DIY MFA: Why You Need an Agent (Part Four)
Welcome back to your Do-it-Yourself MFA program. Your fiction manuscript is complete or your non-fiction proposal is done. Now, you need to find an agent. I think it’s really important to understand...
View ArticleDIY MFA: How to Get an Agent (Part Five)
Welcome back to your Do-it-Yourself MFA program. The subtitle of this post is “how to find and sign with a reputable agent” and yes, the emphasis should be on the word reputable. While reputable has...
View ArticleDIY MFA: Querying Agents (Part Six)
Welcome back to your Do-it-Yourself MFA program. You have your possible agent list, clearly arranged by my ranking system from 1-3. Now it’s time to start querying. It’s not really a surprise that...
View ArticleDIY MFA: Working with an Agent and Waiting for a Sale (Part Seven)
Welcome back to your Do-it-Yourself MFA program. This installment assumes that you’ve signed with an agent. If you’ve exhausted your list and you haven’t found an agent and still wish to publish,...
View ArticleDIY MFA: No Agent? Other Paths to Publication (Part Eight)
Welcome back to your Do-it-Yourself MFA program. Let’s say that you didn’t get an agent, that you’ve been banging your head for a year or several years or several projects and you still don’t have an...
View ArticleDIY MFA: Working with an Editor (Part Nine)
Welcome back to your Do-it-Yourself MFA program. I’m really not sure what happens when you self-publish, so hopefully someone can chime in on the comment section below. This installment will be about...
View ArticleDIY MFA: Be Your Own Publicist (Part Ten)
Welcome back to your Do-it-Yourself MFA program. Now it’s time to get out there and sell the book. Actually, this part should be happening while you’re still writing the book (if it’s non-fiction) or...
View ArticleDIY MFA: What Happens Next — Wrap Up (Part Eleven)
Welcome back to your Do-it-Yourself MFA program. We’re now at the end of the journey — the book is in hand, the readings are set-up, the reviews are pouring in … so what happens next? Well, first of...
View ArticleHow Many Twitter Followers Do You Need to Get a Literary Agent?
The quick answer: why are you concerned about Twitter followers? Is it because someone once told you that you need a big social media following to get a book deal? Even though there were clearly...
View ArticleDo You Need to Plot Out a Novel Before You Start Writing It?
To plot out or not to plot out a novel with a manuscript outline has been on my mind this week because I’ve just returned to writing a new book after taking a break to sketch out the remaining...
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