MJ Huntsgood
According to the New York Times, 81% of Americans have a novel burning inside of them, but less than 3% of those people turn that novel to paper. Recent statistics show that of those who do write that book, a staggering 0.01% end up being represented by a coveted literary agent, or someone to promote their book to publishing houses. Despite many of these books being excellent, well-written, or even extremely marketable, the barrier to entry stands very high.
But you can do it. Here’s how.
First, you must come up with an Idea.
Traditional publishing is built on markets. So you need to have a hooky, exciting Idea, and part of that is just built on luck. What I tend to do is just focus on the characters and the central themes, and allow for flexibility within the plot/setting to ensure audience engagement later in the editing process to keep my readers hooked.
Second, you need to write the Book.
Develop drafting habits. Build a schedule. Consider joining groups like your local early morning writer’s clubs to encourage accountability. It’s at 5:00 a.m. Set your alarm. Don’t be late.
Your spouse, of course, doesn’t really approve. The two of you have always been night owls, and even now, while you’re drafting late into the night, you hear the sounds of video games upstairs. The alarm goes off at four and you both groan. You draft. Your spouse makes you coffee.
Be dedicated, that’s my motto. Watch people get agents on social media faster than you. Get stressed. Spend a few nights not sleeping, just writing. Mainline coffee. Collapse into bed just as your spouse gets up for work.
“Do you want me to stay with you?”
“Nah, you can go.”
While you’re at it and since you’re up so late, join the sprint group, the one that does sprint-writes at 10 p.m. on Tuesdays. And the one that does 9 p.m. on Thursdays every other week.
But it’s not enough, just writing. You have to get feedback. What a reader sees tells you what you need to fix.
Because, third, you’ll need to edit the Book.
Meet up with critique groups. Join three. Join four. Start your own reading group. Meet biweekly. Share your work. Get feedback. Draft. Draft. Draft. Get feedback. Draft. It’s nearly time to query.
That’s right, the fourth step is querying.
“Querying” is the process of finding an agent. You need to learn how to write a query letter and prepare a submission package. There are about eight hundred different websites on how to do this and all of them give differing information, so ensure that you are as confused as possible as you dive in.
There are lots of places you can go to drop your query letter for critique. If you’re tender-hearted like me, I highly recommend Reddit. They give gentle, soul-crushing reviews on your query letters and plot, allowing you to rethink both your letter and your life in general.
Maybe you need to change the plot. Maybe the Idea wasn’t as hooky as you thought.
Your spouse reads the 18th draft of chapter one and gets confused if Raj has super powers in this draft or if Trish is still supposed to be a ghost. You sigh and say that you’ve simplified things. You send over the new blurb with the new plot.
Go back to step two. Draft.
Draft.
Draft.
Draft.
Resubmit your query letter to Reddit with a new plot and a simplified format. They love it. Multiple requests to be beta readers. You’re thrilled.
The Book must be ready. Back to step four. Query.
It’s been six months since the Idea and the house has fallen into disarray. You look around and see that you haven’t really moved from your couch in over eighteen hours. The latest work Zoom meeting is playing on the coffee table but you’re drafting. Always drafting. Work is behind. Everything is behind. But the Book is almost ready.
It’s so quiet. When did your spouse leave the room? What about reading chapter 18?
A ping on your phone makes you jump. It’s your best friend. She is younger and prettier and significantly more talented than you are. She has a book deal.
You’re falling behind again. You need to catch up.
You take your query letter and your novel and throw them out into the world. Take them to the big agencies. The best agencies. Your favorite agencies.
Rejection. Rejection.
They love your letter. They hate your Book.
You hate your Book too.
Readers. Critiques. Drafts. Jump back and forth among the steps.
Your job tells you they’re downsizing. You almost feel relieved. More time to draft. More time for the Book. You can take on those 3 p.m. critique groups. Your spouse takes on later hours at work.
Draft.
Draft.
Draft.
It’s not enough. You need help. Maybe an editor. Let them take that step away from you.
It’s $3000 for a developmental editor, and the bills are piling up. You’ve been out of work a month, but the draft is almost done. You’re ready to go back into the trenches, but you need one more look over the draft. Someone who knows the industry. Someone who knows what they’re doing.
Your finger hovers over your 401k.
It’s your savings. It’s your retirement. You don’t need it. You could go back to work. You could take a break from the Book.
“It’s your dream,” your spouse says, muting a late meeting. “Since you were a kid. Retirement can wait.”
Half a year’s salary drops into your account. You don’t use it for debt. You use it to live on. You have to. You have to finish the Book. You give it to the editor. The notes are enough to get you going.
You edit. You polish it. You perfect it.
“This is it.” Your spouse says. “It is. It’s ready.”
Query again. Query everyone.
Rejections.
Rejections are signs of problems within the text.
Draft. Go to conferences and workshops for first pages. Perfect yours. Do critique after critique on your first pages. Make them shine.
Partial requests. They liked the first pages.
Rejections.
Rejections are signs of problems within the text.
Work on the pages you sent. Critique after critique after critique.
Draft.
Draft.
Partial requests.
It’s February. Ice gathers on the branches outside your window. You’ve started your next novel in an effort to take away from the mind-numbing ache of waiting.
Your eyes drift to your text messages. The world outside of writing. Your “real life” friends.
Heard about your job, are you okay?
Haven’t seen you in a while, want to get lunch?
When are we getting together?
You don’t leave the house anymore, you don’t have people over. The living room is a wreck. Your spouse tries to clean, your spouse tries to keep up, but working for two takes its toll. Holding up the weight of you and your dreams is heavy.
An email notification pops up. It’s from an agent you admire. Ah, it must be another rejection. You’ve gotten six this week. You flip it open.
I’m intrigued by this premise and would love to see the rest of the novel. Please attach it and send it along.
In the querying world, this is a full request.
A full request! An agent wants to read your novel! The whole thing! You scream and inform your best friend who calls and screams with you. There is no competition, there is nothing but delight. You are two succeeding stars in orbit, moving towards the goals you have dreamed of.
Your spouse comes out of a meeting. Tired, but smiling. “Did I hear you got a full request?”
“Let’s go somewhere,” you say.
“Where?”
“London. To celebrate this, and me going back to work.” You promise to take a break. To stop throwing yourself into it. You’ve clearly done enough, and it’s time to step back, to let things take their course. To let your life go back to what it was before the Idea.
You and your spouse make a cleaning chart so you can start to do your share. You know you’re the problem here and you’re going to make it right.
Go to brunch with your friends.
Clean the house. Your spouse loads the dishwasher and you unload.
Get another full request.
Go to London. Get a full request while you’re standing under the Eye.
Come home, get job interview after job interview. Land them. Get hired quickly, easily. Start immediately. Feel the burn of success running through your veins. It is February and you are on fire.
It is March and there is silence. Your job is slow and you come into work and sit, bored. You have nothing to do. Your commute is long. You go home and work on your next novel. You query new agents. Occasionally, you get a rejection. Occasionally, you get a full request. Mostly, there is silence.
The first rejection on a full request will come through soon enough. And then another.
Rejections are signs of problems within the text.
But there are so many full requests out! How can you make edits to the full now?
Scramble. Find readers. Get feedback. Implement. Long nights. Intense edits. Meet with industry professionals and go on forums on how to handle talking to agents about updating the full.
Take time off. Go to a big conference with your work and have a critique group look at it over zoom late at night. Get feedback.
Edit.
Edit.
Edit.
The dishes stay in the dishwasher until Thursday.
Projects start to come in at work, but you’ve taken to doing edits at your desk. This needs to happen now. Why couldn’t you have learned about this while things were slow?
But you’re committed. You stay up late. You get up early. You fix it. You crush it. It’s done. You write the letters saying you have an updated manuscript and send them out to all your fulls.
Half of them reply.
Now, contrary to all of the articles and advice you have read, you will have a “dream agent.” Do not even try to kid yourself. Everyone out there gets one. You’ll sit there, moon-eyed, thinking about your agent and you’ll flip your absolute crap when that agent asks for your full. You’ll dream about them calling you with an offer. You’ll dream about publishing deals. You’ll dream about the nightmare being over.
Invest in tissues. Crying is a mandatory part of this process, as you are required to consider yourself a failure throughout, especially after the three-month mark has passed with several of the fulls you have out. Find yourself taking the day off and sitting in the car in front of a friend’s house, your phone in hand.
“Can I come in?”
“Where are you?”
“I’m in front of your house.”
You’ll need to sob into their arms that you’ll never make it in this industry, that you’ve put everything, everything on the line for this Book, for trying to get published.
The clean house.
Your stable job.
Your spouse’s happiness.
And for what? You can’t live on an author’s income. Your career is so much more lucrative, and you’ve thrown it in the toilet for this dream, this thing, and you’re in so deep you don’t know what you’re doing.
Your friend tries to comfort you. She’s new at this game, but she’s already better at it. She’s sent out four queries and already gotten one full request. You’ve sent out a hundred and gotten fifteen. You’re falling behind, always behind.
You go home and look over your manuscript. You’ve taken to smoking in the living room. Your spouse retreats upstairs to play video games. It’s less stuffy there. Cigarette after cigarette, line after line of text. When will it ever be good enough?
An email pops up.
It’s a reply to one of your fulls. Your heart sinks. It can’t be a rejection from this agent. Not this agent.
Thank you so much for allowing me to read your novel. I absolutely loved your main character and this incredible story!! I really felt this experience, it was so well written and such a needed story!!
The enthusiasm flows off the page. They want to set up a meeting with you. This is it. It’s the Call. Where they offer representation. You’re it. You’re the 0.01%.
You cry on the phone to your friends. You sob to your spouse, who will order sushi and champagne so you can celebrate. You tell your coworkers, who won’t get it at all. They think you’re some weird, bookish person who doesn’t get out much. That’s so weird, because you used to be so outgoing back before the Idea.
You research questions to ask during the Call. You join several agented forums and get tips. You practice. Your best friend tells you what she wished she asked.
You sit in front of the agent on zoom on a warm Monday afternoon. The agent. The agent. They loved the Book. They loved your characters. They want to represent you. They have a plan. Their plan is great. You ask them a few questions about the characters, because you just want to see if they get it, and they do. You ask them questions about their strategy, and they know it well.
You want to say yes on the spot.
Everyone tells you the procedure is to wait three weeks and nudge all your agents. That is what you do. The next day you get another offer. The next day another agent who had been silent asks for your updated full.
When you send that “I am thrilled to begin working with you” email, the silence of the room around you will be sudden and deafening. You’ll look around, and realize that it has been 10 months and you’ve been absent for most of them. It was all-consuming. The Book, the publishing world. It needed to happen, for you. You needed to get published, and you’re only halfway there. Your agent still needs to submit you to publishing houses. You needed to do this, though. You needed to make this a reality, and whatever it cost, it cost.
You message your two writing friends. Do you want to have a party to celebrate me getting an agent?
Hell Yeah
absolutely not, i’m in the middle of rewrites i’ll be with you in spirit
“Did you send your agent the email yet?” your spouse says, coming through the doorway.
“Just did,” you say.
“Your favorite, right?” Putting the groceries down, your spouse hands you a bottle of champagne. “Are we having a party?”
“Rebecca is down,” you say.
“I’ll invite everyone else. They’ll be so excited to see you.”
And you know what? They’ll come. They’ll be thrilled at your accomplishment. They’ll marvel at what you’ve done, and they’ll know you’ve worked hard. So hard.
“Too hard,” they’ll say.
You wave them off and toss a bowling ball down the lane. “I’m just committed. I’ll be done before you know it.”
You give your agent your Idea portfolio, which is a list of what upcoming books you’d like to write. It is June. You calculate how long it took you to write your last novel. You have just been laid off again, so you have more time to write. You tell your agent October.
Writing a novel in a few months isn’t that hard.
You did it before.
Back to step one.
MJ Huntsgood is a speculative thriller and horror author who enjoys exploring the use of perspective and deep POV in her work to find the nightmare not just in a situation, but within ourselves. She hopes you, like her, dream of leaving this boring dystopia where we work to earn the right to work and human rights are even remotely up for debate. Since 2023, she has been in over two dozen literary magazines and has published in anthologies with Timber Ghost Press, Red Cape Publishing, and Macmillan Children’s Books. She is a loser of various awards, and an applicant for many others. She lives in an unreasonably haunted townhome in Washington DC with her ever dwindling number of underwatered plants, 2 cats, and trophy husband. You can find her at www.mjhuntsgood.com and on most social media sites @MJHuntsgood.
Photos by MJ Huntsgood
