Attention: All writers
From: Me
Subject: If you want to get published, read this
When I am published it will be with great thanks to David Henry Sterry and Arielle Eckstut, a husband and wife team who seem genuinely interested in being helpful. They are The Book Doctors, experts in the field of publishing.
Finding an agent is a horrible task. I’m not whining; ask anybody. It took me approximately 15 months to write A REASONABLE PRICE. That was a breeze compared to the effort I’ve spent querying the novel. Mind you, the dozen or so people who’ve read my novel have “loved” it. I’ve been told, “I was late for a doctor’s appointment because I couldn’t put it down.” “I woke up in the night wondering what secrets Dana was protecting.” “It was riveting!” “It is an incredible novel.” The ending is “brilliant.”
Shall I keep going?
But apparently I’m terrible at “selling” my own work. Selling was so much easier when I was an art dealer and I could pitch my artists’ work!
Fortunately, I found The Book Doctors.
Eckstut and Sterry wrote a book in 2005 called PUTTING YOUR PASSION INTO PRINT. In 2010, I read it, dog-eared it, highlighted it, and queried the novel I was working on at the time. (I’ve always thought of myself as a quick learner, but … ) This February, I saw that Eckstut and Sterry had updated their book (now called THE ESSENTIAL GUIDE TO GETTING YOUR BOOK PUBLISHED), and they were doing a webinar through Writers’ Digest, so I signed up and bought the updated copy of their book.
After years of studying the “art” of query letters, I learned more from their webinar in ninety minutes than I ever did reading about it. Their advice was straight-forward and logical, and the webinar was quite entertaining.
Recently, I had a one-on-one consultation with David Henry Sterry. David walked me through my pitch and told me what most insiders won’t say. He is a smart and funny guy, and he has given me loads of new-found confidence.
I’ve been sending out my revised query letter for a couple weeks now, and have gotten some strong interest. Woot, woot! Time will tell, I suppose. Let’s just say I have a really good feeling about the new pitch. Thank you, David and Arielle.
If you are a writer who wants to be published, or you know someone who is, check out The Book Doctors. You’ll be glad you did.