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An agent teaches writers to face their hopes and fears

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By Jerry Waxler

The publishing game can be maddening. Not only must you write the best possible book. You must then sell it to a publisher. Many writers feel overwhelmed at this stage asking themselves and each other, “How can I possibly turn into a sales person?” Supposedly, the “solution” is to find a literary agent who will sell it for you. The cruel irony is that you still must learn to sell your book to an agent. I decided to avoid the whole mess by publishing my first books and sell them at my workshops.

However, occasionally I look up to the cathedral in the sky, where happy published writers hang out at tea parties, and I wonder if I will ever gain admission. To learn how to storm those gates, I recently attended an all day workshop on the subject. The event was  hosted at one of the region’s premier writing events, the Philadelphia Stories “Push to Publish” conference, and the speaker was literary agent, Sheree Bykofsky, author of The Complete Idiot’s Guide to Getting Published

At first I intended to be an interested bystander, learning what other people must achieve. The morning of the workshop, I dusted off one of my favorite works in progress, a book about the importance of memoir writing, and on an impulse dashed out a one page query as fast as I could type. Quickly scanning my work, in a surge of self-congratulation, I approved my first draft.

When I arrived at the workshop I put my query on the pile with the other 24 aspiring writers. Our fate was in Sheree’s hands. When she started, she pointed to the pile and said, “I receive 200 of these a day and my job is to throw them out as quickly as possible. I’m just warning you. You are all going to hate me.” I rejected her gloomy prediction. The others might hate her, but I was sure she was going to love my query, and in return I could already feel my blossoming love for her.

She picked the first one up and said, “It’s not formatted correctly. It needs to look like a formal business letter.” She threw it aside and moved on. The next one went into the reject pile because it was right and left justified. “Always format queries ragged-right.”

I congratulated myself. I did those two things correctly. I was still in the running. She picked up the next one and said, “This is double spaced. No good.” She tossed it with the others. This surprised me. I raised my hand. “I thought that the industry standard for submitting to editors is double space.”

“No,” she said. “Not true for queries. They need to be single spaced.”

“Darn,” I thought. “She won’t like my line spacing. But I’m sure she’ll like everything else about it.”

When she started to review mine, she said, “It’s double spaced.” And then, perhaps feeling the positive vibes I was sending her, she kept commenting. “There are capitalization problems.” Finally, she correctly noted, “This looks like you wrote it quickly. Slow down and be sure your query shows off your best work.” Then she tossed it in with the other rejects. The criticism that hurt the most was her complaint about capitalization. How could she throw away my great idea because of typography details. It turned out her prediction was right. I did have to fight with my own feelings of loathing.

Despite her negative feedback, I knew my book had merit, and after the disappointment washed through me, I realized she was teaching a nifty lesson. In a little over a half an hour she had drilled into us how to get past the first round of gate keeping. I simply need to pay careful attention to formatting and other details. With a little extra effort, I could surmount this obstacle.

I learned another, even more important lesson. I had just been rejected by an agent and I was still breathing. It felt like a rite of passage. Instead of feeling defeated, I felt brave. I could do this. So I kept listening and learning about the writer’s relationship with an agent. In addition to general information, she helped me clear up some misconceptions.

Because agents often turn up at writing conferences, I suspected they only do business with people they have met in person. This discouraged me, because I only have the chance to meet a couple of agents a year. When I asked her about it, she said it wasn’t true. She has sold lots of books for authors she has never met.

Another impression that had blocked me from seeking an agent was my fear that I might pick the wrong one. I was behaving like a teenager who refuses to date for fear of entering a relationship with the wrong partner. Like that lonely teenager, I had mythologized the perfect agent as being so godlike, she didn’t exist. After today’s demonstration, I decided agents are human and fallible and that when I am ready to enter into such a relationship, I would be happy to look for a human business partner, rather than holding out for a mythical one.

Finally, she told us not to pay attention to the people who predict the end of the industry. “Publishers need books, and I sell a lot of them.”

At the end of the day, she told us how to craft an elevator speech in which we would describe our book to an agent in one minute. She then gave us fifteen minutes to craft our pitch. Then each of us stood in front of the room and gave our spiel. This was my chance to redeem myself.

This time, instead of nit-picking my formatting, she listened to the substance of my book idea, and apparently she liked what she heard. She praised me, in front of the room, a wonderful feeling that made up for my earlier disappointment. Later, she invited me to send her the book proposal.

Sheree Bykofsky’s class transformed my attitude about the whole category of literary agents from scary gatekeepers into potential allies. I decided that if they insist on letter-perfect formatting in the query letter, it’s a requirement I can live with. Now, instead of seeing the publishing business as an unattainable castle, I began to see it as less threatening and more inviting, with lots of doors, where agents greet people and occasionally help some enter. I decided it’s a little like dating. You try and fail, and try again and fail again, and learn along the way, until eventually you get it right. I’m not in yet, but I’m getting closer. At least now I know what to bring with me when I knock.

Note
Read my article about a creative nonfiction panel at the Philadelphia Stories Push to Publish Conference.
What Creative Nonfiction (CNF) Means to Memoir Writers

Sheree Bykofsky Associates, Literary Agent

List of suggestions for submitting your best work,Submit Manuscripts That Shine

More memoir writing resources

To see brief descriptions and links to all the essays on Memory Writers Network, click here.

To order my step-by-step how-to guide to write your memoir, click here.

Stephen Markley Interview Part 6: Post-publication blues?

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by Jerry Waxler

Writers who aspire to publish a book are eager to reach the finish line. Then when they cross the line, that particular race is over but life goes on and presents new challenges. I asked Stephen Markley a few questions about how what changed after he published “Publish this Book.”

Does writing a memoir limit your life?

Jerry Waxler: Your writing teacher didn’t want you to publish this book because he warned you that your first book defines you, and he said the memoir “wasn’t you.” Is this another bit of satire? I’m not sure how a memoir wouldn’t be you?

Your writing teacher’s advice is probably not that far off from one of the common fears I’ve heard from many aspiring memoir writers. They are afraid that if they write their memoir, it would mean their life is over, as if at the end of the memoir they are supposed to put down pencils down the way you would during an exam, and everything after that is cheating.

So what do you think, now that you’ve published it? Was the writing teacher right? Did it lock you into a direction you didn’t want to go? Was it the end?

Stephen Markley: I certainly hope it’s not the end. Look, I want from my career what every writer wants: the ability to choose whatever project interests me regardless of commercial relevance. Whether this will ever happen remains to be seen. I certainly found it was easier to publish a non-fiction book, so I can’t disregard that, but I do want to write fiction and follow my other passions and let my intellectual curiosity take me where it will. What my professor feared was that I would be essentially trapped in this young-guy-snarks-on-the-world shtick without any way of returning to some of that darker literary territory that I was writing when we first met.

To a degree, that trap has been sprung and I am caught in it, but I’m not worried yet. “Publish This Book” is partly an advertisement for books to come: it’s saying to readers, “Hey, here’s what I did with a memoir. Any interest in other genres?” To the extent that I get people telling me that they look forward to reading a novel, I think it’s succeeding in some small way.

Basically, I’ve resigned myself to being a writer with a small following. I doubt I’ll ever have the mainstream success of some of those big-timers who can throw together a book based on a reliable script every year or so. It’s just not who I am, and writing the same book over and over again does not interest me.

Marketing the book

Jerry: Are you really running around to colleges the way you planned to do in the book?

Stephen: Well, I just quit my job at Cars.com and plan to spend the summer out and about on the east coast driving around doing bookstore signings. Then in the fall, I’m going to go full bore at colleges again. My reasoning is that if ever there was a time to be young and unemployed and a little stupid, this is it. I’ll stay with friends, drink a lot, and kiss a pretty girl or two. I doubt I’ll look back when I’m fifty and wonder what would have been if I’d stayed in my cubicle making a reliable $35k a year.

What’s next?

Jerry: What are you working on for your next project?

Stephen: What I’m working on now is either an unwieldy disaster that I will give up at some point or an inspired fictional experiment. I feel the same way about it now as I did when I was at roughly the same point in writing “Publish This Book”: I’m not at all sure if it’s going to work, but I’m having a hell of a lot of fun writing it. It’s about writing (again), but also about the current cultural and political epoch. I have a feeling almost everything I write for the rest of my life will in some way be about the past decade: the years 2001-2010 have just been too breathtaking in horrific and wonderful ways to not dedicate an entire branch of literature to them.

Mostly, I just want “Publish This Book” to sell enough copies and garner enough fans that I can write and publish for the rest of my life. It’s really rare to get an opportunity like this: to be young and single and unattached and constantly inspired and ferociously hungry. There aren’t enough hours in the day to get every idea I have onto paper. I sometimes blink and wonder if all this has actually happened for me. Only once, I spotted someone in public reading my book. It was on the Brown Line in Chicago, and I did a double-take when I saw the cover. I just wanted to walk up and hug her.

Notes

Visit Stephen Markley’s Home Page

To read my review of the book, click here.

More memoir writing resources

To see brief descriptions and links to all the essays on Memory Writers Network, click here.

To order my step-by-step how-to guide to write your memoir, click here.

To learn about my 200 page workbook about overcoming psychological blocks to writing, click here.

Stephen Markley Interview Part 4: Structure of a Memoir

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by Jerry Waxler

The first thing that caught my attention when I picked up Stephen Markley’s “Publish this Book” was that it was a parody of itself, a memoir about “writing this very book.” This trick of self-conscious awareness, or “meta” as it has come to be called, played a big role in my thought process in college. If my friends and I observed something, we could then continue the discussion by making a comment about making the observation. It’s a mental twist I still enjoy 40 years later. In fact, now that I think of it, this might explain my interest in memoirs. First, we live our lives. And then the memoir is our commentary on what we just lived. A memoir is by its nature “meta.” But Stephen Markley’s memoir is even more meta than that. In this Part 4 of my multi-part interview, I ask him about his fascination with the structure of memoirs, and the shape of his own.

How you playfully constructed the long middle

Jerry Waxler: One of the known problems with writing a book is that you have to somehow keep the middle moving along. In writing classes I’ve heard it called the muddle in the middle. As usual, you do a great job of sending up the long middle, by using an extraordinary trick.

You separated your mind into parts, and dramatized the battle between the parts. Wow, talk about being able to discover the conflict within everyday life. This was a lively, intriguing technique. I think any author who fears they won’t be able to find the dramatic tension in their lives ought to study some of the devices you used in your book to realize how the author discovers and accentuates tension that is already there.

One thing that surprised me about this technique was that you used the terms Ego and Id, to show your personality being broken into parts. I would have thought these Freudian terms were old-fashioned. They were already starting to lose favor back in my day. So help me understand, were you using Freudian terms to be retro, or are these terms pretty widely understand in your generation as well?

Stephen Markley: I chose the terms because they are very identifiable. Everyone has heard of them, even if they might not be able to give the exact definition. Plus, I loved the idea of part of myself being this completely self-consumed narcissist and the even deeper part being just plain fucking crazy.

Jerry: One of the things I love about reading memoirs is that it helps me understand how other people think, what they believe, and so on. With your Ego and Id battle, you’ve given me a front row seat, but into what? How well do these scenes reflect your own inner process? Do you actually think about the battle of your mind? Were you trying to develop an authentic glimpse into your inner process?

Stephen: Obviously, everyone is more complicated than a simple three-way personality battle. I used that device because 1) it was comical and 2) it allowed me, Stephen Markley, off the hook. I had embodiments of poor decisions or cruel things I said or did. This sounds cowardly, but it helped me write more honestly. The crucial scene comes at the end, after I’ve found out that the book will be published, and my Ego’s swagger is suddenly gone. Because the only purpose the Ego ever serves is to buffer the writer from cold reality, criticism, and setbacks. When the Ego realizes the biggest obstacle has suddenly been removed, he becomes terrified. It was my way of showing that all ego is always a shield.

How authentic is any of this? I have no idea. I’d say it’s as close to the bone as I could cut. But when you’re sawing off your own arm, you might think you’re halfway done and look down to discover you’ve barely pierced the bicep.

How do young people end a memoir?

Jerry: In memoir writing workshops, many young people are nervous about writing memoirs because their lives have not arrived at the conclusion. For example, if an author had not yet married, how would they reach closure on loneliness? You seem to have addressed this problem head on, but not with a simple answer. You use a variety of literary devices to reach a conclusion. The strange thing is that you reach the end in several ways: with a relationship, with a long footnote (huh?), and with the publication of “this very book.”

Your ending was a send-up of memoir endings, and like your joke about discussing false memoirs in a false scene, you are ending the book with a variety of ways to end the book. I’m amazed that you have so much interest and passion about the form that you are sending up the whole structure of a memoir. Your youthful craziness is applied so beautifully to this writing challenge it makes me proud to have been young once. Thanks for this fun exploration of story form.

Stephen: You’re welcome.

Extreme Meta

Jerry: Your memoir takes the prize for meta- a book about itself. I told my writing group about the concept of your book, not really expecting them to understand what I was talking about. The moment the first sentence had left my mouth, they cracked up laughing. Your publisher apparently liked the joke, too.

Books that were huge in the college scene in the 60’s often had this self-referential or ironic or self-aware humor. An example that comes to mind is Catch-22 with all of its paradoxes, like the fact that Major Major Major was bullied because people thought he was being arrogant, which turned him into a recluse and yet also promoted him to becoming a major.

Just as the ironies and paradoxes did not detract from the serious points of Catch 22 (war stinks, power corrupts), I felt that your humor did not interfere with your serious points about the difficulties of growing up, the hunger of the aspiring artist, and the urgent relevance of compassion lurking within your devil-may-care attitude.

Do you find that self-referential humor is still a hallmark of college reading? Has the meta thing struck your college audiences as a big deal? Have you decided to hang your hat on meta, or do you think you’re just passing through?

Stephen: While I certainly don’t think the obsession with self-referential humor is anything particularly new, I do think the generation I’m a part of just finds it really engaging and useful given the times. Aside from that, books that call out people’s bullshit will always be popular. I remember reading “Catch-22” and just being floored. Same with “Slaughterhouse-Five,” and “Breakfast of Champions.” Young people just like to hear that the old and wise are actually old and unimaginative. It gives us hope that we can do better. As far as “meta” goes, I think that label is basically a buzzword. If you read my book, you do discover fairly quickly that for all its meta posturing it is as old-fashioned and classic a story as there is: young man on journey faces obstacles, ponders love, loss, friendship. It’s as sweet and simple as it comes, and that story will never go out of style.

It’s possible my next project will also be thoroughly meta, but that’s OK, I think, because it will be meta in an entirely different way than “Publish This Book” was. When it comes to choosing projects I will be driven entirely by my own inner angels and demons (with the possible influence of loads and loads of cash money).

Notes

Visit Stephen Markley’s Home Page

To read my review of the book, click here.

More memoir writing resources

To see brief descriptions and links to all the essays on Memory Writers Network, click here.

To order my step-by-step how-to guide to write your memoir, click here.

To learn about my 200 page workbook about overcoming psychological blocks to writing, click here.

Looking for the onramp at Philadelphia “Push To Publish” writer’s conference

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by Jerry Waxler

At the Philadelphia Stories’ “Push to Publish” conference in the Fall of 2009, I peered into a room filled with cabaret tables, each with an editor on one side and an empty chair on the other. Christine Weiser, who along with Carla Spataro organized the conference, stood guard at the door. When the moment arrived she opened the gate and the pack of us hustled in, eager to sop up every one of our allotted 15 minutes.

“Speed dating” is my favorite way to meet editors. In fact it’s my only way. Over the last ten years, I’ve met a dozen of them, and from each interview I take away some insight about the gatekeepers who stand between me and my future readers. Probably the most informative meeting was the very first, when a young editor told me, “I don’t understand what you’re trying to say.” Since then I have refined my message, learning to be as clear and concise as possible. I’ve also become increasingly curious about them. By turning the tables and asking them to talk about themselves, I deepen my respect for them as real people with whom I may some day do business.

At many conferences, attendees only get one chance, but “Push to Publish” offers multiple interviews. First I headed to Fran Metzman who represented the online Journal Wild River Review, as well as the printed Schuylkill Valley Journal. I told her of my interest in finding a outlet for my essays about memoir writing. Even though Metzman was responsible for fiction at these journals, she also writes a nonfiction column on women’s issues for Wild River Review. “Yes, submit a proposal,” she said. “Just be sure to do a professional job.”

My other date was with Christine Yurick, the publisher of the new print publication “Think Journal.” I asked her to describe her journal’s specific slant. She said she likes structured stories. I was puzzled.

“I assumed that by definition a story has a structure.”

“No, not all,” Yurick said. “Some journals emphasize experimental pieces.”

This explained why I sometimes can’t understand literary journals. Today’s ah-ha revealed that these publications differ in their philosophy of Story. I filed the concept away for future reference, to help me look for the place most appropriate for my writing.

When we finished, she said she would check out my blog and get back to me if she thought there was a match. Note to Self: “Gatekeepers read blogs.”

The net result of the two interviews was a glimmer of hope that literary journals might someday provide an onramp into publishing.

Creative Nonfiction Craze

When it was time to go to the first workshop, I selected a panel called “Tapping Into The Creative Nonfiction Craze.” The assigned room was locked, so about 40 of us trooped down to the auditorium, and arranged chairs into a makeshift meeting area. Our numbers and eagerness suggested that Creative Nonfiction is indeed a craze. And yet, despite its popularity, most literary journals still publish mainly fiction and poetry. The one exception, not surprisingly, is the journal “Creative Nonfiction” which is devoted exclusively to the genre.

As each panel member offered their observations about writing stories of truth, I began to grow optimistic that perhaps memoir writers have a widening channel through which to publish their work. Curtis Smith reinforced my suspicion when he said, “thanks to the proliferation of online and print journals, this is a great time to be a writer.”

The last time I heard offer such an upbeat claim for writers was years ago when Kurt Vonnegut said in an interview that during the 1950s many writers got their start by publishing in magazines. His nostalgia made me curse the day I was born, wishing to be alive in a good time for writers. Curtis Smith claimed those times had returned. Happy day!

Continuing my search for the onramp to publishing, I attended another panel called “The Joys of Small Press.” Moderator Barbara Berot said that small presses are an easier entry point for new writers. Marc Schuster, Acquisitions Editor for PS Books, pointed out another advantage. “Big publishers are looking for products that will sell while small presses are looking for books they love.” Another panelist Debra Leigh Scott said that because of advances in printing technology, the cost of starting your own small publishing house has never been lower.

Like so many other people in the business, these panelists agreed “there isn’t much money in writing.” From there, the session sputtered back and forth between the strategies of publishing and the difficulties of earning money. Naturally I would like to be rich, but I keep this motivation at bay, because the more I think about money, the more likely that I’ll focus on its absence.

Curtis Smith, the same guy who cheered me up in the previous panel, offered a way out.  “Keep your day job and write for fun.” His reassuring smile reminded us that money is only one of the many rewards of writing.

In my younger years, when offered a choice between a dark thought and a happy one, I always chose dark, believing that was automatically the smarter of the two. I soon became adept at seeing darkness at the end of every path. After a few years, I had my fill of smart despair, and decided I’d rather be happy. I diligently studied the art of finding something pleasurable in almost every situation.

The business of writing provides a perfect opportunity to exercise this discretion. Given the choice between misery and fun, I follow Curtis Smith’s advice and choose fun. In fact, fun is precisely the reason I attend writing conferences. By coming together with other writers, I enjoy the pleasure of their company, transforming writing from an isolated activity to a social one.

At the end of the day, I thanked Christine Weiser for another great conference. She said, “By the way. Would you be willing to submit some of your essays to the Philadelphia Stories blog?” Here was another opportunity to participate in the writing community, and another way to reach readers and writers. “I’d love to,” I said and walked out to my car. Skipping past puddles from the all-day autumn rain, I eagerly anticipated the approaching winter, looking forward to a whole season full of excuses to stay inside and write.

—

This is the second article I wrote about the 2009 Push To Publish Conference.  To read Part 1, click here.

Publish! How to share your memoir with readers

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by Jerry Waxler

Once you’ve written your memoir, will it languish in a drawer, waiting for the day when your heirs will find it? I doubt that plan will inspire you. I have always thought it morbid to worry too much about what will happen to my remains after I’m gone. I want to share my writing now. And there are so many options that can provide that satisfaction.

Writing feels like a very private act, just between your thoughts and the paper, while publishing by definition exposes you, connects you, lets others in. But it turns out writing and publishing are more connected than they first appear. This entire system of words was developed by humans to communicate with each other. Paper is simply a clever repository, where words wait until it is time to fulfill their potential. Here is a summary of the ways that writers move these words from paper to a reader’s mind.

Traditional commercial publishing
Commercial publishing is a business, and like any business, you must learn the ropes, make contacts, find what the market wants and is willing to pay for, and then make a deal. You’ll have to learn how to write queries to gain their attention, and you’ll have to prove to them that there are lots of people who admire you enough to buy your book. If you don’t prove you have lots of such people, most publishers will pass you by. All of these requirements are doable, but they take you far beyond your initial goal of sitting alone and writing.

Self-publish
You can bypass the commercial publishers and publish it yourself. This means no begging. You have complete control. And with control comes responsibility. No matter how good a writer you are, it’s worthwhile to hire a professional editor to fix typos and grammar indiscretions as well as to streamline clumsy sentences. And you’ll need to design the cover and format the book. It’s all up to you. But when you’re done, you’ll have published a real book that you can sell at lectures, give to family members, and market to the public.

Self-publishing technology 1 – Print on Demand
When you have a completed work, you can get it set up as a print-on-demand book through any one of dozens of such companies. They only print what you sell. There are no boxes of books in your basement.

Self-publishing technology 2 – Short run printing
Once you get your book ready for a publisher, you can have it printed in a short run, of 50 or 100 at a time, more economically than you might expect.

Blogs and websites
To get your life into the public, blogs make it as easy as writing in a diary. You might start out just for you, and as you find your voice, you might hook up with others of like minded interest or experience.

Writing groups, critique groups, memoir groups
Writing groups are a wonderful way to share creative time with a few other people, telling stories about writing, swapping tips, critiquing each other’s work. Because you share so much of yourself, these connections can turn into lifelong friendships.

Special interest groups
If your story appeals to special interest groups, like veterans, or an ethnic, religious, or professional group, your book will make a wonderful talking point to earn you invitations to meetings and to become an expert in your community.

Repurpose your material for magazine and other writing
You can keep going, using the material you researched for your memoir as raw material for non-fiction articles as well as for more storytelling and fiction.