We talk a lot about how to sell that first novel to a major publisher, but it’s hard sometimes to draw any real conclusions on the best way to break in when all we’ve got is a lot of anecdotal data. Everyone’s path is different. The experience of someone who broke in twenty years ago might not match the realities of publishing today. For that matter, the experience of someone who broke in today might not match the realities of someone else who broke in today.
So, taking a page from Tobias Buckell and his first novel advance survey, I’ve put together a survey about selling that first novel. I would love it if anyone who has sold at least one novel (any genre, including tie-ins — there’s a question where you can enter genre) to a professional publisher (for at least a $2000 advance1) could take a few minutes to click the survey link and answer about a dozen questions. If you don’t have exact numbers, please give your best estimate.
http://jch.checkboxonline.com/FirstNovel.a
The survey will remain open through March 15. Pass it on. The more data I can pull together, the more useful the results will be. Please send people to this post instead of directly to the survey, so they get the introductory info.
I’ll post the results next month after the survey closes. This is rough, Mythbusters-style science — it’s not going to be a truly random sample, and it’s not a controlled experimental design, but it should give us some results. And it’s far better than “Well, this one guy who wrote a book once told me this is the way to sell your novel…”
If any of the survey questions are unclear, or if the survey itself gives people any trouble, please let me know ASAP so I can get that fixed.
ETA 1: For purposes of this survey, I’m not counting coauthored novels. I’m looking for the first professional novel sale where you were the sole author.
ETA 2: I do ask for book titles for verification and deduplication, if necessary. This and any other identifying information will be stripped out before anything is made public.
ETA 3: I’m looking for brand new authors and grizzled veterans alike. The broader the range of data, the more likely we’ll be able to see if certain trends have changed over time.
Thanks in advance!
—
- The minimum $2000 advance is an arbitrary cutoff point, which I took from SFWA’s guidelines for professional publishers. ↩
Mirrored from Jim C. Hines.
My Books
(August 2013)
Page Summary
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- morgan_ashbury : Professionally published= advance paid? [+0]
Comments
Only 10 responses so far, and it's already interesting. Some of my guesses look to be correct. Others, not so much :-) (3 of 10 people sold their first completed novel, which is making me jealous.) Still need a lot more data before I can draw any conclusions, though.
And I just realized I should go do the survey myself!
I think original and tie-in both count though -- that could be something to note in the genre question.
I would count the DAW sale as my first professional novel sale.
You're right that the survey doesn't take into account every possible path to publication.
Edited at 2010-02-18 04:33 pm (UTC)
I'm curious to see how this comes out.
As for how many years of writing, that one's going to be subjective. Technically, I wrote a few stories back in high school, but never did anything serious with it. It wasn't until 1995 that I started with the goal to be a "real" author, and that's the year I went by in the survey.
Everyone's experience is going to be a little different, and there are always going to be outliers. That's one of the reasons I'm hoping for a large pool of responses -- the outliers are just as valid as anything else, but the larger sample size should give us a good overall picture.
I hope.
I know it's too hard to tabulate results when you don't have valid integers. But my writing life isn't governed by valid integers. It's governed by the things I did, not by when I did them.
I'd be more than willing to share any of my data. I just can't do it on that form.
If not, that's okay too :-)
I'm thinking I should write up the results in full Mythbusters style. I just can't decide whether to dress up as Adam or as Jamie...
---L.
Do I lose brownie points for that? ;-)
Laura J. Underwood
BTW--You went to CA with me on a recent trip :-) I just finished THE MERMAID'S MADNESS on the plane back. Fabulous job! I think this one is your best yet! When is the next one out? (Answer: not soon enough.)
Red Hood comes out on July 6. I'm delighted you enjoyed Mermaid! In some ways, I think it was a more ambitious book than my previous stuff, so it's great to know you liked it!
Also, and totally unrelated, why can I never spell "judgment" right on the first try???
complimentcomplement! what Toby has.From talking to other authors, I think Toby's numbers are still pretty accurate for people selling that first novel today.
Edited at 2010-02-19 04:36 pm (UTC)
but at a better time than friday night. =)