What I did wrong to publish

3 Things I Did Wrong To Publish

​Hello There!
This is Part 1 of a series documenting my journey to publication (hopefully!).
I just completed my novel, Midas and the Golden child. It is a YA Thriller that follows the kidnapping of young and naïve 15-year-old Katie Thompson, the daughter of an FBI agent. I have sent query letters out am now waiting for responses. In the meantime, I decided to start this blog following the process as well as discussing how this journey will effect my real life. I’m already quite the busy bee. I primarily stay home with my one-year-old, but work one day a week supervising nursing students in the hospital. Our home, however, is a mini-farm, so there is always work to be done between our ducks, chickens, and garden. 
This is not the first novel I have written, but I was young and naive like Katie when I wrote the first one. I did not know the difference between publishing and self-publishing, nor the first thing about marketing. This posting, I’m going to talk about what I learned from that experience, and all of the new information that I’ve managed to collect this time. I am sure that as time goes on, I will continue to learn more and more about the world of book publishing, and I hope to share that with you as well.
Wrong About Editing
I believed the publishing group I went with would help me edit the story once it was completed. All I needed to do was propose a good story. Wrong. Wrong! WRONG! That is not how that works. Before you find an agent or a publisher, you must have a polished story--or at least a story that is as polished as you can get it. Editing costs money to the publisher, and if your manuscript is going to cost them too much, they will not invest in you--especially if you are a first time author. The competition is thick, and if they can make more money off of someone else, they will. Even if your story might be better.  
If you spill your guts onto a page, it’s going to look exactly like that. Guts on a page. 1st drafts are messy, ragged, and often nonsensical. If you are not willing to go over and over your manuscript--your 600+ page manuscript, with a fine tooth comb writing is not for you. Also--if your manuscript is over 100k words (pages mean nothing), it is too long. WAY too long. Fantasy and Sci-Fi are exceptions, but most stories need to be around 70-90k words. Mine is 89k, and I worked my butt off getting it there. You must be willing to carve up your story and edit out as much as you can. If it does not contribute to the plot, it needs to go.
Editing is tedious. There was a grammar concept I was mistaken on. My critique partners showed it to me, but then I had to go back through my 89k words and correct every single time I did it wrong. It was not a mistake you could find through control+F either. I had to go line by line looking through every end quotation mark in my story to determine if I had formatted it correctly. Blah, that was a boring evening.
Wrong About Publishing/Marketing
I don’t know about you, but when I started out writing, I had in my mind that authors were these people gifted by God with a silver pen and words of angels. If you had the talent, you could put anything on paper and eventually, someone would notice your genius. What a bunch of bollocks. Like most anything, writing is a skill that takes years of practice to improve. A person might have a certain talent in one area or another, but if that talent is not watered and fertilized, it will choke out or remain stagnant. Most recommend writing at least once a day. I have not found this feasible with my current lifestyle, but I do try to write as much as possible. If I’m not putting pen to paper, then I’m at least thinking about my novel and the next thing that I want to write.
With this idea in mind, I picked a publisher that did not require an agent and sent them my manuscript. They accepted it. Easy-peasy, right?
Nothing in writing is easy. If it feels easy, you’ve probably done something wrong. I went with a group who, with my investment of $3,000 would publish me. They promised me they would help me with marketing and would share in the profits once we reached a certain sale total. Here’s the problem though--I already gave them money. If the book were successful, sure they would make more money, but I had decreased their incentive to help me out the gate. They set up an interview for me with a woman on an AM radio station who gave the wrong name on the interview. THE WRONG NAME. How can you sell books if the interviewer is putting the wrong name out? I complained, but it went nowhere. Their other ideas regarding marketing included setting up a Facebook page and Twitter account on my behalf--two things I could easily do myself (and that I had to pay extra for). There were no instructions or advice on how to use these accounts or how to market myself. Needless to say, the book did not have much success. Now it sits on my shelf reminding me of one of my worst financial decisions.
Wrong About Critiques
Critique groups and other readers are huge. Once you’ve stared at the same page for hours and hours, you will not be able to see the mistakes any longer. A fresh set of eyes is key--especially one that knows a bit about writing. I did not have anyone else read my story before attempting to have it published because I was embarrassed to tell people that I was a writer. Don’t be! Own it! It’s a cool world you live in and a neat skill. You’re going to have to sell your book, often that means selling yourself too.
I found a critique group that I like on Critique Circle. There are several other sites out there, but this is my home. You can sign up for a free account. The first two posts put you into the Newbie Queue which almost guarantees that you will receive a bunch of critiques. The benefits of critiques is not limited only to you receiving critiques, but as you critique others, you will begin to see the same mistakes in your own writing better and be able to fix them better. Being critiqued and critiquing has helped me become a stronger writer more than anything.
Another thing that Critique Circle offers in their forums is a critique of query letters. How helpful this section is will hopefully be determined soon!
I will keep you up to date as time goes on, and hopefully we shall see success right around the corner!