Recently, I've been in contact with Eliza Stopps (author of the Leslie Kim Serial) and she was kind enough to answer a few of my publishing orientated questions. As an aspiring author, I'm always looking for more information about the industry and, while Eliza is self-published, she gave me some insightful facts about the publishing process.
Now, I'm nothing if not generous, so thought I'd post the interview on my blog in case there are any other budding authors intrigued about how they might publish a book one day!
I must say a huge thank you to Eliza for taking the time to answer my questions and I hope you guys enjoy!
How many literary agents would suggest sending your synopsis and manuscript to, per time?
I think this depends on the agent. Check on the literary agent's website for the answer to this, because some agents would prefer you don't submit to more than one agent at a time. If that is the case, just send it to one agent and wait for their response before moving on. Otherwise, you can do it in batches.
For me personally, I write in a variety of genres. I might be submitting a children's book, poetry, and science fiction short stories all at the same time. I usually submit to 1-3 agents per manuscript at a time, just so I am personally familiar with each agent. If you submit to like 100 agents all at the same time, you will get your name out there but that in itself can be a negative. If you submit to 3 agents and they all return with feedback saying that your book isn't right, it might be a good idea to read over your synopsis and query and see if there is any way you can improve before sending it to the next batch. If you send it out to many agents at the same time, you will have less time to improve between queries.
Ultimately, it's a personal choice for each author. My advice would be to do enough queries that you get over the anxiety of writing them but not so many that you feel overwhelmed and frustrated by the process.
What are the pros and cons of traditional publishing?
Yes, school and college is upon us students for another year but... look at all the new releases! The authors understand our pain and decide to unleash all their new releases on us at once.... making us seriously behind in reading. Yay!
