Consider my Eyebrows Raised Part IV

17) Apologies. I know I’ve said it before, but they drive me nuts. A sense of humor and a basic knowledge of the process helps. I neither need nor want authors to demean themselves, but there have been some amusing iterations of salutations such as “To Whatever Poor Bastard Has to Read This,” or lines in the query humorously acknowledging trouble they’ve had being placed, time they spent in the industry themselves, or why they’ve suddenly switched from technical manuals to books for eight year olds (which is more common than you’d think.) Again, played right it shows you’ve got a leg up. But never, ever apologize. Seriously. Don’t. Thanks are good. Apologies, not so much.

18) Ms. Crew- So now I’m the bearded lady, am I? Well, why not? Probably more money to be made in the circus than in publishing anyway.

19) Let’s talk lengths real fast. Here’s what the average book SHOULD be: 20,000 for MG, 40,000 for YA and 60,000 for Adult. Each CAN be about twice as long and still be relatively safe. I mean, any of you guys ever read Stephen King’s book on how to write? I didn’t, but I was there during the lunch break when he wrote it. Seriously though, one of his rules is a good one. Whatever you write, you should expect, indeed, you should self enforce a mandatory 10% reduction in word count after the fact. And if you’re Stephen King, I’d recommend a 30% reduction because GODDAMN. Anyway, I can’t really give you a magic cut off point, but going more than double my rough estimate of averages is VERY bad. Can you sell a 150,000 word adult novel? Yeah. But your agent will want to cut 10%. And the editor will want to cut 10% again after that. And that’s a lot of work. You’d improve your chances if you did it yourself. Can you sell a 75,000 word Middle Grade? Probably not. You may look at like, Harry Potter or Scott Westerfield and say “but they did it!” except that their books are targeted essentially at the 12-14 market. Regular middle grade is more like 8-11. Also, they’re established. Also, those books aren’t as big as you think they are. They may have page counts like giant adult novels, but the text is big, the leading is big (until later in HP when the books got so long on account of Rowling’s absolute refusal to edit that they had to shrink the text so the books were small enough to bind without going to specialized printers who normally do stuff like encyclopedias) the margins are big, chapter headings are big, and there are illustrations. Is Behemoth by Westerfield 500 pages? Yes. How many words is it? Less than 75K, I’d wager, and he’s already a big star. Like it or not, you can’t do what he does. It’s actually really simple math: the shorter your manuscript the less work it is to edit- when you edit, your agent, and your editor. The shorter it is when it’s done, the cheaper it is to print, which makes for better margins, which makes for happier editors. All other things being equal, when presented with two good books: One 80,000 word adult novel and one 130,000 word novel, which will they pick? The one that costs two dollars per copy to print or the one that costs three? And when you put this all together, remember that editors spend most of their time in meetings. The editing gets done at home. 50 hours a week is light in publishing and editors routinely work double shifts. One at the office, the other nights and weekends. Shorter books mean the editor can give what’s there more attention. Also, it makes them happy since they’ll have more free time. This circumstance also applies to many agents. Do you want your agent and editor to be happy? Yes. Why? Because then you can sell your next book more easily.