I actually do think the prologue bias is fair. Like Sack I don't mind prologues, but I have other biases. The moment I see something is in present tense, I ditch it and move on. I know how much blood, sweat and tears that author poured into their present-tense story, but I still ditch it without a second thought. I don't owe that writer anything, especially not a read of their book. Likewise, if I see any mention of elves or wizards, that book's getting deleted (or, more likely, not even downloaded in the first place). Again, arbitrary. Again, fair. I don't owe it to that author to read their book. Agents don't owe us anything. If we include something they don't like, it isn't unfair of them to not read our work.
But I like elves and wizards! Until I realize they're all generic and they might as well not be wizards and elves.
It's when all (or most) agents decide to arbitrarily dump the same device or topic from their potential book list that our writing options shrink. I feel creative writing is rapidly being distilled down to a list of do's and don'ts. Not hypothetical lists either, but actual numbered lists in books about writing and marketing. How depressing is that? Conform or else. For generations, writers have often been nonconformists, whose view of the world is not the same as everybody else's. That is what I fear is changing, and not for the better. Where will the original voices go?
@jannert these days, with self-publishing, your writing options don't shrink. Even if you want traditional publishing, there is no good reason to pursue that alone. Take the hybrid approach, and write what you want.
Yes, I totally agree. In fact I've said it before on the forum, many times. Thank goodness for self-publishing. I know there are lots of problems with it, but I think it's the way forward. That and eBook publishing. Much as I'd rather hold a real book in my hand (mostly to be able to page forward and back more easily to double-check things) I recognise that eBooks create an opportunity to get something out for people to read that doesn't cost the earth to produce. Consequently the financial risk to the publisher (who is probably also the author) isn't high. It's the way I plan to go, for sure. My lord, it is SNOWING out there again.... And Sunday is the first day of summer?
I agree. There are problems with both routes, but by pursuing both at the same time you tend to offset the problems of one versus the other. When it comes to traditional publishing in particular, pursuing only that route seems to me to be a mistake.
Yeah but I think if that happens, there's a reason. And that reason is that the device isn't popular with readers. Because all agents and editors want is books that readers will buy. I can't agree that writing is being distilled into do's and don'ts, mostly because I don't read writing advice articles and the ones I do read I tend to eye roll at. I don't take any of them seriously. The way to learn what works and what sells is to read books that have sold. If a certain type of book isn't on the market I wouldn't take it as a cruel conspiracy from the gatekeepers but a sign that that type of book isn't in demand.
Well, I'm not bothering with the traditional route because 1) my book is way over the 120,000 word upper limit for a new novelist, and 2) I have a prologue. And 3) it's not a genre book. And 4) I'm on the wrong side of the Pond to sell a book by an American writer that's set in the American old west. So I'm not going to waste my time chasing these guys. I've spent many years reading the lists of agents, requirements, etc, and have not found a fit for me. Plus I'm not trying to build a career as a writer. So traditional publishing holds nothing for me, really. Onward and upward.
But all the things these agents say they don't want to see, we do end up seeing in many an end product. This tells me it's about the timing of presentation of a thing in our work rather than whether it can or cannot exist. I don't think options are shrinking. I think what is shrinking is time as it relates to the onslaught of work being submitted. I think we're all pretty aware that even when we do get the agent, there's a great deal of likelihood that the original manuscript we first present will see at least some change before it gets put between a glossy cover, so I don't see why, with the clues already present that have given rise to this an umpteen number of other threads on the same topic, we cannot present an item that engages the agent, and once engaged, work on selling the whole kit and caboodle.
Memoirs of a Geisha is a 186,000-word non-genre debut novel with a prologue, set in Japan, from an American author. Arthur Golden's agent is Leigh Feldman. It clearly can be done. Not wanting to pursue traditional publishing is different from being unable to and your post seems a mix of the two. Also not forgetting you don't need an agent to be traditionally published.
Non-sequitur aside: Great book! I'm not often playing outside the land of spaceships and aliens, and I really, really, really liked this book.
Well, we'll need to agree to disagree on this. I don't think it's a cruel conspiracy, but I do sense flocks of running sheep.... As in my example earlier of the coffee shop, stuff doesn't sell if it's not available. So it's easy to say 'it doesn't sell,' as an excuse for not offering it or giving it a chance. I am a huge consumer of books, and just gave 10 bin bags full of them to charity, so I have room on my 7 bookcases (5 shelves each) for more. I am a reader. And I'm a reader who has been disappointed in most of the recent books I've bought. They're not terrible, but there is a samey-ness about them that I find discouraging. The genre ones seem shallow and predictible, and the literary ones lack heart. I find most of them easy to put down. I'll pick most of them up again and finish them, but they don't stick with me, and most of them go straight on to the give away pile. The books I keep re-reading are, for the most part, the older ones. Not 'classics,' but just books that were written 10-20 years ago. Maybe this just means I'm old fashioned. Or maybe this means that recent writing lacks something that draws me in.
That book was published in 1997. Nearly 20 years ago. Good luck getting your first non-genre novel that's 186,000 words long published today. That's exactly my point. Back when I first started writing my novel (ironically around the same time as Memoirs of a Geisha was published) I fully expected to try for a traditional publisher. Times have changed.
I don't know why I'm getting into one of these arguments again. The bitterness and vitriol about agents is quite upsetting.
I'm not bitter about my own situation, actually, and I'm trying to avoid vitriol. But the reality is I realistically don't have a hope of getting my novel traditionally published—mainly due to my story's length, but also its subject matter and lack of genre. I think what irritates me is people telling me I should just go for it anyway, that others have succeeded, etc. Show me one single first-time author who has succeeded in the past couple of years with a project similar to mine (in length and subject matter) and I'll eat my hat. I've looked and looked, and can't find any. It's easier to list what my book is not than it is to discover what it is. It's not a historical novel (although it's set in the past it's not about the past.) It's not a Romance (although there is a love story in it, the love story is not the purpose of the story, and the pair get together in the middle of the story, not the end of it.) It's not a thriller, a mystery, horror, or any other genre I can think of. It most certainly is not a Western (although it is set in the American old west.) I don't consider it 'Literary' either, as my style is ordinary, and I'm not trying to be a poet. I just wanted to create a story about ordinary people trapped by a situation from the past that threatens their lives and their happiness. I tried to tell it in a straightforward, but emotionally engaging manner. I truly cannot categorise it other than to call it General Fiction—but categorise it I must, and in a couple of short paragraphs as well. I have no idea what sort of agent would be interested in it, even if it was half the length it is. I have done my research on this issue over a number of years, and have yet to come across a single agent or publishing house whose requirements match what I've written. It seems a huge waste of my time to pursue them, when I can simply self-publish and keep writing. As I've said, I'm not trying to build a career. I just want my book to get out there. I'll worry about getting the word out myself, and maybe catch a few readers. It's the story I wanted to write, and that's what matters to me.
Again, though, it's no one's job to offer it or give it a chance. Nobody needs to offer any excuses to you because nobody owes you publication. If you ask why someone does something and they tell you why, that's not offering you an excuse, it's doing you the courtesy of explaining something that isn't really any of your business. Publishing is, for the most part, a private enterprise. If the government refused to publish something, you'd have a right to at least some sort of an explanation. But you expecting a private business to give you an excuse for why they don't want to publish something makes as much sense as you being expected to offer an excuse for why you don't want to write something. I really feel like there's a weird sense of entitlement to some of these attitudes... nobody owes anybody publication or representation or an explanation of why one or the other is not being offered.
If you can't fully categorize it, maybe it'd be either best to give it the closest general genre and maybe an age group (ie: males 20-32) just because it deals with characters of that age and situations that those of such an age can understand/relate to. Just from reading tweets from agents, quite a handful want to know that the author themselves understand where it belongs in a bookstore.
I think you may have misunderstood my meaning. I'm not saying that a publisher not wanting to publish something needs to offer an excuse. They're perfectly entitled, as individual agents or publishers to say 'I don't like prologues, so I won't look at them.' However, saying it's because they don't sell is another thing entirely. That's become one of those 'truths' we're not supposed to question. But books out there with prologues do sell, so I AM questioning it. It's like my experience with the chocolate. In fact, dark chocolate assortments do sell, but only when they're in stock. No, everybody won't buy them, and some people hate dark chocolate, but enough people do like it that it's worth making it available. Dark chocolate is still being stocked in that same Thornton's store, years later, and I still go in and buy it. (My Easter Egg this year was dark chocolate and came from that store.) That day I mentioned—the day they didn't have any in the store— is the only day I've ever tried to buy it there and couldn't. So it doesn't sell was an excuse. We're being told that prologues don't sell. So ...that means most books that have been published with prologues have failed? I see quite a number of books out there that have prologues that do sell, so I just don't buy that. Unfortunately, it's now become such gospel that many folks (quoted on this forum thread) are putting it about as such. Don't write a prologue, because it won't sell. Nonsense. It's a self-perpetuating myth. They don't sell because agents and publishers don't put them out there for sale. (Obviously, like any other writing, these prologues have to be well written and appropriate to the story. But if they are good, they sell.) The milk chocolate readers won't read them, but the rest of us will.
I could probably work around the genre thing if the story was half its length. I'm a world champion waffler, in case you hadn't noticed. But it's twice the 'acceptable' length these days, and no amount of waffle is going to conceal that. Here's the Writer's Digest breakdown of acceptable first novel lengths these days: http://www.writersdigest.com/editor-blogs/guide-to-literary-agents/word-count-for-novels-and-childrens-books-the-definitive-post Now here's a breakdown of the famous novels that would not have seen the light of day if they had been submitted by a first-time author using today's criteria. Not because of the quality of their writing, but simply because of the length. Instant reject pile as soon as the agent sees the word count figure. The ones in the 100-109K group MIGHT get looked at, but they would probably be urged to cut out the 10,000 'extra' words. The others would get the immediate boot. Some of the sci-fi ones might scrape through, because a slightly larger word count is 'allowed.' But apparently anything around 120K is now classified as 'epic fiction.' What a laugh. word count for books 100,388 – To Kill A Mockingbird – Harper Lee 100,609 – Ender’s Game – Orson Scott Card 103,090 – A Distant Shore – Phillips, Caryl 106,821 – Prisoner of Azkaban – JK Rowling 107,349 – Gullivers Travels – Jonathan Swift 107,945 – Wuthering Heights – Emily Bronte 109,571 – The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn – Mark Twain 112,737 – McTeague – Frank Norris 112,815 – The Golden Compass – Philip Pullman 114,634 – Walden – Henry David Thoreau 114,779 – The Tenth Circle – Jodi Picoult 119,394 – Sense and Sensibility – Jane Austen 119,529 – My Sisters Keeper – Jodi Picoult 123,378 – Atonement – Ian McEwan 127,776 – Life on the Mississippi – Mark Twain 128,886 – The Yearling – Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings 130,460 – War Trash – Jin, Ha 134,462 – The Return of the King – J. R. R. Tolkien 134,710 – Schindler’s List – Thomas Keneally 135,420 – A Tale of Two Cities – Charles Dickens 138,087 – Moll Flanders – Daniel Defoe 138,098 – Snow Falling on Cedars – Guterson, David 138,138 – 20000 Leagues Under the Sea – Jules Verne 143,436 – The Two Towers – J. R. R. Tolkien 144,523 – One Hundred Years of Solitude – Gabriel Garcia Marquez 145,092 – A Tree Grows in Brooklyn – Betty Smith 145,265 – Cold Sassy Tree – Olive Ann Burns 145,469 – Last of the Mohicans – James Fenimore Cooper 155,887 – Emma – Jane Austen 155,960 – Oliver Twist – Charles Dickens 156,154 – Watership Down – Richard Adams 157,665 – Alias Grace – Margaret Atwood 159,276 – The Kitchen God’s Wife – Amy Tan 161,511 – Cold Mountain – Charles Frazier 166,622 – Uncle Tom’s Cabin – Harriet Beecher Stowe 169,389 – White Teeth – Zadie Smith 169,441 – Half Blood Prince – JK Rowling 169,481 – The Grapes of Wrath – John Steinback 174,269 – Catch-22 – Joseph Heller 177,227 – The Fellowship of the Ring – J. R. R. Tolkien 177,679 – The Poisonwood Bible – Kingsolver, Barbara 183,349 – Great Expectations – Charles Dickens 183,833 – Little Women (Books 1&2) – Louisa May Alcott 183,858 – Jane Eyre – Charlotte Brontë 186,418 – Memoirs of a Geisha – Arthur Golden 190,858 – Goblet of Fire – JK Rowling 196,774 – The Corrections – Franzen, Jonathan 197,517 – Stones from the River – Hegi, Ursula 198,227 – Deathly Hallows – JK Rowling 198,901 – A House for Mr. Biswas – V.S. Naipaul 206,052 – Moby Dick – Herman Melville 208,773 – Midnight’s Children – Salman Rushdie 211,591 – Crime and Punishment – Fyodor Dostoyevsky 216,020 – The Amazing Adventures of Kavelier and Clay – Chabon, Michael 225,395 – East of Eden – John Steinbeck 236,061 – A Prayer for Owen Meany – John Irving 257,154 – Order of the Phoenix – JK Rowling 260,742 – Cloudsplitter – Banks, Russell 311,596 – The Fountainhead – Ayn Rand 316,059 – Middlemarch – George Eliot 349,736 – Anna Karenina – Leo Tolstoy 364,153 – The Brothers Karamazov – Fyodor Dostoyevsky 365,712 – Lonesome Dove – McMurtry, Larry 418,053 – Gone with the Wind – Margaret Mitchell 455,125 – The Lord of the Rings – J. R. R. Tolkien 561,996 – Atlas Shrugged – Ayn Rand 587,287 – War and Peace – Leo Tolstoy 591,554 – A Suitable Boy – Vikram Seth
If it's good, maybe an agent would be interested in splitting it into two parts? Or maybe you can. I think part of the author-agent relationship is that the agent wants authors who understand the product they're creating from a commercial point of view. Because, if the author doesn't then odds are their writing reflects that.
