Page 3: The
Independent Gay Writer©
all
about books & writing| Interview
with Brent
Hartinger (continued from page 1)
What were the challenges (literary, research, psychological, logistical) in bringing it to life? I was determined that this not be one of those depressing "issue" books. So many young adult books are way too earnest, and most of the few existing gay teen books deal with really serious stuff like suicide or gay-bashing. These are real problems, but far too heavy for the book I had in mind. I hope my book has a serious message, but I wanted to capture the fun and humor of adolescence too. And more than anything, I wanted this to be a book that people want to read--dessert, not broccoli! (Hey, whether we like it or not, we teen book authors are competing against Nintendo and Britney Spears in a thong!) One psychological challege: Gay teenagers are typically coming to understand their own sexuality at earlier and earlier ages (it has to do with media exposure and more forthright attitudes about homosexuality, and it's not necessarily a bad thing). Anyway, I wanted Russel, my main character, to know that he is gay from the very beginning of the book. But this wasn't my personal experience at all, so I had to draw on my conversations with today's gay teens and try to put myself into the head of a character that, in that respect, is very different from me. An interesting literary challenge: My book is the story of a teenager who starts a secret gay-straight alliance at his school. But because he and his friends can't tell anyone the true nature of their club--and because they don't want anyone else to join!--they give it the most boring name they can think of: the Geography Club. Since the name is a ruse, they don't learn any actual geography, but I did intend for them to learn about a "geography" of sorts--specifically, the rigid social terrain of most American high schools. I knew this had to be done with a light touch, because I hate heavy-handed metaphors. Frankly, I'm not sure I succeeded--but I definitely did try! Another challenge: I hate stereotypes, and I'm bored by how jocks and cheerleaders are always so evil in so many books. So in my book, I decided to shake things up. Sure, there are some jocks who are jerks in my book, but the main antagonist is actually one of the geeks. It was fun to go against the grain, but it was difficult to give a real sense of menace to such an inoffensive character. But I'm more confident that I succeeded here. Finally, I wanted a protagonist who is likeable, but the plot requires him to do some pretty unlikeable things. The book is about having integrity and standing up for people who are different, but for my character to learn about integrity, he has to behave like a jerk for a time. It took a couple of drafts to get just the right amount of jerkiness--enough to make a point, but not so much that the reader loses sympathy.  See just how many books by independent
writers iuniverse has published in its five years of
operation—or go to
the bookstore,
right here at
rondonaghe.com for hand-selected titles. | Patricia Nell Warren's
Secrets: How To
Look For A
Gay Fiction Publisher... continued from page 1 So gay fiction is the Cinderella stepchild right now. Paradoxically our own Wildcat titles are still doing well, but that's because we're in complete control of our own marketing and promotion. Wildcat gets a lot of submissions. Unfortunately we can't publish any of them (because we publish only my stuff right now), so we have to send the authors somewhere. Two years ago I sent a gifted young lesbian author, Alex Marcoux, to Haworth; they just published her second novel in their Alice Street imprint. I've advised several people on self-publishing, notably Randy Boyd, Charles Ortleb and Frankie Barrera, and they've done very well with it. If your friend has a really wonderful novel, he may get lucky and find a publisher after just a few submissions. Your friend is a journalist, so the first thing he should do is think hard about his connections, and see if he can network his way to the personal attention of a good agent or an editor at a major publisher. I got my first agent through my connections at The Reader's Digest, when I worked there as an editor many years ago. A good agent isn't an absolute necessity, but it helps. (And there are bad agents. If your friend is online, he can go to my "Secrets of Writing and Publishing" and read all about agents, of which I've had a few.) If the networking thing doesn't work, he should gird himself for the long haul. In my experience, the sooner a new author realizes he has to do some legwork, the better. First the book should be in presentable condition. Anything that is rough and badly needs editing or reorganizing will get turned down flat. Nobody wants to edit any more. Next, he should prepare a one-page query letter. One never sends the manuscript right off the bat -- publishers don't like to get unsolicited stuff these days, so it's a waste of money to send the ms. The letter should include a couple of paragraphs describing the book, hopefully to spark interest in the recipient. He should also include a paragraph of resume about himself. The fact that he's a journalist and has published already might be a help. He should also get a copy of the current edition of "Putting Out" (Cleis), the guide to gay publishing, which has a listing of contact info for gay agents and publishers in it. He should locate the nearest copy of Literary Market Place, a trade resource that is found online and in most libraries and lists contact info of hundreds of trade and university and regional publishers. Third, he should familiarize himself with the book marketplace by visiting a large gay and lesbian bookstore, and browsing amazon.com, and reading trade mags like Publishers Weekly, Library Journal, Independent Publisher, Foreword...seeing what's out there and who is publishing it and how it's being marketed. Books and journalism are two different animals, as he will learn. This might give him ideas on where to send his own work, depending on what the subject or category is. If his book is a gay male mystery or a political thriller, he might not send it to the same publisher as he would a biography of a great Latino drag queen. Then he should send out the first batch of query letters. Send them simultaneously, not one at a time. Try the obvious ones first, like Haworth and Kensington and Alyson and the big trade houses. For lesbian writers, there is Alice Street, Cleis, Bella Books, Attagirl and others. It helps to send it to a particular person. This means he has to call the publisher and ask who is the best person to address a query letter to. He should include a self-addressed stamped envelope, and he is under no obligation to tell anybody that he is doing simultaneous submissions. next column... |
If there are no takers, he should
send the
second wave of query letters to everybody in the world. Most
people in the business are so rude and harried that they don't
reply. He should be prepared for the rudeness, and not take
it
personally. As a journalist, he probably already has a hide as thick as
an alligator's.
It's a big help in the book business. All these hundreds of letters will probably garner a few nibbles of interest. Then he can send the manuscript, neatly printed, with a self-addressed stamped envelope. If the publisher is interested, the next stage is discussions and negotiations, and that's a story unto itself. If he doesn't have an agent, he should read some books about negotiating book contracts (findable at amazon.com), because there are many pitfalls. Some publishers (including some small presses) are downright unscrupulous. They might want him to give up the film rights (he shouldn't), or pay for the editing (he shouldn't), or other nonsense. He should not be afraid to play hardball, and negotiate the best possible terms for himself. A bad contract is just as bad as no contract at all. Too many authors just sign the boilerplate that the publisher puts in front of them, because they're afraid to rock the boat and desperate to break into print. So they wind up being stuck with terms that are not favorable to them. One favorable term is to give a publishing license for a given number of years, instead of "in perpetuity." Another: if the publisher fails to publish the work within a given time, the rights should revert to your friend at no cost to him. And if the publisher lets the title go out of print, your friend should have first refusal to buy copies remaining in the warehouse at a wholesale price, and/or to buy the film or digital files for the print job, so he can publish his own edition of he wants. Your friend should also locate a lawyer who is experienced in publishing and entertainment law, to go over the contract for him. I negotiate my own contracts, but I do have a good lawyer, Robert Harrison at Harrison & Harrison in L.A., and don't make any major moves without him. Trying to get a book published these days is a little like being a salmon swimming upstream to spawn. Millions of salmon start the journey upriver, and a lot of them get eaten by bears. Yet there are always the stories of amazing breakthroughs, like the author of the Harry Potter books, who was on welfare just a few years ago, and wrote her books in the local library to keep warm. Now she's the highest paid woman in the UK. These stories keep us all hopeful. I imagine that her success has sparked a spike in submissions by women authors who hope to explode into fame the way she did. If your friend's book gets rejected by everybody in the world, he shouldn't give up hope. That's what self-publishing is for. The old stigma on self-publishing is ending. All the big wholesalers and distributors know that self-publishing is here to stay. It is the book equivalent of the independent record label, or the independent film studio. All the aforementioned people I've helped have got their titles carried by Ingram, Amazon et al. Well, I wish your friend luck, and hope that not many bears will be lurking along the banks. Let me know how he does. Yours, Patricia Nell Warren  Click here to find out more. |