Jan Christensen

Many folks are very interested in how writers get published. Here is how I did it and some suggestions for those who want to do it, too.

First, of course, was the desire to write. Next, I picked a genre--mysteries. A helpful hint is, what do you read the most? Whether it's romance, mysteries, horror, fantasy, mainstream or literary, pick one.

Next question is always, "How do you get your ideas?" Never from someone else! The idea has to come from inside the writer--something that sparks his or her interest. A good way to find out if you really can be a writer is to look around the room you are sitting in, pick an object, set a timer for ten minutes, and write for that full ten minutes, without stopping. Try to write something in your genre. If you can do that, you can be a published writer.

As long as you have some other talents, of course. One is persistence. This is not an easy business. It's loaded with pitfalls, so it is best to take it one step at a time.

I joined a writer's group, after I had written a few stories, a novel, and read about writing in books and magazines for a number of years. We met every two weeks, religiously, and we brought along enough copies of a short story or a chapter for each member. We handed those out at the end of the session. During the session, we went around the table, each person critiquing the other stories (one story at a time). Several of the members had already been published when I joined, which is a good thing--even though they didn't write in my genre, they knew the general rules of writing and pounded them into me. They also cheered my first, and every subsequent, publication. They have been a very important part of my writing life.

I started with the group writing short stories. I still believe that this is the very best way to learn to write fiction. Why? Let me count the ways:

You learn to make every word count and don't wander all over the place.
You learn about good beginnings, middles and endings.
You get to use many points of view, many different kinds of characters, settings, descriptions, and for some, even voices. You will find out which you are most comfortable doing by writing short stories.
It gives you great satisfaction to finish a piece (it takes so long with a novel).
It's easier for a group of readers to critique a short piece because they see it all at once. Much harder with a novel to give an overview reading it a bit at a time.
If a story doesn't work, it's not as big a waste of time as if a novel doesn't work.
Your novel is more apt to work after you've had all that practice writing shorts.

So, I practiced writing lots and lots of short stories, submitted some, and had a few published. It was slow going at first, though, getting those stories published. It gets much easier as a writer gets more and more out there.

Then I decided I was ready to write my second novel. The first was in a drawer, waiting for some serious editing, which I was not in the mood to do. I tend to get bored rather quickly, so I am one who writes without outlines or much in my head about how the story/novel is going to go. That way, I'm not bored with the whole thing before I get it on monitor. Luckily, I don't mind editing/rewriting very much, although would rather simply edit than have a lot to rewrite.

I thought the second novel also had some problems, but I sent it out to about sixty agents. Which means I sent out what they requested--either simply a query letter, or a letter and a synopsis or outline, or a letter, synopsis/outline and partial--usually two or three chapters. No one was particularly interested except one scam artist. Fortunately I avoided him, and kept writing. But altogether, this took probably about forty hours--a whole work week, with bad results. I admit, it was discouraging.

Novel number three was supposed to be second in the series with the same major characters as in novel number two. However, it took off on its own, and other characters took over, leaving little for the "major" characters to do. On the other hand, I had a lot more fun writing that novel than the first two. First, I was a more confident writer, and second, the subject matter was, to me, more interesting. It was about a cult, and I have not marketed it heavily at all. But I plan to.

I was writing a chapter of a book or a short story every two weeks, for years and years, to give to my writer's group. Somehow, marketing my work fell by the wayside. Some Saturdays I'd send off a huge bunch of short stories and some would even get published, but I did nothing about the novels. Except start another one.

This one was called "Sara's Search" and I finally decided to see if I could get it published. It seemed to be pretty well done, to me, and I thought it had a chance. Which it did. I sent it out about four times, and suddenly, I had an offer from Quiet Storm Publishing www.quitestormpublishing.com, which I accepted rather quickly! Not only did they want "Sara's Search," they wanted two more of my novels as well because they believe in building authors' careers.

Fortunately, by this time I had yet another novel finished, and I was happy with it, so it will go to Quiet Storm in its time. And I have half of yet another one done.

I hope you see how all this happened. I just wrote, almost every day. I got feedback from my main writer's group, and joined several others who always seemed to break up, over the years. I marketed my short stories fairly well and over twenty-five have been "sold," and twenty-five published. If I had marketed my novels as well as the shorts, perhaps I would have had a contract sooner. That is probably the only thing I would have done differently.

It should be obvious that the most common way to become a published author is to write a lot and submit a lot. Some people seem unable to do one or the other or both, but still want to be writers.

And some writers hit their stride right away, publishing almost everything they write, writing scads of new things, and just generally getting with the program. But even they have to keep it up to be successful. And I've found many more who have struggled for years than who have taken off right away.

So, the mantra for getting published is: Write, submit; write, submit; write, submit.