the floor.
Kaelyn: 29:37 Okay, fine. The Beta readers get,
Rekka: 29:39 Copy editors get bacon.
Kaelyn: 29:41 There we go.
Rekka: 29:41 There we go.
Kaelyn: 29:41 I mean everyone knows copy editors love Bacon. So then after that,
Rekka: 29:47 Can I just, can I just make a comment?
Kaelyn: 29:49 Of course.
Rekka: 29:49 If your book reaches copy editing, Yay.
Kaelyn: 29:52 Yay!
Rekka: 29:53 Cause you're done with the line edits, you're done with the revisions. Because what I was going to say is you're done.
Kaelyn: 30:01 Um, copyedit is like that's, I won't say it's carved in stone.
Rekka: 30:07 But that book is on its way out the door.
Kaelyn: 30:08 But it's heavily etched into clay. If you need to, you can go back and fix something, but we really don't want to do that.
Rekka: 30:18 Yeah, minimal touching after.
Kaelyn: 30:21 Yeah, exactly. You know there's definitely like there've been times when we've, you know, had to do that and then it's um. For those of you listening at home Rekka is vehemently trying to avoid eye contact with me.
Rekka: 30:34 There might have been some last minute issues.
Kaelyn: 30:36 And look, it happens and you know, but like copy editing, you are functionally done the book at that point. In the meantime cause you're probably going, okay well I've got all this stuff going on. What's this publisher doing that's supposed to be so great and special? Rekka?
Rekka: 30:55 What is the publisher doing Kaelyn?
Kaelyn: 30:59 You looked like, you looked like you had a thought.
Rekka: 30:59 I was going to say that between getting these revisions back, you've got stretches of time where you're sitting and you probably pacing if you're not sitting.
Kaelyn: 31:14 Um, Rekka is about to go into a whole thing.
Rekka: 31:16 Yes in the meantime.
Kaelyn: 31:18 So we're going to do,
Rekka: 31:19 Meanwhile,
Kaelyn: 31:21 What the authors in the meantime should be, and then we're going to jump back to what publisher is doing. Because you're right, there are long stretches of time where you're just sitting there waiting to get things back.
Rekka: 31:32 Yes.
Kaelyn: 31:32 So what are you doing in the meantime?
Rekka: 31:34 Well, aside from stressing that things are not actually being looked at.
Kaelyn: 31:39 You're sitting there going, oh my God, they hate it. They're, they're figuring out how to cancel my agreement right now.
Rekka: 31:43 Yes.
Kaelyn: 31:44 This is.
Rekka: 31:45 Yeah, there's that. Or there's like, do they, are they working on me? Are they working on the book that comes out next week?
Kaelyn: 31:52 Um, if we're still working on the book that comes out next weel ...
Rekka: 31:55 Yeah, I know. I know. I know, but you know what I'm saying? I'm like, I know that your calendar has more than my book. Is my book on the front of the table or is someone else's book on the front of the table? And I, if I ask am I going to find out, no, they haven't looked at it and I don't want to know that. So I'm not asking, so I'm just over here panicking. So while you're panicking, uh, try to distract yourself by handling the things that you can take care of at this point.
Kaelyn: 32:20 Yeah, because there's a lot you could be doing to help yourself and help you career and your book.
Rekka: 32:24 When your book launches, you don't want that to be the first day you go, Huh. So should I do like a website or something? [laughter]
Kaelyn: 32:31 So, like people are asking me like, how did I get in touch with me? I guess they should have Twitter.
Rekka: 32:36 Yeah. Maybe a twitter or I don't know. Um, what are readers even? You know, like be on, be public.
Kaelyn: 32:46 I mean, what is a book?
Rekka: 32:49 Well that's, that's another episode, that's a five episode series on what is a book.
Kaelyn: 32:55 The metaphysical. But there will be alcohol involved. There will be crying.
Rekka: 32:59 I'm looking forward to that one. But so, so there are things, you know, your social media platform, you don't have to do every social media venue out there, but pick the ones that you feel comfortable expressing yourself as your, your public persona. If you are using a pen name to hide your identity, now's a good time to start dusting the tracks and making sure that you've sealed those, those ridges tight and everything like that.
Kaelyn: 33:25 Yeah, by the way, now's a good time to start establishing your pen name.
Rekka: 33:28 Right. So you don't want on your book launch day for someone to come looking for you on Twitter and see that you have exactly one tweet, which is please buy my book.
Kaelyn: 33:38 I mean, that's a good tweet.
Rekka: 33:39 It's a good tweet.
Kaelyn: 33:40 It could be multiple of that.
Rekka: 33:40 The publisher likes that can be your pinned tweet, but by then, you know, you can start talking about how excited you are. Um, if your cover reveal has just gone out from your publisher, do not, do not preempt the cover reveal that your publisher has scheduled to do, not do that.
Kaelyn: 33:58 They're going to be nice and show it to you beforehand. But you know, that's, that's under the hat.
Rekka: 34:02 Um find other authors in your genre, um, the, the people who wrote the books, which are your books, comps you, you know, like follow them. Um, don't go like stalking their followers and, and, and attacking people in saying like, please come follow me, you, or anything like, you know, don't be, don't make it weird.
Kaelyn: 34:20 Don't have to be weird about it.
Rekka: 34:21 But, you know, start to build a following, start to follow other people, start to interact with conversations that are not personal conversations and start to tweet about your book, about the process, about your emotions as an author because you want to be a real person when someone comes looking at your Twitter profiles.
Kaelyn: 34:40 So, um, but also there's other people that you may meet in your life.
Rekka: 34:45 Yeah. So I was getting to that, but okay. So I was using Twitter for example. But you don't have to use Twitter. If you are more comfortable on Facebook for some unknown reason, my opinion slightly interjected there or,
Kaelyn: 34:57 No, I mean great because then all your data's going to be given out to a lot of people. So it's actually really good publicity.
Rekka: 35:04 Is that what that is? Didn't feel like really great publicity.
Kaelyn: 35:07 That's not how that works?
Rekka: 35:08 There's Instagram, there is tumbler, there is um, it depends on what your, where your audiences and if you read in the genre that you write in, you probably already know where that audience is.
Kaelyn: 35:18 Yeah, of course.
Rekka: 35:18 You might already be there. So pick your um, your social media profiles and I think it's a good idea, before, I know Kaelyn was trying to lead the witness, but um, before you start attending industry events, if you already have a Twitter handle, you are going to meet people and you are going to become mutuals at these events, if you, if you hit it off, so have a profile that doesn't make you look like a ghost. This is a good thing. So, so get this kind of stuff. Have your website, your website doesn't have to be perfect. It doesn't have to be just a word press website
Kaelyn: 35:52 I mean, you can,
Rekka: 35:52 With a little bit of information about you.
Kaelyn: 35:55 Square Space.
Rekka: 35:55 Yeah, there's a lot of stuff I need to say it,
Kaelyn: 35:58 But create like a very basic, you know, here's a little about me. Here's my book. Here's some links to where you can buy it.
Rekka: 36:03 Yup. Just a clean layout, mobile friendly. And because someone looks you up while you're there, standing in front of you or standing in line to talk to you some like a panel or something. So, but making it, give yourself the online presence that you want while you have control over it.
Kaelyn: 36:17 Yes
Rekka: 36:17 And then, um, and that's a good project to keep you occupied while your publisher is doing whatever the next step is before they need your input again. And then do look around for industry events. Um, ones that have more reader attendance are going to be the ones that you want to focus on more when you already have a book.
Kaelyn: 36:37 Yeah.
Rekka: 36:38 Because a reader can't do anything with your, with the knowledge that we have a contract,
Kaelyn: 36:42 With who you are.
Rekka: 36:42 You know, so, um, go make friends with other writers. And this is so precious to have other writer friends because one of these people understand what you're going through every step of the way they have been there.
Kaelyn: 36:51 It's a support group.
Rekka: 36:52 It's a hive mind and it's also like a herd immunity sort of situation.
Kaelyn: 36:57 Oh my God, I love that. Yeah.
Rekka: 36:58 Yes, that's exactly, that's exactly what it is. And it's a group of people who know what you're going through and sometimes they can pull you aside when you were having a breakdown and they pet you gently,
Kaelyn: 37:07 Deep breaths, deep breaths.
Rekka: 37:07 And they serve you, your, your bacon and your cookies and your hugs and
Kaelyn: 37:10 Tea, tea is important.
Rekka: 37:12 Okay, fine. Some people drink coffee, Kaelyn
Kaelyn: 37:17 Coffee, whatever, whatever hot beverage distilled from plant life ...
Rekka: 37:18 Your cozy beverage of choice. Yes. Hey, sometimes it's beef broth, sometimes beef broth, this is what I need.
Kaelyn: 37:26 It's distilled from a living thing. Cozy beverage of choice
Rekka: 37:28 Cozy beverage of choice, that's the term. So we, um, you know, we as authors, write in this desolate loneliness, like even if you're surrounded by other people, if you're getting the work done, chances are you're silent and you're staring at a screen and you are insular inside your mind. So that's really ...
Kaelyn: 37:45 It's very isolating.
Rekka: 37:47 It's really refreshing to go somewhere where you see that other people are doing this too, that you are not alone in feeling this way. And when you walk into that room and you go, oh my God, I don't belong here, every single person in that room is feeling the same way.
Kaelyn: 38:02 But further, you're wrong.
Rekka: 38:04 Also, everyone in that room is wrong and they will tell each other that, authors who are friends with other authors are like the most beautiful people.
Kaelyn: 38:12 No, it's great.
Rekka: 38:13 And yeah, so, so go make some friends at conferences. Um, it's a whole other thing that we're not going to dive into on this, like how to network at conferences.
Kaelyn: 38:23 We're going to talk about it at some point.
Rekka: 38:24 And we will talk about that. Um, you're not there to sell your book. You've already sold your book. You're not there to, um, to chase agents into bathrooms.
Kaelyn: 38:36 Don't do that, ever.
Rekka: 38:37 So please don't, um, or anyone don't chase anyone into a bathroom.
Kaelyn: 38:42 That's actually, that's a good point.
Rekka: 38:42 Unless they say, please follow me into this bathroom, I need your help with my t shirt tag or something. Anyway. Um, yes, you're going there to be a real genuine, um, trustworthy person. So that's how you behave when you were there. And then we'll go into that in another episode, about
Kaelyn: 38:58 Maybe when we're at the Nebulas? That would be a great, live from the Nebulas.
Rekka: 39:01 And I do have an article on SFWA blog about it. I believe it is called 'A Quantum Residents at the Nebulas'.
Kaelyn: 39:11 That's fantastic. Yeah. So go check that out.
Rekka: 39:13 So I'll link to that in the show notes, but it is, it gives you an idea of what it's like to be among other people who are more creative in a similar way as you.
Kaelyn: 39:21 Yeah. Again, yeah, I think that's a great idea. We'll do that at the, Nebulas so another episode to look forward to.
Rekka: 39:26 Yes.
Kaelyn: 39:29 Umm, maybe we'll grab a few people and to have a conversation that'll, that'll be fun. So that's what you as an author can be doing. In the meantime, what your publisher is doing is all sorts of background stuff that you will, you get checkins and updates about. But really what they're going to be most concerned about is you writing and finishing the book. So, but in what's going on in the background is your publisher is dealing with marketing, they're figuring out, um, you know, how to market this book, who to market it to what the key demographics are. Um, and then a bunch of things are going to come from that. A big one is cover art. You know, that is, that is a huge important thing. I have sad news for all of you authors who just were sketching, you know, your dreams of what the book's going to look like. You don't get a say really. Um, you know, of course you'll get a look at it. You'll get, you know, some progress and updates. But at the end of the day, your publisher is the one that does your cover art. Because for a lot of reasons, but one of the big ones is they know what they're doing.
Rekka: 40:39 Right. And it's a piece of marketing. It's not just the duvé on your bed.
Kaelyn: 40:43 Yeah. And I'd say like, actually that was something that even me, it took a little while for me to get over where like I'm seeing cover art from books I've worked on and I'm like, well that's not quite right. And I'm going, I'm getting Kaelyn, that's not the important part. The important part is this looks awesome and you want to pick it up.
Rekka: 41:01 Um, that's a really tough hurdle to get yourself over mentally.
Kaelyn: 41:05 Oh, it's very, that is, you know what I have to say that is one of the things I found that authors really have the most trouble with because again, it goes back to the personal, this is very personal. And also I think, cause I know I do it when I'm reading submissions and when I'm getting excited about something, I'm picturing what the cover is going to look like in my head.
Rekka: 41:23 Yeah. So you know, the author's doing that.
Kaelyn: 41:25 The author's absolutely doing it and um,
Rekka: 41:27 And they've been working on it longer. So they, they've been dedicating their hearts to some vision that is not coming to happen.
Kaelyn: 41:35 Now, I mean, I will say, you know, we, when we do these, most of the times the response I get back is, oh my God, that's gorgeous. I never would have even conceived of that stuff. You know, trust me, the publisher is not going to screw you over on cover art because they want it to also be gorgeous and represent the book.
Rekka: 41:52 But more importantly, they want it to sell the book.
Kaelyn: 41:54 Yes, so this is big part of the marketing. Um, but in the meantime, they're also, you know, reaching out to industry contacts and their contacts, blogs, uh, publication magazines. Anybody who has a lot of attention that does reviews, they're going to be getting ARCs, advanced reader copies out to everyone, you know, to take a look at and hopefully getting, generating some buzz, getting some good feedback. You know, there's all kinds of social media now that's just based around reading and what you reading and everything. So you know, they're going to be putting these things out on to anyone who review books and like, you know, getting blurbs for the book. Um, in the meantime they're also writing back copy. Writing back copy is really hard.
Rekka: 42:39 It's a whole other thing. As much as you dread writing your query letter.
Kaelyn: 42:43 Oh God, yeah, that's the editors version of the query letter is like writing, so I do understand your pain a little bit because I have to do back copy for the books I work on a lot.
Rekka: 42:51 And, and you print how many copies of that book?
Kaelyn: 42:56 More people are going to see my back copy then your your letter. So yeah. And then they're doing publicity. They're getting everything psyched up for the, for the prelaunch. And really the biggest thing is trying to generate buzz and trying to get preorders because that is what is going to help make your book successful. So that's what's going on in the meantime. So after copy edits, everything's done, it goes to layout. Layout is going to do what layout does. They're going to get the book already formatted to publish. They're going to add any art or um, it's a big letters at the
Rekka: 43:31 Drop caps,
Kaelyn: 43:31 Drop caps. Those, I should know that, um, you know, they're going to take care of all of that to get the lay out going and then you're book's pretty much ready to go. There are a bunch of other steps that lead up to the release of the book that also have to do with marketing. You know, they might ask you to, uh, write a blog post for this website. You did that right?
Rekka: 43:55 I wrote quite a lot of them.
Kaelyn: 43:56 Yeah.
Rekka: 43:57 And let me tell you, just like switching your mindset from writing a book to a query letter, writing a nonfiction blog posts like a worst, I, it feels like writing an essay for a teacher all over again.
Kaelyn: 44:07 So wait, I don't put aliens in this one?
Rekka: 44:10 Well, I mean, I did.
Kaelyn: 44:11 Okay.
Rekka: 44:12 So, but I mean, so a lot of these are nonfiction articles about like your writing process or anything you discovered about yourself or are relating the aliens to some tidbit about your process or something like that.
Kaelyn: 44:29 This is, this is where we're trying to humanize the authors. And I don't need that in the like make them seem like people
Rekka: 44:37 We're totally normal, who said we aren't?
Kaelyn: 44:39 But make it so, people like to connect on that level and see the process. And it's great because it gives you a little insight into how everyone's working and what they're doing.
Rekka: 44:51 And when the author can like express that they are passionate about their book,
Kaelyn: 44:54 Exactly.
Rekka: 44:54 Then other people are interested in that and being and reading it and also being passionate about the same book.
Kaelyn: 45:00 Um, you know, there may be, depending on the scale and the release of the book, maybe you'd be asked to do interviews beforehand, uh they might, you know, then there's a whole bunch of other stuff that happened after release. But your publisher is in the meantime just getting everything ready. They're dealing with preorders. If your book is being released to be sold in bookstores, through a distributor, they are dealing with that. That is, that is a whole long process. Um, they're, uh, getting everything set up for ebooks and ebook preorders and just getting everything ready so that when it's launch day, it's ready to go. Social media posts, reviews and magazines and other publications.
Rekka: 45:45 And timing them to like keep the traffic coming for a few days.
Kaelyn: 45:49 They're definitely thinking, what's the best way we can get the most attention on this book for the longest amount of time. And again, if you have an agent, there'll be involved in helping with that as well. Um, so then it's your book, Birthday. Your Book Day.
Rekka: 46:05 Yes. And that was a weird day.
Kaelyn: 46:09 Yeah.
Rekka: 46:09 Because there's not actually a lot going on.
Kaelyn: 46:12 Yeah, you kind of, wa- wake up and feel like the world should be a little different.
Rekka: 46:16 This is, I call it the, um, the birthday Princess Syndrome.
Kaelyn: 46:20 Yeah.
Rekka: 46:20 Like I always, I always looked at movies and TV shows and saw that like on somebody's birthday, they were center of attention and they wore fabulous clothing. And on my book birthday, I got up and I went to work.
Kaelyn: 46:36 Yup.
Rekka: 46:36 And I sat there and I reloaded and social media all day. It was incredibly, it was like the least focused day I'd experienced in months. It was kind of horrible.
Kaelyn: 46:47 Books are released on Tuesdays,
Rekka: 46:51 Yeah.
Kaelyn: 46:51 And so for most people it's
Rekka: 46:53 It's your day job.
Kaelyn: 46:54 A regular Tuesday
Rekka: 46:55 And you somehow try to make it through your regular Tuesday. But all you can think about is your book is out and you're waiting for someone to text you like Amazon rankings or or something. You're waiting for someone to tag you on Twitter or Instagram and not happening. And it's already 7:00 AM. How come nobody is celebrating?
Kaelyn: 47:14 Why has no one been waiting outside Barnes and noble to buy this?
Rekka: 47:17 Why didn't someone bring me flowers at the office? And that's sort of the thing is like every birthday that I had, this expectation that I would be the center of attention, I would end up in tears. And it's very easy to have that same expectation and results on the day that your book comes out. Like you're a published author and the worst thing is going to work. And having some, the coworker say, Oh, I guess you're quitting your day job now. It's like, well thanks.
Kaelyn: 47:41 I am not.
Rekka: 47:42 Um, so you're angry with me for writing a book. You have a complete misconception of how this goes and you're probably not even gonna read the thing, [laughter].
Kaelyn: 47:52 So, that is kind of, you know, that's where we are, it ends with you being the most happy you've ever been, but also really sad.
Rekka: 47:59 Also welcome to publishing.
Kaelyn: 48:02 This is publishing.
Rekka: 48:02 And they will, and you will be asked so many times that day. How do you feel? So you might want to write that blog post ahead of time too because they don't want to know the truth.
Kaelyn: 48:12 Um, so that's kind of a, you know, that's the rough process. Um, like we said, glossed over, you know, a lot of stuff. Just really quickly hitting it because we're going to talk about all of this in more detail down the line. This was sort of a long introductory into this is what this podcast is. I mean, we're not going to do in an order.
Rekka: 48:33 No.
Kaelyn: 48:34 We're going to jump around a little bit.
Rekka: 48:35 Because we're going to miss something and then if we do it in order, then we can't go back. So it's just going to be filling in.
Kaelyn: 48:39 Also it's more fun to kind of, you know,
Rekka: 48:41 Like what are we really talking about?
Kaelyn: 48:43 Yeah like, I've got something to say about this.
Rekka: 48:45 Big mood.
Kaelyn: 48:46 Yes, yes, exactly. Um, so that's, that's kind of where we're going to leave you for this episode. Um, you know, we hope this was at least maybe a little informative.
Rekka: 48:57 And once again, like if you heard a step in this process where you're like, I didn't know about that.
Kaelyn: 49:01 Or I'd like to hear more about that.
Rekka: 49:03 Definitely that. Or, um, if you are feeling more confident as a result because you didn't know all this stuff, like, you know, good for you. But I mean, like we want to hear from you what's useful, what's informative, what's startling and a little bit terrifying. At WMB cast on Twitter or Instagram feedback at Wmbcast.com definitely reach out. And of course, if you're a patron on patrion.com forward slash WMB cast, you can interact with us there and we'll probably take questions for future episodes.
Kaelyn: 49:33 Oh definitely, yeah.
Rekka: 49:33 You have some level patrons later on, um, once we start building up a community there, obviously today's day one. So, yeah, or we don't have great expectations for today cause you know, we try to be realistic about our launch days but um.
Kaelyn: 49:47 No, it's, I mean we, you know, we keep saying this but we really just want to hammer it home, so much of where this came from was wanting to be a resource and build a community that's active and that we can engage wit.
Rekka: 50:01 And have these conversations.
Kaelyn: 50:03 Exactly how these conversations about what don't you know, what scares you, what you know, what is holding you back from trying to do this? What part are you stuck on?
Rekka: 50:13 What have you heard conflicting information on?
Kaelyn: 50:16 Yeah. And look, here's the thing, you're not going to insult either of us with any questions, you know, Rekka's a writer I work in publishing. I know that, I - I've made peace with that a lot of people that are going to listen to this are going to be on the writing side of things. And you know what, that's great. That's what I'm hoping for. So, you know, I'm not going to be insulted by anything that you know, comes our way. Don't be rude, obviously.
Rekka: 50:40 But let's be decent.
Kaelyn: 50:41 Yeah. But, um, yeah, you know, if you're like, if you have a question like, well how come I need a publisher for this? I love it to answer that.
Rekka: 50:51 Right.
Kaelyn: 50:51 And, another a qualification. You know, if you're interested in self publishing, this still also could be helpful for you.
Rekka: 50:56 And I have a self published title, I have future plans for self published titles.
Kaelyn: 51:00 Yes.
Rekka: 51:00 This is like this is a safe space for every path through the book creation process.
Kaelyn: 51:06 Yeah. That's why it's called We Make Books because we all make books in different ways, different capacities and at different points in the process. But everyone is involved making books. So we really want to hear from everyone is, is what we're getting at here.
Rekka: 51:23 Please reach out to us.
Kaelyn: 51:24 Yeah. Um, uh, Rekka and my Twitter's are both linked in the uh,
Rekka: 51:30 On the front page of Patreon, it's on the bio of both Instagram and Twitter. So you can find us.
Kaelyn: 51:35 Yeah, and you know, you can and you know, go through the podcast thing, but you know, you can also reach out to us directly,
Rekka: 51:40 If you have comments specifically or a question specifically for one of us.
Kaelyn: 51:44 We're out there.
Rekka: 51:45 Yes,
Kaelyn: 51:46 And we can't wait to hear from you.
Rekka: 51:47 And so we will talk to you again in the next episode and that will be, if you are listening to this on launch day coming up very, very shortly,
Kaelyn: 51:54 Yeah, like queued up, hopefully next.
Rekka: 51:57 Immediately next.
Kaelyn: 51:57 So stop, listening to this and go enjoy the next one.
Rekka: 52:00 Skip ahead.
Kaelyn: 52:01 Thanks everyone.
Tuesday May 14, 2019
Episode 2: I Finished My Draft! Now What?! (Part 1 of 2)
Tuesday May 14, 2019
Tuesday May 14, 2019
Hi everyone, and thank you for listening to the launch episodes of the We Make Books Podcast - A podcast about writing, publishing, and everything in between!
We Make Books is hosted by Rekka Jay and Kaelyn Considine; Rekka is a published author and Kaelyn is an editor and together they are going to take you through what goes into getting a book out of your head, on to paper, in to the hands of a publisher, and finally on to book store shelves.
In this episode, Rekka and Kaelyn continue their discussion on the production process of a book, picking up from when your book gets picked up by a publisher!
We Make Books is a podcast for writer and publishers, by writers and publishers, and we want to hear from our listeners! Hit us up on our social media, linked below, and send us your questions, comments, concerns, and any theories you may have about how much Godzilla a Godzilla Would Godzilla if a Godzilla Could Godzilla Ghidorah!
Thank you for taking the time to listen to this introduction, the first batch of new episodes drops on May 14th, so be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss it.
A transcription of this episode can be found below.
We hope you enjoy We Make Books!
Twitter: @WMBCast | @KindofKaelyn | @BittyBittyZap
=== Transcript ===
Rekka: 00:00 Welcome to the We Make Books podcast. I'm Rekka Jay
Kaelyn: 00:03 I'm Kaelyn Considine
Kaelyn: 00:04 and I am a science fiction author
Kaelyn: 00:06 and I am a science fiction and fantasy publisher and editor. This is the first official episode of our podcast. We previously recorded an introductory episode, which if you haven't listened to already, we highly recommend you go back and listen to,
Rekka: 00:20 that's like our mission statement and what we hope to achieve with this podcast and the format that it's going to take. So, um, since we're still early on and it's not too much to go back and binge everything since this is episode one, um, we invite you to go back and just and listen to that episode and that will really tell you what we are getting into. But of course by listening to this episode, you also get a taste for that. But this one's not quite going to be our normal format.
Kaelyn: 00:42 No, this is going, we're a little bit of a departure from what will be our normal format. Uh, we'll tell you a little bit more about it, the start of the show. Um, this intro is a little longer because we just, you know, have a couple of things we want to say, but in this episode we're going to be taking you through some broad steps of the publishing process and we just wanted to start this with the disclaimer that we know these are broad steps. We know we're oversimplifying, glossing over things, not giving every single detail. And that's the point because we just want to give you an idea of here's all the things that are happening and these things are what we're going to be talking about more specifically as the podcast continues on.
Rekka: 01:19 Right. Kaelyn was inspired to the idea for this podcast by somebody saying, "I don't even know what I would do with my finished draft." So this is going to be a very, uh, it's like a two-part mini series that we're starting off the whole podcast with of like, here are all the steps that are coming your way and we hope that you're going to say, oh, I didn't know about that.
Kaelyn: 01:41 Yes
Rekka: 01:41 Or like, okay, okay, okay, this is, this is good. I'm feeling good about this. You know, like, and then
Kaelyn: 01:46 Bam.
Rekka: 01:47 Bam.
Kaelyn: 01:47 I've never heard that word before. What is that?
Kaelyn: 01:49 Yeah, what is that, so definitely if you are confused by anything, make a note of it and tweet us @wmbcast on twitter or email feedback@wmbcast.com and let us know that like that is something that you have never heard before or something that you've always been confused about and we can definitely add that to our slate of things that we're going to take a deeper dive into, which will be the normal format. But here we are just kind of getting your feet wet, kind of giving you a taste for everything that's on its way for your story and for your process ahead of you. So, um, again, this is a longer intro than usual, but we wanted to, we wanted to preface that this isn't going to be the speed at which we normally cover the entire process
Kaelyn: 02:31 and by the way, for a really long introduction, go back and listen to the, again, go back and listen to the introductory episode because we talk a lot more about what we're hoping to accomplish here, what, how we want this podcast to be a resource and helpful to people in the writing and publishing industry. It's also pretty funny. We tell some interesting stories about how
Rekka: 02:52 we've got anecdotes and anecdotes.
Kaelyn: 02:54 We got stories about how we got here. They involve alcohol, drunk lists, and a lot of texting. [laughter] So, you know, go take a listen. Um, you know, get to know us a little bit. We're, we're really hoping to get to know a bunch of you as we continue on with this. So, um, without further ado, let's get into the episode.
Piano: 03:20 [Music]
Kaelyn: 03:20 Microphones are, you know, like, they only work if you talk into them.
Rekka: 03:22 What!
Kaelyn: 03:23 I know. It's fine. Eventually we'll all have chips in our head that take care of that for us.
Rekka: 03:29 Yeah. It was just like, okay, "Life: Rewind back the last 25 minutes and publish that as my podcast."
Kaelyn: 03:34 Oh, goodness. All right. Anyway. Hello everyone.
Kaelyn: 03:37 We do publish science fiction, right?
Kaelyn: 03:38 We do. Hello everyone, and welcome to The We Make Books podcast. I am one of your hosts, Kaelyn Considine
Rekka: 03:44 and I'm Rekka and I'm wondering why Kaelyn is doing the intro intro instead of just the episode intro.
Kaelyn: 03:49 Oh, I don't know.
Rekka: 03:50 [laughter] Just professional all the way down.
Kaelyn: 03:54 I just want to, you know, in case they forgot in the last 20 seconds or we went on a long tangent–
Rekka: 03:58 that music was really good. And they're just like bopping along, and like, wait, where am I?
Kaelyn: 04:03 So this is the, you know, as we said in the intro, the first official episode of the podcast, and hopefully you listened to our introductory episode. If you didn't, I would recommend going back and listening to that just to kind of get a feel for what you're about to commit your time to.
Rekka: 04:17 Also, we really like the sound of our voices, so we'd like you to have as much of it as possible.
Kaelyn: 04:21 I do not like the sound of my voice.
Kaelyn: 04:24 [laughter]
Rekka: 04:24 [laughter]
Kaelyn: 04:24 We talked about this in the intro episode actually. So this is, this is a big give for me. Um, so we thought, you know, we're, we're releasing a few episodes all at once for when we get started here. So we thought what we'd do for the first two episodes, we're going to cover a very rough, very light go-through of the process of taking your book from mostly completed book through the submissions, through the editing, to the published and sitting on a shelf somewhere for people to buy
Rekka: 04:55 Over two episodes, though.
Kaelyn: 04:56 Over two episodes. Yes. We're going to do very high level, the first episode which you're listening to now, we're calling Draft to Acquisition. Then we're going to go Acquisition to Bookshelf. So for our purposes going forward here we are assuming that you are either done or approaching done. This book will be completed at some point. Eventually we're excited to talk about, you know, getting to the finished point
Rekka: 05:24 Yeah getting from the middle point or the beginning point or that moment when you start to say, wait, what am I even doing? And that's a mindset thing. We not talking about mindset today.
Kaelyn: 05:31 Yeah.
Rekka: 05:32 We'll touch on like attitude later, but we're not talking about mindset.
Kaelyn: 05:35 Yeah. That's for another discussion. And you're going to hear us say that a lot.
Rekka: 05:39 Yeah. Um, but today we're trying to run down the first stage, which is a finished draft to acquisition.
Kaelyn: 05:47 Yes.
Rekka: 05:47 Um, which is sort of funny because the first thing we're going to tell you to do is put your book down and walk away from it.
Kaelyn: 05:55 [laughter] Yeah ....
Rekka: 05:55 That's the hardest stage.
Kaelyn: 05:55 It's, yeah. You've just spent so much time and energy and effort and life force.
Rekka: 06:02 That is true.
Kaelyn: 06:04 On creating this thing. So here's the deal. Don't look at it for a while. Do something you know. And I'm not saying like completely erase it from your memory.
Rekka: 06:13 Don't, don't not tell people that you finished it. Like go out, have dinner, celebrate it.
Kaelyn: 06:18 Go see a movie
Rekka: 06:20 consume another book. Like you've probably not had much time for reading lately because you've been working so hard in yours. go read something,
Kaelyn: 06:27 play a video game, shift your mental focus off of the book.
Rekka: 06:30 Get to the point where you forget exactly what order everything happens in.
Kaelyn: 06:34 Yes, yes, definitely. Because, and here's why we're saying to do that: because you have probably spent so much time on this, it is so in your head, you're sleeping and breathing this, you are possibly missing things and putting it down and walking away from it for a bit is a good way to then come back with a semi fresh set of eyes. It's your book. You're never going to come back to it with a complete set of fresh eyes.
Rekka: 06:59 Right.
Kaelyn: 07:00 But putting it down, not thinking about it as much and then coming back and doing another path is so helpful and it's such an underrated piece of advice.
Rekka: 07:09 I really pound that drum, so I don't know if...
Kaelyn: 07:12 I do too. And that's the thing.
Rekka: 07:14 I don't know if it's an underrated piece of advice because, let me tell you, it's the first thing I tell people.
Kaelyn: 07:17 I mean even with like authors that you know, like I'm working with at Parvus, like if they're stuck on something and they're like, I don't know what to do. And I literally tell them, I want you to go do something else for a week and not think about this.
Rekka: 07:28 Take a draft vacation.
Kaelyn: 07:29 Yeah. So, so anyway, that's, that's the person, my art, both of our recommended first step
Rekka: 07:36 and then you come back like a week or two later, um, longer if you, if you're not in a rush
Kaelyn: 07:41 If you have the time, you know, depending on deadlines
Rekka: 07:43 this in something that you're doing for a deadline, you, you have some time, maybe come back after a month and just load it onto your kindle so that it's not something you can easily edit, and read it as a reader would consume it. So that means you don't like how that sentence is written? Too bad. Keep going. Yeah. Like you're not making an editing pass. You are experiencing your book as best you can as a new reader.
Kaelyn: 08:06 And do I like my own book? And you know, that's, it's very important to do
Rekka: 08:11 and make notice of spots where you're getting a little bored. Like maybe it's hard to press through a chapter and you just keep like wandering away cause your reader will too.
Kaelyn: 08:19 If you're getting bored, someone that's reading it, there's a very good chance they're also,
Rekka: 08:23 Yeah, cause you're slightly more invested in this than other people.
Kaelyn: 08:26 Yeah. So once you've done that next recommended step, get someone else to read your book now. I say anyone, but really it should be, it should be someone that this is a book they'd be interested in because if it's like pulling teeth, they're just going to be like, I don't know. I guess I liked the talking space aliens.
Rekka: 08:42 It's like, well that was really interesting. That's maybe not helpful feedback.
Kaelyn: 08:46 That's not helpful feedback but getting some feedback and like this is sort of the pre acquisition Beta read or a stage where you want people to go, you know what? I was confused about this one thing or I wasn't sure what was happening here.
Rekka: 09:01 It didn't feel like this question that was raised early on got paid off.
Kaelyn: 09:04 I don't understand this character or why there– and somebody that is interested in this is the one who's going to give you the best feedback there. Now, maybe you don't know anyone and there's all sorts of communities of people that,
Rekka: 09:16 Yeah, I mean online you can, you can connect with people if you do it in a natural way, like don't show up and drop your manuscript on the desk and be like read it,
Kaelyn: 09:23 Read it!
Rekka: 09:24 Read it, everybody. Try to build up a community of online friends or real life friends or book club friends
Kaelyn: 09:29 There are so many writing groups out there.
Rekka: 09:31 I mean,
Kaelyn: 09:31 And they're great
Rekka: 09:32 If you need Beta readers, sometimes the best Beta readers are genre readers and they're not necessarily writers themselves, but they know what it feels like to read the right book in that genre because you know, you'll hear from many sources and probably us like in two seconds that every genre has its own set of expectations
Kaelyn: 09:50 Yes.
Rekka: 09:50 And promises that you're making the reader. And if you don't hit the beats that someone who picks up a space opera, for example, is expecting to read, they're going to feel like something's missing even if they can't put their finger on it. And at this stage, you know, you just finished it. If you can get an early reader to say like I just feel like something was missing at the end. You at least know that, okay, you're writing space opera, go study a space opera, go read another space opera. See what what identifying marks are happening throughout the story in general, broad terms, not like, you know, this character X goes and does this thing and says this to somebody. That's not the stuff that is going to feel like it's missing, but the, the hero at the mercy of the villain kind of moments.
Kaelyn: 10:32 The broad strokes. Yeah, it's, it's sort of intuitive, which is not always helpful in terms of identifying
Rekka: 10:37 and that's why sometimes your, uh, your readers can't tell you what they didn't like. They just knew that something was off. And it's frustrating.
Kaelyn: 10:43 I can't give you a definition, but I know it when I see it.
Rekka: 10:45 Yeah. Oh yeah. I know that phrase.
Kaelyn: 10:47 So the next step after this, and I'm going to kind of give my little thing and then we're going to kick it over to Rekka because she's actually got a lot of experience with this. Once your book, you've gotten some feedback, you've made some changes, you're happy with it,
Rekka: 11:02 and you have the kind of feedback that tells you how off the mark you are.
Kaelyn: 11:05 Yes, you've made some changes, you're happy with it. The next thing that you've got to think about, and I'm not, I cannot overstate this, it's a big decision to say, do I need to get a professional editor to work on this? Do I need to pay someone to come in and take a pass at this book? Now, I think a lot of people are hesitant to do that for a number of reasons, but one of the biggest ones is, "well, I think it's good. Is someone else going to come in and tell me to change everything?" The answer to that is a good editor should not do that.
Rekka: 11:41 Well.
Kaelyn: 11:41 Okay. Yeah. Let's backtrack here.
Rekka: 11:44 So you are really proud of every of every grain of sand that is in this story.
Kaelyn: 11:48 Yes. Every –
Rekka: 11:49 An editor's going to give you suggestions and some of the suggestions are going to be to change things.
Kaelyn: 11:56 Yes. So you went through this process.
Rekka: 11:58 I did.
Kaelyn: 11:59 When you, you know, you've gotten this book to a point where you're like, I am really happy with this story. Why do I need it? Someone else to look at it.
Rekka: 12:06 Well, because
Kaelyn: 12:07 Not you-you, you, the hypothetical writer
Rekka: 12:09 I, the hypothetical writer might consider an editor because one, there are a lot of writers out there right now.
Kaelyn: 12:20 Yes, yes, there are.
Rekka: 12:21 And if you are going to sell this book, whether to an agent or to a publisher or directly to the reader, you need to make this a very polished product as polished as you can on your own.
Kaelyn: 12:35 Rekka and I were actually talking about this before we started recording, even just 20 years ago, having a personal computer at home was not necessarily a standard, especially even 25 years ago. And the fact that we're so easily able to just open a word processor and write. It's great.
Rekka: 12:53 And we output the documents in the same format as the professionals, you know?
Kaelyn: 12:57 Yeah, exactly. But I mean, however, you know, let's take it back to 30, 35 years ago. Most people, if they had anything, it was a typewriter
Rekka: 13:06 and typewriter's were expensive
Kaelyn: 13:07 and typewriters were expensive, and typewriters were a pain in the ass.
Rekka: 13:10 Yeah.
Kaelyn: 13:11 Like so the fact that everyone can very easily sit down and write now means that there's a lot more writers out there and that's great. But it also means that you've got to really distinguish yourself. So back to why do I need an editor? Because they're going to give you an unbiased outside, fresh eye. Now unbiased is, this person has no skin in this game. Obviously they want you to succeed. If they don't want you to succeed, you should not be working with that person. But that's as far as their bias goes because they are there to help you get your book into the best shape it can possibly be in.
Rekka: 13:48 Right. And presumably they're editors because they enjoy this.
Kaelyn: 13:52 Yes. So Rekka, you had spent some time with a developmental editor.
Rekka: 13:56 I contracted an editing story coach. That was really the relationship. Um, so yeah, I had coaching, um, Skype sessions with an editor and he read my manuscript on first pass and then we had a conversation after he'd read it. But before we really like formed this longer term relationship because it did go on for a bit and we had a conversation and the first thing was not like here's what's wrong with your book or like, here's what I think you should change. It was what do you want to do now?
Kaelyn: 14:30 This is again, this is something we'll go into depth more later about you know, the relationship and how finding the right person to work with. But we are going to just do a few quick cautions here. If you're going to hire an editor, a coach to help you with this, have a very frank conversation upfront about what your expectations are, what you're looking for.
Rekka: 14:51 And that editor may or may not agree to read your manuscript before this.
Kaelyn: 14:54 Yes, some will offer a consultation periods for, you know, an hour of let's talk about this.
Rekka: 15:01 They might read your first 30 pages and then have a conversation because they're going to know a lot from there. Just like somebody who's reviewing submissions, would also.
Kaelyn: 15:07 Yes. Exactly and make sure that you guys are both in agreement about what you'll be getting back from that because the last thing you want to do is go through this whole process and then end up with something that's not useful.
Rekka: 15:18 Right. Like if you expect that you're not only going to get like some suggestions to improve the story but you're also going to get a copy edit pass. You should both have said to each other, "So this includes a copy edit pass. Yes. Okay, good."
Kaelyn: 15:31 Yeah. By the way, if you're getting a copy edit pass from this person, this is going to be a very longterm relationship.
Rekka: 15:36 Yes. Cause you are not ready for a copy edit yet.
Kaelyn: 15:38 Yeah. So you've done your work with your editor, You have the manuscript is in a place that you're happy with and now it's time. You're going to start submitting your manuscript and the first thing you need is a query letter.
Rekka: 15:54 And this is a whole other thing that you have to write now.
Kaelyn: 15:58 And this is another thing we are absolutely going to go into much greater detail about because
Rekka: 16:04 it's a totally different mindset writing this thing than it was to write your story
Kaelyn: 16:07 and this one page is so important.
Rekka: 16:09 It really is. It's your foot in the door or it's a door in your nose.
Kaelyn: 16:15 [laughter] Yes, exactly. Right now we're about to split into two different things that can happen. Ways to submit your either can submit to an open call that a publisher or publishing house is having, which means that anyone can submit, uh, you don't need representation to do that. The other end of it is querying an agent to get your manuscript published. There are a lot of similarities between these two processes, but functionally they're very different.
Rekka: 16:45 Well, functionally for the book, the book is going to go through certain steps.
Kaelyn: 16:49 Yes.
Rekka: 16:50 Um, from this point on whether you are accepted by the agent or whether you're accepted by the publisher, your book's probably going to go through another revision pass at least once.
Kaelyn: 16:59 Oh, definitely.
Rekka: 16:59 Um, but what you're doing now is you're aiming for publication, but if you go through the agent and you get an agent, you are no longer responsible for attempting to submit the book to the publisher. You are not guaranteed at this point, when you get an agent, that it will find a publisher,
Kaelyn: 17:18 Yes. We're going to, we're going to start with the open submission call because that one is a little more straightforward. There's fewer moving parts.
Rekka: 17:24 I actually want a backup just to touch.
Kaelyn: 17:26 Oh sure.
Rekka: 17:27 Because you have a story and your story probably follows some sort of conventions within a certain genre. Um, it probably has a certain style. It might be intended for a certain age group or audience and other, some other sense. This is a great set of metrics by which you can try and find an agent or a publisher who is a good fit for your story.
Kaelyn: 17:52 Yeah, that's a really good point.
Rekka: 17:53 Don't go barking up the wrong tree because you are just desperate to get it published.
Kaelyn: 17:57 Yeah, definitely. And that's one of the things we're going to talk about with both of these is please pay attention to the submissions guidelines.
Rekka: 18:03 It's not just the submissions guidelines, but it's their history and what they publish or who they represent.
Kaelyn: 18:07 Yes. If you have a publishing house they have an open call, please go read the submission guides.
Rekka: 18:13 I betcha there's a link on the submissions.
Kaelyn: 18:15 You know what? There probably is. [laughter]
Rekka: 18:17 Just go straight from the top right to the bottom and make sure you've done all the pieces that they're asking you to do when you send in the submission.
Kaelyn: 18:24 I bet there is even an email address at the end that you can contact if you have any questions.
Rekka: 18:29 I betcha there is.
Kaelyn: 18:31 So anyway, do all of that.
Rekka: 18:33 Yes. I'm assuming you want this book to get published. This is one of the simplest things that you can do to just get start you off on the right foot. If you don't do it is the simplest thing to get you booted right back out the door and you've lost your chance with this publisher, at least for the time being until they forget your name and they're not going to, by the way,
Kaelyn: 18:54 um...!
Rekka: 18:55 well they might forget your name, but like they might have a checklist and they show that this person was booted specifically on the fact that they did not follow this admissions guidelines.
Kaelyn: 19:03 Hey look, every, you know they, there is, there is forgiveness of course for authors,
Rekka: 19:07 there is a chance to learn again, but like if you make a habit of just sending the same style of submission to everyone, you are probably going to miss important things that are not so important to you, obviously, but are important to whoever you're submitting to.
Kaelyn: 19:23 But for each thing that you're submitting, be it to an agent or open call, you are preparing a submission. You're not blanketing the same thing everywhere, you know and saying carpet bombing every outlet with it.
Rekka: 19:34 Yup. You don't write your letter once and send it to everybody.
Kaelyn: 19:38 Yes. It's, I'm not saying you're rewriting the letter each time, but you need to make sure that what you're sending is appropriate and will catch the attention of who you're sending it to. So for an open call, maybe they just want a query letter and the first five chapters, maybe they want a query letter and the whole manuscript. Please have a query letter. They'll probably, you know, typically there should be some sort of a submissions portal for you to go to, to take care of this. And then, you know, you'll get a confirmation: We've received your manuscript, you will hear from us within x number of days. And if you do not, please feel free to follow up. And you can't see, but Rekka is smiling at me because this is something I talk about a lot. It's–
Rekka: 20:22 Yes, it's uh, it's near and dear to Kaelyn's heart: math.
Kaelyn: 20:26 Get a calendar out and count off 90 days because if you submit January 15th, 90 days is not March 15th, 90 days is April 15th. January, February, March. Yes, it's three months, but it's not 90 days. So, um, and that's one of those things that it's like just , guys pay attention, come on
Rekka: 20:50 And be concerned enough with not wasting anybody's time that you would actually take a moment to go, okay, has it actually been 90 days? It is so easy to search Google and say like "what is 90 days from January 15th" and Google will spit out an answer or a website that will spit out an answer. And it is– you don't even have to do the math yourself. The world has made it so easy to never math again.
Kaelyn: 21:14 Just, you know, just be aware of these things because I know they sound trivial, but you have to understand that especially when a publishing house has an open call
Rekka: 21:23 How many submissions do you suppose they get?
Kaelyn: 21:27 Hundreds.
Rekka: 21:28 These are all the people who've been afraid to query for an agent.
Kaelyn: 21:31 Yes. Or just have not been successful in doing so. So being as conscientious and
Rekka: 21:40 considerate.
Kaelyn: 21:41 Considerate as possible is extra points.
Rekka: 21:45 Yeah.
Kaelyn: 21:46 So then we have querying to agents.
Rekka: 21:49 Well, I mean this goes for both. You don't pay.
Kaelyn: 21:54 If anyone is asking you for money, do not submit to them.
Rekka: 21:57 Do not pay a reading fee. Do not pay submissions fee. Do you not pay like an award submission fee. You know.
Kaelyn: 22:04 You should never have money coming out of your pocket just to be submitting or considered.
Rekka: 22:10 Yes.
Kaelyn: 22:11 So if you're finding a place that's like well our submission fee is $50 because we need that to cover the, the time and cost of you know, someone looking at this, close the window, walk away, find a better, better place. So yes. Thank you. That's, you're right. That's important.
Rekka: 22:29 I didn't want that one to get overlooked by anyone who is going to skip ahead past the agent's part, cause they don't care about agents. Yeah. So,
Kaelyn: 22:36 but some people care about agents. A lot of people, care about agents.
Rekka: 22:39 There's a good reason to care about agents, and I say this as someone who does not have any kind of agent. Agents are like a big brother or sister or other person that they know how the industry works. They also work closely with auothers and they know how you feel at almost any given moment in the process. And we know there are feelings.
Kaelyn: 23:00 [laughing] They understand you.
Rekka: 23:00 And so you have somebody who is sympathetic to you, who has a network within the industry and who has relationships with publishers and maybe has lunch with an editor that like has told them
Kaelyn: 23:14 I have lunch with agents a lot.
Rekka: 23:15 Yeah, I, "I had lunch with this editor and they're looking for a book that is exactly like that. And then you just told me about like, can you polish that up and send it to me?" And so that's something you don't know unless you've had lunch with that person who just mentioned it in passing.
Kaelyn: 23:30 Yeah. And so that's uh, that's part of definitely part of the appeal of an agent, it's a major part of the appeal of an agent. But to get an agent you have to query them. I'm going to just say real quick here, I always think the query is a little bit of a misleading title because in theory what it's asking either of a publishing house or an agent is, are you interested in this?
Rekka: 23:55 Right. That's the query. The question is, are you interested in this?
Kaelyn: 23:58 What it should actually be saying, however is here's why you should be interested in this. And again, we're going to do probably more than one episode about submissions and query letters in the future.
Rekka: 24:10 Easily more than one.
Kaelyn: 24:11 Yes. [Laughter] Um, but when you're querying an agent, you're basically saying, I've written this book or here's a proposal for a book I'm going to write and trust me, if you're a first time author, you're not getting that. That's for established New York Times best sellers. Um, and you know, agents, we'll also have, uh, submissions, guidelines, query guidelines. You know, what they want from you, the format they wanted in
Rekka: 24:36 whether they want a synopsis with the email or whether it's the synopsis is the first step of interest or whether the, you know, they want the first chapter or whether they want to three chapters. I mean, every agent has a method that they have determined because agents are pretty independent people with regard, like they may even be with an agency, but they all kind of have the freedom to come up with their own process.
Kaelyn: 25:00 Yes.
Kaelyn: 25:02 So work with them on it.
Kaelyn: 25:03 Yeah. And this is again another thing we will be talking about at greater length in the future. Um, but yeah, work within the guidelines of what they set up because again, they are bombarded, you know when agents open for queries, they're like,
Rekka: 25:20 there are people waiting at the door.
Kaelyn: 25:21 Yeah, they're inundated. So just that as you know, again, same as with the open call, right off the bat, don't make more work for anyone. And this is why when I say you're preparing each submission individually, you are because everyone's going to ask you for something a little bit different and yes, it's annoying. But you know what, that's just how it is.
Rekka: 25:43 Since we're talking about multiple submissions. I just want to take a moment to suggest that you get a spreadsheet of some sort
Kaelyn: 25:49 Yeah
Rekka: 25:49 and you want to track who you've submitted to, uh, have a column for whether they require exclusive look or whether you can submit to others at the same time. Have a column for each of the stages of the, um, or each of the formats of things that you might send them. Like a query letter, a synopsis, a first chapter, a full manuscript, and just put a little x in the box for whichever ones you sent them so far and then put the date that you queried them.
Rekka: 26:22 And if they list their response time, put that in and you can do the math or, or
Kaelyn: 26:28 Or Excel will do it for you.
Rekka: 26:29 If you know excel spreadsheet formulas, you can make it, figure out the dates that it's fair to follow up. And we're saying follow up politely. Yes. And then other bits of information, like just any, you know, any,
Kaelyn: 26:44 anything that's relevant that's going to help you keep track of what stage your book is or your manuscript is in.
Rekka: 26:49 And I would keep a copy of the letter that you sent them
Kaelyn: 26:52 Yes definitely.
Rekka: 26:53 So that you can reference it and say, you know, like, um, I've sent this to so and so and um, you know that way like if you are sending these out in many, many directions at once, you can keep track because you may not remember which agent. Like if you get an email back saying, please send me the first chapter.
Rekka: 27:11 You may not remember why you picked that agent. If you don't know their name already,
Kaelyn: 27:15 You have to do a lot of the work on your own here. So keeping track of that kind of stuff is very important. So, but let's say you do get picked up by an agent
Rekka: 27:24 Or they at least reply and they request a full.
Kaelyn: 27:26 They, you know, there's going to be steps there. And again, this says something else we will discuss at greater length in the future. Um, but so an agent has signed you
Rekka: 27:36 And now they're going to take over the submission inquiry process for you.
Kaelyn: 27:40 But first they're probably going to ask you for some changes in your manuscript
Rekka: 27:45 Rights
Kaelyn: 27:46 Agents in recent years have become more and more involved in the first pass in the editing process. Very few agents are now just going to take your manuscript and say, yes, this is good.
Rekka: 27:59 Right. They're not a post office.
Kaelyn: 28:02 They're going to ask, you know, they're gonna read it. They're going to ask you for some changes. Some of it might be, um, you know, based on trends they know about. Some of it might be, I have you in mind for this kind of a thing. So I want it just tweaked a little bit just so it catches their interest. Yeah. Agents might ask you for edits before they sign you. You can decide whether that's, you know, good or bad.
Rekka: 28:25 You want to follow your gut on that one based on the language in the request.
Kaelyn: 28:29 Yes, literary agents are hard to get and they're very busy and you know it, you have to decide if you want to put that extra work in for the promise of maybe you know, getting signed but possibly not
Rekka: 28:40 Yeah, because it may not be enough.
Kaelyn: 28:42 But at the same time it's feedback from a professional in the industry. So you know, always, you know.
Rekka: 28:47 Give that the, the weight that it's due.
Kaelyn: 28:49 Yeah, exactly. So after you know, you guys have had the discussion and you get the manuscript to where you, both of you are happy with it. The agent now takes over the querying and submissions process. And so this is where things kind of especially diverged from just the open call to querying through an agent.
Rekka: 29:10 So if the agent is handling the querying and um, submissions for you for the process of getting it picked up by a publisher, you now have a partner that is joining you in the submissions. But this isn't guaranteeing you that your book is going to be picked up. It is a vote of confidence from a publishing professional.
Kaelyn: 29:33 It's a big vote. It's a vote that carries the weight of more than one single vote.
Rekka: 29:37 Yes. And it's, it's a huge confidence booster. Um, or you should take it as one that somebody believes in your book as much as you do because you may not have that up until this point.
Kaelyn: 29:49 Yeah.
Rekka: 29:50 But there is still the chance that you know, this, this book is going to take a lot longer to still be picked up by a publisher and it may still find a home or you may decide that you need to revisit a few things based on feedback that they receive from the publishers. Um, but so there's still a chance for rejection at this point. Just
Kaelyn: 30:06 There absolutely still is a chance for rejection at this point and we're going to be after this, kind of moving more into the actual acquisition's process. So let's talk about the last thing that can happen before acquisitions.
Rekka: 30:17 And that's unfortunately is the, no thank you. This isn't right for us or phrase differently.
Kaelyn: 30:23 And here's the thing. Most people, that's what you're going to hear a lot.
Rekka: 30:27 And remember how we said when you're done with the draft, like maybe step away. Here's a moment. This is also ideal for stepping away.
Kaelyn: 30:34 Yes, right off the bat, most books that get rejected or rejected because they need more work. Um, it could be stylistic, it could be story, it could be any number of things in between those two. It's discouraging. Of course it is. But you have to understand that there are so many of these books that this is why we say you need to distinguish herself. Sometimes your book, however it may be great, it just might not be right for that publisher or for that agent. Maybe they just publish something very similar.
Rekka: 31:09 Yeah. Or they're working on something very similar at that moment and they can't even tell you that
Kaelyn: 31:12 Yeah, they're working on something very similar. Um, you know, maybe it's just something that they feel like they are not equipped to sell the right way. And I mean, I know we definitely have walked away from books because we're like, look, we don't want to tie up your rights because we don't think we can do what needs to be done with this book.
Rekka: 31:30 And this goes back a little bit to making sure that you know exactly who you're querying so you don't come back with complete mismatch because that's going to guarantee, guarantee a rejection much.
Kaelyn: 31:40 Exactly.
Rekka: 31:40 So like save yourself the heartache and make sure that you are finding people who sell books that are good cops for yours.
Kaelyn: 31:48 The biggest piece of advice I can give is do not take this personally. I understand that saying that from coming from someone on the publishing end, from the person who sends the rejection letters is like, well, of course you can say that.
Rekka: 32:03 Well, here, let me say it. I'm an author. I write these things. Um, you wrote a book that is the story of your heart. You love it
Kaelyn: 32:14 It's deeply personal.
Rekka: 32:15 You put hours of emotion and energy into this. That does not mean that it is not a product. You have developed a product that needs to be marketed and packaged and sold. And if you can't, if that's not something that you will ever be able to handle, write the stories and then put them in drawers. That's okay.
Kaelyn: 32:39 Give them to your friends,
Rekka: 32:40 You need to be able to detach yourself from your story enough to know that there are things that are going to improve it, that you might not have chosen. If you could write anything.
Kaelyn: 32:52 Don't take it personally. It's not personal. I understand that this is the most personal thing you've probably ever submitted and doing so puts you in a vulnerable position. It's hard to get rejected with that. It's not personal like, you know, it's not personal. It's just business.
Kaelyn: 33:11 And it sounds so awful.
Kaelyn: 33:13 It sounds cold.
Rekka: 33:15 But that's what it is. I mean publishers are trying to stay profitable so that they can continue to make books that they love. I mean essentially that was why people get into this in the beginning, at least in the beginning. And you hope that they maintain that passion.
Kaelyn: 33:31 It's hard. And so we'll, you know, we're kind of, we're both kind of getting into the emotions of it right now.
Rekka: 33:37 And we did say we weren't doing an emotional episode like, so we did get to rejections and there's no way to, you were saying detach yourself from it. It's not personal. And here we are getting very worked up about it.
Kaelyn: 33:46 Getting very personal about this.
Rekka: 33:46 So that's fair.
Kaelyn: 33:48 But along those lines with the personal, I mean it's fine if you want to get angry.
Rekka: 33:53 You don't, not to reply.
Kaelyn: 33:56 Keep it to yourself.
Kaelyn: 33:57 Yeah. If you need to vent, do not do it on Twitter.
Kaelyn: 34:00 Do not do it on Twitter.
Rekka: 34:01 I don't care if the person you submitted it to subtweets you on Twitter or you think they've subbed tweeted you on Twitter, you are not going to participate in that.
Kaelyn: 34:09 Here's the thing, people in the publishing industry, we talked to each other. So if you get a rejection letter from me or an email rather, you know, thank you so much for submitting us for, sorry this book is not right for us at this time and I get a reply from you that is anything beyond thank you for your time and consideration or you know, asking for notes from something which we'll get to that later. But that is, I'm going to remember, you know, and this is not a situation where you, it's time for you to start an argument with me.
Rekka: 34:48 Right. Your decision's already made
Kaelyn: 34:49 My decisions made
Kaelyn: 34:50 And you are just reinforce it if
Kaelyn: 34:53 Here's the thing, my decision's final. Um, and that's just how it is. It's, you know, it's our company and we get to decide these things. Yeah. If you're going to, you know, if you're going to get angry, go
Rekka: 35:05 Scream into a pillow,
Kaelyn: 35:06 Call a friend please ,
Rekka: 35:09 Talk to a therapist.
Kaelyn: 35:09 It's okay to feel those things just, you know, do not put them out into the world. So dealing with rejection is difficult, but it's something, you know, as Rekka said, it's something you're going to have to get used to.
Rekka: 35:19 Yeah.
Kaelyn: 35:20 Because this is more often than not, you're going to be rejected. Don't think of it as a failure. It's not necessarily a failure. It's room for improvement.
Rekka: 35:32 Right, and if anything rise to the challenge and say, well, okay, not necessarily right off the bat because again, if this was not a good fit for whoever you queried, then someone else may see what you see in this book and pick it up.
Rekka: 35:48 And it's when you start to get rejection after rejection from, from publishers you think were really perfect matches their publishing books by people you read that like inspired you or some story or all these other reasons and they're just telling you it's, not a good fit for them.
Kaelyn: 36:03 That's, that's heartbreaking.
Rekka: 36:05 It's heartbreaking, but it's, it's an indication that you really should be paying attention to what you're submitting and what form it's in. Maybe at what level of editing you've, you've sent it in.
Kaelyn: 36:14 And maybe this is a good time if you didn't do it before to consider getting an editor.
Rekka: 36:19 Right.
Kaelyn: 36:20 So that's rejections. You know, it's an inevitable part of this process. So we wanted to take a minute to talk about it, reassure you that feelings about this are normal and it's okay to have them.
Rekka: 36:30 And your first rejection is not a total rejection of your entire writing career.
Kaelyn: 36:33 Exactly. Yeah.
Rekka: 36:35 So that's the rejections.
Kaelyn: 36:36 Yeah, that's the rejections. I mean they're, it's hard, but you know,
Kaelyn: 36:39 It is part of the process
Kaelyn: 36:40 It is part of the process and uh, I'm going to say you got to get good at it. And I know that sounds like a weird thing to say, but, but you have to,
Rekka: 36:47 You can work out these muscles of like how to properly deal with the rejection and how you use that information to inform your next query or your next provision.
Kaelyn: 36:56 Exactly.
Rekka: 36:57 So on the flip side, eventually, hopefully you do not get rejected.
Kaelyn: 37:02 And you get that magical call or email from an acquisitions editor that says, dear, so and so, I'm interested in your book and I would like to have a phone call with you.
Rekka: 37:13 So the next step is that, um, you're going to form a relationship with this Pub - Well, you don't even have to like, here's, here's your power now the publishers interested in you. So we're going to talk in our next episode about the process of going through and um, and Kaelyn who has the inside scoop from the side of a publisher and tell us what the thought process is on that side and maybe why they made a decision to acquire something. And then we can talk about the relationship that you build and the proper steps to go along with that. Some, some words of warning. And
Kaelyn: 37:47 We're going to take you through the process of what happens when someone is interested in your book. Go through what is going to happen, getting up to the contract being signed. And that's the, that's the big moment. But then that's, it's not over after that.
Rekka: 38:02 So not over [laughter]
Kaelyn: 38:03 So much more after that. And we're going to just talk again, same format, same thing, quick overview. We know that we are skipping and glossing over a bunch of really complex things
Rekka: 38:14 And we promise if you highlight the ones that you're like, Whoa, whoa, Whoa, Whoa, wait, back up. Can you go into that, like tweet us, WMBcast, and tell us like that moment that you're like, that's the thing I don't know about and I need to hear more about and then, and we can dive deep into that in another We
Kaelyn: 38:28 We'll mark it for a future episode.
Rekka: 38:29 Absolutely.
Kaelyn: 38:30 Yes. Uh, so we're at the acquisitions point right now and our next episode we're going to cover what happens after, during and after that.
Rekka: 38:38 Right up to the point where a reader can pick up your book off the shelf.
Kaelyn: 38:41 So thank you so much for listening to this episode. And the next one is, uh, probably all queued up already
Rekka: 38:48 Probably
Kaelyn: 38:48 Because these are all coming out at once.
Rekka: 38:50 We launched with a few episodes for you, so you don't even have to wait. All right. So, um, if you could leave a comment or a rating on iTunes, both would be even better.
Kaelyn: 38:59 That would be wonderful.
Rekka: 38:59 And that will help other people find this. If you want to follow us on Twitter or Instagram, we are at w-m-b-c-a-s-t, w-m-b-cast. You can find us at WMBcast.com or WeMakeBooksPodcast.com and of course we are also on patreon.com/WMBcast. And we are asking that anyone who finds this super valuable and can contribute to, to the cause to help us keep the lights on and keep the production running and maybe improve,
Kaelyn: 39:28 Keep the shed warm
Rekka: 39:29 Yes, keep the shed warm and maybe improve, um, our production quality in the future and add more content that we can provide to people. And we really hope that this is helpful and we want to help as many people as possible. So if you could help spread the word, and if you know somebody who needs this information, you know, send them a link,
Kaelyn: 39:45 Yeah, send them a link, we'd love it.
Rekka: 39:45 That would be so helpful. We absolutely love it. So thank you. And we will talk to you again soon. Thanks everyone.
Piano: [Music outtro]
Sunday May 05, 2019
Episode 1: An Author, an Editor, and a Dinosaur Walk Into a Shed…
Sunday May 05, 2019
Sunday May 05, 2019
Hi everyone, and thank you for listening to Introductory Episode of the We Make Books Podcast - A podcast about writing, publishing, and everything in between!
We Make Books is hosted by Rekka Jay and Kaelyn Considine; Rekka is a published author and Kaelyn is an editor and together they are going to take you through what goes into getting a book out of your head, on to paper, in to the hands of a publisher, and finally on to book store shelves.
In this kick off episode, Rekka and Kaelyn take a few minutes to introduce themselves, talk about their vision for the podcast, and tell the story of how each of them ended up here.
We Make Books is a podcast for writer and publishers, by writers and publishers and we want to hear from our listeners! Hit us up on our social media, linked below, and send us your questions, comments, concerns, and any theories you may have about “The Rise of Skywalker”.
Thank you for taking the time to listen to this introduction, the first batch of new episodes drops on May 14th, so be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss it.
A transcription of this episode can be found below.
We hope you enjoy We Make Books!
Twitter: @WMBCast | @KindofKaelyn | @BittyBittyZap
=== Transcript ===
Music: 00:07 [Music]
Rekka: 00:07 Yeah I'm ready are you ready?
Kaelyn: 00:07 No, but let's do it anyway.
Rekka: 00:07 Fist bump, we can do anything.
Rekka: 00:16 All right. Inauguraguh-gull [stumbles and laughs]
Kaelyn: 00:23 God, we publish books. [laughter]
Rekka: 00:25 We don't read them out loud though, that's not our job.
Kaelyn: 00:27 That's a good point. Yeah. Inaugural episode.
Rekka: 00:31 I'm gonna leave that to you to say.
Kaelyn: 00:32 Okay. It's not actually the inaugural though.
Rekka: 00:37 Mine doesn't count. I was alone.
Kaelyn: 00:39 No but I mean it's the intro.
Rekka: 00:41 Oh, fair.
Kaelyn: 00:41 So, all right, let's just get started and we'll, we'll see how
Rekka: 00:46 We'll see how it goes and whether this ends up the episode nobody ever hears.
Kaelyn: 00:51 The black file, we're going to have to start one of those.
Rekka: 00:54 Exactly. That's what Patreon's for.
Kaelyn: 00:55 Yeah. Yeah. Are you already recording this?
Rekka: 00:59 Mm-hmm.
Kaelyn: 00:59 Okay.
Rekka: 00:59 I have been. Of course I have, this was, this was the deal. [laughter]
Kaelyn: 01:02 [laughter] Okay. So, hello everyone listening and welcome to the introductory episode of the We Make Books podcast. My name's Kaelyn Considine--
Rekka: 01:15 And I'm Rekka Jay.
Kaelyn: 01:16 --and we both make books. Um, I work for Parvus Press, which is an independent publishing company, as their acquisitions editor and also editor of various books that we publish and...
Rekka: 01:31 ...and Rekka Jay writes science fiction as R. J. Theodore and I happen to also be published through Parvus Press. A little bit of nepotism here. That's fine.
Kaelyn: 01:42 No, it's just, we're just lucky that we got to publish some of your amazing books. One out, another two coming.
Rekka: 01:48 Yes that's true.
Kaelyn: 01:48 We know it. We definitely know how lucky we are. Um, so Rekka, why don't you go ahead and get us started with what we're doing here?
Rekka: 02:00 Well, I mean we, are we starting into the backstory? Is this the origin story of We Make Books?
Kaelyn: 02:05 No, we'll save that for once we've got them hooked, I think.
Rekka: 02:08 Okay.
Kaelyn: 02:09 Yeah.
Rekka: 02:09 We want them to already think they found something of value.
Kaelyn: 02:11 Yeah, no, we're gonna--we're gonna save that for after we [laughter]
Rekka: 02:16 So, We Make Books as a concept is something that, I mean really, it should already exist.
Kaelyn: 02:24 It should. I was, we were actually both very surprised that it didn't
Rekka: 02:29 and we were looking, we didn't we weren't taking this lightly
Kaelyn: 02:32 --we looked, yeah, we--we spent quite an amount of time looking
Rekka: 02:34 We were looking for a reason to say, oh never mind, someone's already got it covered, we don't need to do this.
Kaelyn: 02:38 So what we wanted to do here is I work on the publishing side. Rekka works on the writing side of making books, but both of us are crucial and essential to the process of making a book. Um, however, there is not much out there that discusses not just the writing process but also what goes into actually creating and publishing books. So as you said, we really looked, we found a couple of things that weren't quite ...
Rekka: 03:08 Tried to approach it
Kaelyn: 03:09 yeah, and weren't quite what we thought we wanted to do. So our goal here is we want to talk about the writing, publishing process from both sides of it. Um...
Rekka: 03:25 as a creative, I am someone who comes up with a story and I'm so involved in the story that when I come up for air, I finished my draft, I could be completely lost then. I have this, I have this chunk of paper that I printed at staples. Like what do I do with it?
Kaelyn: 03:42 And I on the other hand, am the one that gets the chunk of paper that has been printed at Staples, although, okay. I mean–
Rekka: 03:47 yeah, we're dating ourselves. There's no paper involved at all.
Kaelyn: 03:50 Well, I'm still shocked that you actually print these things out.
Rekka: 03:54 That's another episode.
Kaelyn: 03:55 Yeah, that's another episode. But um, no, I get electronic submissions, thank God, because I couldn't even imagine. Um, what we're looking to do here is to kind of walk people through that. And our mission statement, if you will, with this was we want to be accessible. We want to not be, you know, kind of ratchet down the intimidation factor that goes into this. And we want this to be fun and we want it to be engaging and interactive and we want to hear from the people listening to it. Because as we were talking about this podcast and what it was going to be about, we realized, you know, both of us from when we started doing this, like you're hearing words you never heard before or like words used in completely not the context that you're used to hearing them. And it's like, what is that? And in some cases you're like embarrassed to ask–
Rekka: 04:41 right, cause you think you're the only one in the room who doesn't know.
Kaelyn: 04:43 Like, "Oh my God, I don't know what that is." Um, when the first time I kept hearing the word 'ARC,' I was like, well, what, what is an ARC? And like I already knew what advanced reader copy was. I just had never heard it abbreviated to the word
Rekka: 04:55 And then spoken out loud.
Kaelyn: 04:56 Yeah. To the word ARC. So, um, yeah. And then you're like, you're afraid to ask because you're like, "Oh God, should I already know this? Like everyone's gonna think I'm an idiot."
Rekka: 05:04 Right.
Kaelyn: 05:04 Um, so two facets. One of course, you know, kind of pull back the curtain a little bit, see what's going on, but then also open everything up to 'here's what is happening, here's how a book gets made. And here are the people that are involved in making it.' Um, you know, we're going to go through the whole process, not linearly. We're going to jump around a bit.
Rekka: 05:28 Right.
Kaelyn: 05:29 we'll have some guests on where appropriate. Um, and we're really looking forward to interacting and engaging with everyone
Rekka: 05:35 Yeah. Yeah. And that's part of this, like we want to talk to each other. We also want to talk to the people who are listening and who have questions because unfortunately there's no way to rewind and remember what I didn't know at the time. So there's–
Kaelyn: 05:51 I've got a list actually. [laughter]
Rekka: 05:54 You've got a list of what I didn't know at the time? [laughter]
Kaelyn: 05:56 No! Well you you too. But now I've got a list of like, every now and then I'll hear a word and it's like I'll have a flashback to like the panic attack I had when I was like, Oh God, what's that?
Rekka: 06:03 Sure. There's, there's some things that we very vividly remember not knowing–
Kaelyn: 06:07 [laughter] Yes.
Rekka: 06:07 –And being worried about, but you know, sometimes it's like you learn these things as you go and you learn them in an organic sense. There's not a book that's going to teach you.
Kaelyn: 06:17 Well, there isn't a resource.
Rekka: 06:19 Right.
Kaelyn: 06:19 And that was even something that I was looking up online and I think in, I mean, you can speak more to this than I can, but like how did you figure, you know,
Rekka: 06:28 Did I figure it out?
Kaelyn: 06:30 Going online and digging around different websites that say things is not necessarily the most cohesive or really in some cases helpful way.
Rekka: 06:41 I mean, the, the advice is not to diagnose yourself using Web MD. And I mean, that applies to everything. It's just a little bit more critical when it comes to whether or not you have cancer. [Laughter] But, um, by the way, when MD says you do
Kaelyn: 06:53 You always have cancer.
Rekka: 06:55 It's always cancer. Um, so when people go to the Internet to find information, sometimes they stop with the first source. Sometimes they stop when they find the source that tells them what they wanted to hear. Other times they never find the answer and they give up and go home frustrated. And some of it's just like, there's a term for that and you don't know it yet. That's okay. We're happy to explain it to you. It's not a forbidden knowledge, but it's like you have to know the right search term.
Kaelyn: 07:23 Yeah. Um, so you know, when we kind of sat down and wrote out, you know what we're going to go over in this introductory episode is what this podcast is, which I think we just kind of talked about a little bit. You know, this is conversations between both quote-unquote sides of the publishing world, which I'm going to try not to make it sound like it's sides because I really, something I really want to emphasize here is everyone's a team. They're just doing different things. Um–
Rekka: 07:50 It really is a symbiosis.
Kaelyn: 07:51 It is. It is. And we're gonna talk a lot about that. Um, because I think that is one of the major misconceptions a lot of people coming into this have, is the sort of like, and you know, I'm coming from the publishing side, so I will say there is this, like "it's me and the publishers."
Rekka: 08:09 It's, you know, "me, the writer and how do I protect my book against what the publisher's going to try to do to it by default."
Kaelyn: 08:15 Yes. Yeah. And I'd really like to kind of work a little towards dispelling that because that's, that should not be what's, what's happening here. But at the same time, we also want to kind of quickly say what this is not going to be.
Rekka: 08:28 It's not all the answers.
Kaelyn: 08:29 It's not all the answers.
Rekka: 08:32 We don't have them.
Kaelyn: 08:33 We have some, some answers, but it's also, it's not a roadmap. This is not, "do all of these things in your book will get published" because as we're going to talk about, there's so many factors that go into whether or not a book gets picked up by someone and that's a later episode, believe me, we will have a lot to say about that. But ...
Rekka: 08:53 I mean we are coming at this from two individual human consciousnesses, in two individual bodies and so we can't say this is what a publisher at XYZ Publishing House is going to agree with, but there's an insight that we can give you from having been through it and knowing what has worked or not worked from the process. And then of course, as we said, we'll bring in guests if we don't know the answer to a question that has come up on our outline for our topics or um, you know, listener questions, which we hope you'll engage with us–
Kaelyn: 09:34 We're really, we're really counting on that. And we're very much looking forward to that. We really want to hear about people who are either dipping their toe in the water or people who are well into it and you know, please feel free to send us anything or even a like, "I wish I had known."
Rekka: 09:49 Yes.
Kaelyn: 09:49 Um, those are, those are great. So anyway, that's, um, that's what this is. That's, that's where this is going and we're really excited to do this. Again, we were shocked–
Rekka: 10:01 Yeah.
Kaelyn: 10:01 Shocked that that didn't already exist
Rekka: 10:03 And the closest things that came to it sort of existed for like 10 or 15 episodes and then went away or were college projects and stuff.
Kaelyn: 10:12 Or it was a very specific thing that it was doing. And it wasn't like a broad appeal to a lot of a lot of people.
Rekka: 10:20 And again, we're genre fiction.
Kaelyn: 10:22 Yes.
Rekka: 10:22 One of the ones we found was all very nonfiction focused.
Kaelyn: 10:25 Yeah. So that's another qualifier. This is most, this is genre. This is fiction. It's, um, but you know, some of this advice, no matter what is going to apply across the board.
Rekka: 10:36 Mm-hmm
Kaelyn: 10:36 But that's, you know, that's where we're coming from. But I think it'll be entertaining and educational regardless.
Rekka: 10:43 Yes.
Kaelyn: 10:43 Even if it's just one of those, "Oh I always wanted to write a book."
Rekka: 10:47 Or if you're at the other end of this and you're going, you know, just commiserating like, "oh yeah, I remember when I learned that one."
Kaelyn: 10:53 I mean, yeah. So, so that's, that's what we're aiming to do here. Um, I mean how, how are we on time right now? Do we want to hear the story?
Rekka: 11:01 I mean we might as well tell the story.
Kaelyn: 11:03 We'll tell the story. Okay, cause this is, this is the story of how all of this started. Um, I was out one night with some friends and one of them brought a new boyfriend around and um, you know, he was, he was good. He was trying to talk to everyone and trying to be friendly and we were just talking and you know, of course, as soon as I tell people, "oh yeah, I work in publishing and I publish books, I'm an editor" without fail, the first thing I always get is "I've always wanted to write a book."
Rekka: 11:31 You kind of say what you are and then you go to your happy place for a moment.
Kaelyn: 11:34 No, you know, it's fine, you know what, honestly, because whenever people always say, 'Oh, I've always wanted to write a book', my response is, 'So do it'.
Rekka: 11:40 Yup.
Kaelyn: 11:40 Give it a shot. Maybe don't, you don't have to finish. Just, you know, see how it goes. Um, but he didn't say that. He said, "you know, I always think if I wrote a book, I wouldn't even know where to start with it."
Rekka: 11:53 Mmm
Kaelyn: 11:53 And I said, "writing the book?" And he said, "no, like, assume I wrote it. I don't know what to do then." And he asked, "so what do I do?" And I was like, "well, there's this," there's, you know, and I'm bullet pointing all of these steps. And then I'm going back and going, like, I will qualify, we were at a bar and I'd had a couple of beers at this point and I'm– and he was like, "wow, that's, how do you like figure this out?" And I'm like, "you know, I don't know."
Rekka: 12:17 [laughter]
Kaelyn: 12:17 Um, you know, so we were just kind of sitting at the bar and like I just had my phone out, I punched, you know, 'book publishing steps' or something into Google and um, there was nothing. And he was like, well, "how'd you figure all this out?" I was like, "I learned along the way, that's how you do this." So I went home that night and I had this like reeling through my head and I sat down and I got a piece of paper out and I, I won't say drunkenly but–
Rekka: 12:47 It was legible. I saw the papers.
Kaelyn: 12:48 It was legible. Yeah, slightly intoxicated-ly wrote down all of this stuff of just like, okay, so there's the submissions process and then a bunch of steps about that. Then there's acquisitions, a bunch of stuff about that. Talking about things like royalties, what are they and how do they work, you know, rights, like things like that. And then the next morning I woke up and I was like, you know, this is actually kind of useful. Like this isn't like my usual woke up in the morning and find something that I did. [laughter] "What if birds had balloons attached to them so they don't get tired?"
Rekka: 13:22 Aw, see you're helpful.
Kaelyn: 13:23 Yeah.
Rekka: 13:24 You just really want to help everybody.
Kaelyn: 13:25 Yeah. But then I was thinking like the balloons pop, it's going to choke the bird
Rekka: 13:29 And the sea turtles.
Kaelyn: 13:31 And the sea turtles.
Rekka: 13:31 The turtles are going to start choking on balloons.
Kaelyn: 13:33 Yeah.
Rekka: 13:34 And birds. We don't like this future.
Kaelyn: 13:35 So I was like, well this one's actually kind of useful. So I went to some of my colleagues at my publishing company and I talked about, you know, what if we did like a limited series podcast about this? And for a lot of reasons, mostly having to do with time, this just wasn't going to work. But then I was talking to Rekka about it.
Rekka: 13:51 Well you put the bug in the ear of someone at your publishing house.
Kaelyn: 13:54 Yes.
Rekka: 13:55 Who knew that I had recently found myself without a cohost.
Kaelyn: 14:01 Well wait, maybe, maybe you should backtrack and explain a little of like your history with podcasting and where you're coming from.
Rekka: 14:07 Um, well I got into, I was working on a book and I knew that I am an impatient person.
Kaelyn: 14:17 No, see "impatient" has negative connotations.
Rekka: 14:19 But, these are negative connotations that I'm speaking of.
Kaelyn: 14:23 No, you're like, enthusiastic, excited, and you get shit done.
Rekka: 14:26 Fair. I accept. Thank you.
Kaelyn: 14:29 [Laughter]
Rekka: 14:29 So for those reasons, those very wonderful reasons, um, I knew that I was not interested in entering whatever my draft became into the grinder of 10 years of submitting it to agents and 10 more years of submitting it to publishers because you know, there, there was this impression of how you get a book published is by basically waiting and crying a lot. And that's something we're going to talk about.
Kaelyn: 14:57 We are, yeah. That's going to be the title of the episode, "waiting and crying."
Rekka: 15:03 [Laughter] And so I um, and now it's not going to be because you declared it.
Kaelyn: 15:07 No, no, no. I know or will we throw them for a loop and it is? Always play with their minds.
Rekka: 15:15 The thing is, the listener already knows, but we don't know, cause the listener's from the future--
Kaelyn: 15:20 That's a good point.
Rekka: 15:21 --where we've already titled and released the episode [sings: "A paradox, a paradox..."] Okay. So I started listening to self publishing podcasts because I said, "Okay, well I'm just going to self publish this." When I started writing my story, self publishing wasn't even a thing. Vanity press was barely a thing.
Kaelyn: 15:36 Okay.
Rekka: 15:36 There was no kindle.
Kaelyn: 15:38 Yeah.
Rekka: 15:39 That, that makes a big difference.
Kaelyn: 15:40 Yeah, 10 years ago. Yeah, that's...
Rekka: 15:44 Um, well, HA! I appreciate that. Thanks. 14 years ago.
Kaelyn: 15:48 Okay. [Laughter]
Rekka: 15:48 Uh, actually, um, the original incarnation of my book, um, was begun in 2003. It was a graphic novel.
Kaelyn: 15:58 For those who are listening right now, Rekka has taken a book off the shelf and is showing it to me, it is some impressive artwork.
Rekka: 16:05 And it's a lot. And I got 90 pages into it before I nearly destroyed my wrist. So, um, so at one point I said, "I need to take a break". And then at that point I, I, I knew it needed structural changes and then I was like, "Well, what else can I do to it?" And so, um, apparently the answer to that was eventually write it as a novel instead of drawing it because writing doesn't hurt so bad. So, um–
Kaelyn: 16:27 Little did you know!
Rekka: 16:28 Little did I—well, no, it hurts in new ways, but my wrist is fine. And, um, so I started listening to self publishing podcasts to learn how you go about doing that thing when the draft is done. Because like we said, you figure it out. And I knew that I would have to figure it out and I knew that if I started collecting knowledge in the moments, you know, while I was driving and I couldn't be writing that I was, you know, getting ahead a little bit. So that was sort of my introduction into publishing. And um, there's a, I don't know if you're aware of this: self publishing folk have a bit of a bias against publishers.
Kaelyn: 17:03 Yes, I know that. Um. [Laughter]
Rekka: 17:04 Okay. So when I, when I finally decided that I was going to submit this, it felt like a morality choice
Kaelyn: 17:14 [Laughter] God.
Rekka: 17:14 You know, we talked about we don't want to talk about sides. It felt like I was saying a line like,
Kaelyn: 17:19 Do I go over to the dark side?
Rekka: 17:22 You know, do I want to be the scab that goes and takes all the knowledge that she learned about self publishing and takes it to the traditional like, skeleton-basically-gasping-for-breath-side because of the impression I had. Um, and around the same time I was listening to podcasts and interviews and I had a friend who was also into writing though, not at a pace that matched mine, but we were having a conversation and we listened to the same podcasts. So while we were listening to one podcast about how podcasting might help with grow your audience as a writer, I got a text and it said, "so when are you going to start a podcast?" And I said, "I don't know, when do you want to do it?"
Kaelyn: 18:04 [Laughter]
Rekka: 18:04 So that's how I got into my first podcast and hybrid author podcast. And I started with a cohost and we recorded for a year and change before that, uh, cohost started a new job and lost all the free time that he had. So then I was on my own,
Kaelyn: 18:20 [Sympathetic noise] Lost to the, to the waste of productivity.
Rekka: 18:23 Yes. And so there I was by myself and I was not really sure how to continue the podcast. And Colin from Parvus, the publisher at Parvus, uh, called me up and said, "You know, this is the same thing you're doing on Youtube." And I'm like, "Yeah, it is." He's like, "You need a cohost." And I was like, "Yeah, I know." He's like, "So what you do is–" and I'm like, "Thanks, Colin. Thank you for the unsolicited advice, you are a dear person.
Kaelyn: 18:47 I was gonna say did he call you up just to tell you this? Or I'm assuming there was another purpose to the conversation.
Rekka: 18:51 I think did some kind of title layout. Um, there's always a pretense for the phone call and then we get into something,
Kaelyn: 18:57 Well, you know.
Rekka: 18:59 So, uh, he mentioned offhand that the editor at Parvus that I knew from, um, a couple of author conferences and other events–
Kaelyn: 19:10 Various things.
Rekka: 19:11 –we'd interacted on a light level, you know, um, that you wanted to start a podcast.
Kaelyn: 19:16 Let me rephrase that. I kept threatening that our publishing company should do a podcast. Here's the thing, I didn't necessarily want to be on it that much. Um,
Rekka: 19:27 [Cackle] You do know when you share the idea, you own the idea. Unless it's a really good idea, then it's someone else's idea.
Kaelyn: 19:32 Yeah, yeah. Then it's someone else's idea.
Rekka: 19:33 So knowing this was a bad idea, they said, "All right, Kaelyn, go for it."
Kaelyn: 19:36 Yeah, no, I mean we're pretty good at Parvus that it's like, "all right, you know, are you, are you interested in that? You want to, you want to tackle that? Go for it. We'll give you whatever help and support, you know, from your fellow Parvus people as, uh, as–"
Rekka: 19:48 They'll come on and appears guests and such.
Kaelyn: 19:51 Um, yeah, so I didn't really necessarily want to do the podcast. I just thought it was a good idea.
Rekka: 19:57 You wanted to produce or write or suggest.
Kaelyn: 20:01 Yeah. Do something.
Rekka: 20:02 You just wanted to see this baby birthed into the world?
Kaelyn: 20:04 I'd be like the quiet, you know, like I'd sit in the corner and doing, you know, the whatever needs to be done over there and occasionally jump in.
Rekka: 20:11 Well, too bad, you're sucked in now. So eventually I said, "Okay, so Kaelyn, uh, Colin tells me you want to start a podcast." And um, I think a week later we, we pretty much confirmed that we were going to do this.
Kaelyn: 20:22 Well, we were texting because you were coming into the city the next day. So we were meeting up and then you were like,
Rekka: 20:27 We were like, "We should have a conversation."
Kaelyn: 20:28 Yeah. So let's, let's, let's talk about it. And um...
Rekka: 20:32 We didn't really, it was a very nice social visit, but we didn't really get too much.
Kaelyn: 20:36 Yeah. Most of our work was via texts of like "and this" "and this" and "also this other thing."
Rekka: 20:42 Yes. We have lots of ideas.
Kaelyn: 20:45 Yeah, and so, you know, I'm, I'm a little like more cautious with things. I would go so far as to call it nervous. So I'm like, "Okay, well maybe, and okay, well let's come up with a plan. And Rekka's like, "No, I already got the website, got the pointer things set up, we're doing this." And I was like, "Okay, I guess we're doing this."
Rekka: 21:03 Yep.
Kaelyn: 21:03 So here we are now.
Rekka: 21:04 Yeah.
Kaelyn: 21:04 And we're really excited to do this. Um, we're really hoping that it's going to be exciting for people to listen to and engage with.
Rekka: 21:12 Mm-hmm. And give you hope.
Kaelyn: 21:12 And give you hope. And we're really also hoping that this can become a resource for people that are interested in getting into this. Or maybe you're already in it and you're feeling a little lost or maybe you've done it and you just want to relive it.
Rekka: 21:26 We already had someone pointed out to us that there's not a lot of advice even after you've already been in the publishing industry for a while as either side. Like what do you do when you are an author with a series to write? Or um, or you end up leaving your relationship with a publisher or an agent and then you need to seek a new relationship. Like how do you, how do you do that now that you have credits to your name and what changes and stuff like that. So, um, I think there are plenty more topics than we even have planned.
Kaelyn: 22:01 We've got quite a bit planned already.
Rekka: 22:02 And if listeners chime in then we'll have even more. So, um, do follow us on Twitter @WMBcast and you can direct message us they are if you have questions that you want to be anonymous or feel free to shout out loud on the internets and tell us what you'd like to hear us talk about or like, you know, what resonates with you as we're speaking.
Kaelyn: 22:20 Yeah, definitely. If anything is kind of like, "oh, I'd love to hear more about that." Let us know. We're really hoping for feedback.
Rekka: 22:28 Yeah. We want to know that this is helping. We want to know how it could help more and uh, we want to know what your experiences are and if you create a, sort of like that, that echo back then other people will see that they are not alone in needing this information. And when we realize we're not alone in this whole process gets a lot easier.
Kaelyn: 22:48 Yeah. It's, I mean, once you just have even like the first friend and that you can kind of use as a sounding board or talk to about this stuff, it's such a weight off your shoulders.
Rekka: 22:58 It changes the feeling of the entire process. It really does.
Kaelyn: 23:01 Yeah, it's really a significant step in the process. So, um, I guess, I think we're gonna wrap up there.
Rekka: 23:08 Yeah, we should probably just plug the Patreon.
Kaelyn: 23:11 Plug the Patreon.
Rekka: 23:11 Uh, so we have a Patreon account—of course we do cause we're a podcast—
Kaelyn: 23:16 [Laughter]
Rekka: 23:16 But we would appreciate your support if you find this valuable. If this is something that shows promise to you or that you are already like, "Yes, absolutely. 100%. I need this; or I know someone who needs this," please head over to patreon.com/wmbcast (that's w-m-b-c-a-s-t). And if you support the podcast, you will have access to some bonus episodes when we–were not going to talk so much about like secret publishing stuff. Cause this is all about not having secret publishing.
Kaelyn: 23:43 Shhh!
Rekka: 23:43 We'll just talk about like stories, probably a movies and, and uh, the kinds of media that it's easier for everyone to be consuming so everyone's on the same page with us. But um, we'll have episodes like that. We might have other content for the most part with, oh, we're just asking you to chip in and help us pay for the hosting. And, um, the audio production, we'd like to bring in a professional producer, uh, transcripts, which are so important for accessibility and also so that other people can find us when they're searching for the kind of terms that come up in our conversations. So please, if you love what we are promising or, um, if you're listening and you've already heard a few episodes cause you're coming in a little bit later, patreon.com/wmbcast to support the podcast and we really appreciate it if you could. And if you could leave a rating and review at iTunes, that will also help other people find us.
Kaelyn: 24:30 That's always, uh, that's always fantastic. And you can find us on Twitter.
Rekka: 24:34 Absolutely.
Kaelyn: 24:34 As well. I'm @KindOfKaelyn. That's my name is k-a-e-l-y-n.
Rekka: 24:39 And I'm @BittyBittyZap. And if you go to @WMBcast on Twitter, our profiles are linked in the bio for that. (Cause I know that Kaelyn has made everything complicated by spelling her name that way.)
Kaelyn: 24:49 I, yeah, I did this purpose. [laughter] This was my decision. Um, so I think that's, that's what we've got for now.
Rekka: 24:58 Yep. So we are launching the podcast because this is our preview episode.
Kaelyn: 25:01 Actually, yeah. We do have one more thing.
Rekka: 25:01 We should mention that.
Kaelyn: 25:02 Yes.
Rekka: 25:03 So we are launching the podcast on May 14th. So that's coming up soon and we will have a few episodes loaded in.
Kaelyn: 25:09 Yeah. So for instance, if you're heading to the Nebulas–
Rekka: 25:13 mm-hmm!
Kaelyn: 25:13 –and you want something to listen to on the way there, you can listen to us talk.
Rekka: 25:19 Yep, as you fly in–we will have those episodes up Tuesday of that same week–so you can listen on the plane, you can listen in the car, you can listen in a boat if you somehow manage to take a boat to LA.
Kaelyn: 25:28 I wonder if Mareth's taking a boat to LA?
Rekka: 25:30 Mareth may take a boat to LA.
Kaelyn: 25:30 Mareth might take a boat to LA.
Rekka: 25:30 So Mareth, if you're listening–
Kaelyn: 25:35 and you're taking a boat, let us send us a picture.
Rekka: 25:37 Oh yes, absolutely. Mareth's photos are always amazing. So, um, so there will be episodes at, uh, available the week of the Nebulas. And if you were at the Nebulas, come find us.
Kaelyn: 25:48 Yeah.
Rekka: 25:49 Maybe we have a conversation because we are bringing our microphones.
Kaelyn: 25:51 We are bringing everything.
Rekka: 25:52 So, uh, we want to have a couple people to pull aside and, um, get some of these opinions that people need or experiences to share.
Kaelyn: 25:59 Yep.
Rekka: 26:00 So that is something else to look forward to. And, uh, once our podcast launches, we will begin airing new episodes every two weeks.
Kaelyn: 26:08 Every two weeks. Kaelyn and Rekka coming through your headphones or stereo or–
Rekka: 26:12 Whether you like it or not.
Kaelyn: 26:13 Yep, we're there.
Rekka: 26:14 All right, folks, we'll talk to you next time. Have a great–
Kaelyn: 26:17 Thank you so much for listening.
Rekka: 26:18 –Experience in writing.
Kaelyn: 26:19 Thank you. Bye.
Music: 26:19 [Music]