When I wrote the previous point in this blog, I never intended for it to become a series. There are already enough articles about how hard it is for a submitting author to get published.  My goal was only to point out that getting to the submission part of the publishing process is a success all by itself.  After all, the only writers who will never be published are the ones that never submit.

Still, I got a surprising amount of responses over IM and E-mail, so I thought I'd cover the rest of the problem writers too.  We'll call them, "Almost hopeless" writers.  In the interest of keeping this blog at least a little fresh and different, I will be trying to look at unique aspects of each, even though you can find this same information on every writer's help site that exists.  Let's look at three more writers, shall we?  This time these are all writers who submit their work, but for whatever reason never get accepted.

The Desperate Writer:
This author doesn't just want to be published.  S/he needs to be published.  Why we don't know.  Family pressure? A lack of any other talent? A craving to be loved? Who knows.  It's a desperate, overwhelming and urgent desire that overpowers reason and even good writing.  Sure, s/he finishes the manuscript, and cranks that manuscript out to every publisher, agent, or editor s/he can find the address of.  His/her enthusiasm is unfaulted.  The problem is, s/he does this regardless of whether or not the publisher/agent would fits his/her writing, and often accompanies the manuscript with an obviously desperate cover letter.  Then s/he wonder why s/he got either no responses or a straight set of form rejections.

Please, take a chill pill.

How you present yourself is almost as important as how well you write.  A good cover letter isn't going to sell a bad manuscript, but a bad cover-letter isn't going to help a good manuscript.  You need both.  If you really want to make a good impression, then write a professional cover letter, using standard formatting and plain text.  When you send by mail, include a SASE.  Do not ever send a letter with 'cute' stationary or swirly-wirly (hard to read) text.  This is not going to win you any points with someone who is going to form an impression of you in less than thirty seconds.

If you know your manuscript is good, but don't know how to write a professional cover letter, follow these links:

Novel cover letters:
http://www.sfwa.org/writing/query.htm

Short story cover letters:
http://www.writing-world.com/basics/floyd.shtml

The Deceptive Writer:
This writer probably gets farther than all the other writers, but still falls short of publication.  S/he writes a good manuscript, or good enough really, and then begins to polish what s/he thinks really counts.  S/he spends hours getting every sentence of the query letter and first three chapters of his/her novel right, and then starts sending out.  S/he gets a lot of good responses because s/he sounds very professional.  S/he sends the first three chapters, gets more good reviews, and then sends the rest of the manuscript and is rejected, but with great regret.

Why?

S/he did absolutely nothing with the rest of the novel.  The first three chapters and the query letter are very important, and certainly need a great deal of attention, but you need to give your whole novel that much attention.  You might excite a lot of publishers to begin with, but they're going to be really disappointed when you send in the full manuscript and it's filled with plot holes and spelling errors.  Save yourself the embarrassment and edit the whole thing before sending it out.

The Arrogant Writer:
No one likes to see a whimpering coward downplaying their work in every other sentence of their cover letter, but an arrogant writer is even worse.  This writer seems to think that his/her work is up there with Stephen King's and Dick Francis, and because of this all editors and agents should kneel down and kiss his/her feet for the mere honor of looking at his/her work.  The fact that people like this even exist leaves me speechless.

You're not doing yourself any favors by displaying the fact that you have an ego problem.  That editor is going to admire your manuscript, agree that you are indeed good, and then regretfully reject you because its going to be hell to work with you, and there are plenty of manuscripts just as good with less of an ego problem.


I don't know why it is, but people just seem to lose their minds when trying to become a published author.  Maybe that's a requirement of writing.  I would label myself as a mediocre writer, but 7 out of 8 rejections this year were handwritten with encouragement and critiques.  Part of it may be the writing, but I bet a lot of it comes from being both sensible and polite.  Do try and copy the sensible and polite part when sending your manuscripts out.

Oh. and aj_hyena none of these are you either. :P  Your dialog tag issues drive me crazy, but you're not hopeless.