As a new semester begins today at Pace University, where I’m an adjunct lecturer in the Publishing master’s degree program, of course I’m thinking about how and what we learn and that old saw, “Once you stop learning, you start dying.” I’ve seen it attributed to Albert Einstein, not a bad role model at all. Wise words even if they’re not his.
So what am I teaching my students, new to the industry or hoping to break in? I’m teaching them how agents and editors work together, how a book is acquired, how a book’s contract is negotiated and drafted, how it moves through the production process to get from manuscript to finished book. But perhaps most crucial is how it’s marketed and publicized, what the publisher’s role is and what the author’s role is. It’s more important than ever to get that book, one of thousands published each year, into the hands and minds of readers who’ll love it and care about and talk about it. Sometimes the smartest way to do that is tapping into an already invested audience–simpler, of course, for nonfiction on an easily defined topic. There’s always a search for affinity and passion about a book or a personality or a topic or a movie, anything where audiences may overlap or be tapped into or expanded.
What else? We’ll talk about trends and bestsellers, and I’ll bring in industry professionals. Most importantly, I’ll make them read. A lot. Read what? Essays from editors on editing. Publishers Weekly. The New York Times. Bestseller lists. Books about the publishing industry. Queries. A manuscript. A contract.
And they’ll have to write. A lot. I’m going to put them in my shoes, as an agent and as a former editor and publishing company employee. They’ll have to analyze those queries and manuscripts and write reports on their impressions of them. And I’m going to put them in your shoes, writers. They’ll have to come up with their own book ideas. And write actual book proposals over the course of the semester.
I keep learning too, from my students, from my guest speakers, from other professors, and from writers I meet at conferences and in my inbox. It’s invigorating to see fresh eyes on the industry and enthusiasm for publishing and books and new challenges ahead. So I encourage you to talk to other writers, to industry pros whenever you can. Read Poets & Writers, Writer’s Digest, newspapers, other books in your genre, tweets and blogs from writers who inspire you. Never stop learning.
