Your Guide to Writing the Perfect Story

The Publishing Process

I've had some queries on the publishing process, and I'm going to do the best I can to outline it for you. Keep in mind that I have never attempted to publish a book and I am not well-educated on this topic. However, I will do my best and hopefully that will help you out.

Before I begin, I'm going to give you an idea on how this chapter is going to look. First, I'm going to explain the different ways to publish a book because you do have options and it's very important to consider them so that you can make the best choice possible. Next, I will outline the steps prior to publishing your story and on. Lastly, I will let you know the things that publishers look for or will not accept as well as basic tips or pieces of information you should know. Some of this you may recognize from other chapters. 

Part One: Publishing Options

1. Traditional Publishing

Traditional publishing is probably the one that you would think of whenever you hear the word "publish". It's where writers find an agent willing to represent them and that agent of theirs sells their proposal/book to a publishing company. Authors are given some money in advance. Writers would then work through revisions with help from editors at a publishing house. The cover, format, etc is all handled by the publisher. 

2. Vanity Publishing

If you are vanity publishing, that means that the publishing company isn't selecting books because of their content; you are paying them to publish it. The company prints your books, but you are responsible for editing and designing everything, usually. This is a form of self-publishing and is often looked down upon. However, it's perfectly acceptable and common for people to use this method to print books for personal reasons, like a family album or such.

3. Subsidy Publishing

Subsidy publishers have a partnership with the authors. Unlike in traditional publishing, people going this route must make a financial investment prior to their book being published instead of receiving money. The company handles distribution, marketing, etc and authors start being paid right away once the book starts getting sold. Subsidy publishers are less selective in what they publish.

4. Self-Publishing

In self-publishing you are entirely responsible for editing, cover-making, layout, distribution, and marketing. Usually self-publishers hire people to cover certain aspects of this process. Usually they publish their book on platforms like Amazon. A con is that the author must cover all of the publishing costs by themselves, but they also retain all the rights and ownership of their work.

Part Two: Steps of Traditional Publishing

For this part of the chapter, I'm going to focus primarily on traditional publishing because I suspect that is the route that the people asking these questions were intending to go. Plus, it is arguably the most common kind of publishing. As I begin, you'll notice that I cover things before the actual publishing process.

Step 1: 

Plan and research your story. That should be the first step. I won't delve into it because I have in previous chapters.

Step 2: 

Write the story. That should be fairly self-explanatory.

Step 3: 

Revise the story. This is really important because agents aren't going to want to represent a story that is rough around the edges. Smooth over the jagged parts before submitting it to an agent. Not to mention that corrections made by an editor are very expensive and you will be responsible for those costs.