Ask Brooke

Questions Answered

Q:
Hi Brooke, Thank you for this opportunity. I was reading through some of your past posts with much interest. Thank you for posting them. My question is about the title of my memoir. First, is it just me or are titles one of the more difficult tasks of writing? I finally came up with a name that seemed apropos but recently a fellow writer read my ms and thought the title wasn’t very good. So my question is this: Is there a straightforward approach for assigning a title to your work? Certainly it should capture the essence of the content but any other advice you can offer? Should it follow a trend for marketing purposes? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
(submitted by Grace Peterson, November 2011)

A:
Thanks for the question Grace. Titles are one of the more difficult tasks of taking your book to the next level for sure. I recommend being okay with a working title when you’re first starting out, and even to the point of shopping your book. Titles are a tough thing because the publisher ultimately retains the right to change your title, so you may well be out there in the world doing platform-building with a title that will change. There’s nothing you can do about that! The best thing you can do is have a title you love. If you trust the opinion of the person who gave you the feedback, then it might be worth going back to the drawing board. But be careful! Lots of people love to give their opinions, but they’re not experts, and titles are relatively subjective, and they’re subject to trends. Right now the one-word titles are all the rage. All I ever hear from sales folks is “Make it shorter! It’s too wordy.” However, occasionally you’ll see really successful books with ridiculously long titles, so it’s not to say short is the ONLY way to go. Remember that titles are meant to grab. They should be provocative or literary or emotion-grabbing or beautiful. They don’t really have to mean anything. They certainly don’t have to be literal, especially if you’re writing a novel or a memoir. If you’re doing a prescriptive book, the subtitle should do the heavy-lifting of describing what the book is. If you’re writing memoir or fiction, spend some time browsing your competition. Maybe enroll your smartest friends in a brainstorming session with you. Sometimes moments of brilliance come after a double shot of espresso or after the second glass of wine!

Q:

1. How do I go about writing with partners?

2. How do I decide to go with an academic publisher or other?

(submitted by Monica Duggal, October 2011)

A:

1. The best thing to do when it comes to writing with partners is to sit down and figure out who’s going to be the primary writer, particularly if you’re writing with more than one other person. Once you get three voices in the mix, the end result can be quite choppy if you don’t have one person who’s making sure the voice is consistent. If you are a writer partnering with non-writers, it makes sense that you function in the role of editor, smoothing out the various voices and styles so that your final manuscript has a unified voice. Another way to work is that every single person takes on one particular section or chapter, and then each writer passes their work around to the other writers. So, for instance, Writer 1 would pass their work to Writer 2 for an edit, and then after that edit it would go to Writer 3 for an edit before coming back to Writer 1. Always make sure you use tracked changes for these exchanges. You need to assess upfront whether you’re all writers, however. And you’ll want to establish a very clear process before you even start. That process will inform you as you go. You might need to make changes as you all get used to working together, so I recommend having weekly or bi-monthly meetings with your cowriters to go over process and how it’s working.

2. You decide whether to go with an academic publisher based on what you’re writing. What is the topic? Is it something that would appeal to a trade audience? Trade books are just books that you see in bookstores or sold on Amazon that are specifically targeted to mainstream readers. You can always submit your work to multiple publishers and include both trade and academic presses on your submissions list and see where you get bites. But some books are clearly academic books because their orientation is academic. Or maybe they are particularly niche or very obviously going to be used as resource or reference books. Many academic presses do publish books for the trade, so if your book has some crossover (meaning it could appeal to both), then consider that you might have a hybrid on your hands that could appeal to different types of publishers.

Q: I’m currently looking at hybrids, a model in which I pay for everything and the publisher helps with the distribution aspects. What are your thoughts on this? (submitted by Suzanne McQueen, September 2011)

A: I think hybrid options can work well for the right author. If you’re motivated, then having a team and a distribution company behind you can certainly give you a leg up. From a business perspective it makes sense for a publisher to offer hybrid models because it drastically reduces their risk. Look into the possibility of the publishing company absorbing SOME of the risk. There should be some room for negotiation there so that you’re not paying 100% and getting only 50% of the profit.

One benefit of going this route over self-publishing is that you wouldn’t have to figure out how to distribute your book and you get the marketing support of being with a more well-established press. The downside is that you do invest a lot of money upfront—generally quite a bit more than you would with self-publishing. Also, the control is in the hands of the publisher, whereas when you’re self-publishing all the control is in your hands.

Be very upfront about asking about how they will track sales too. Because you don’t work for the company, it might be harder than you imagine to get actual sales figures. Make sure to at least ask about this, if not build it into your contract.
Publishers that do hybrid publishing include White Cloud Press, North Atlantic Books, Balboa Press (a division of Hay House), and Bookwise.

Q: Writer’s Relief, among others, say that memoir is the only nonfiction genre that should be handled like fiction—query letter, manuscript, chapter summaries, but no book proposal. What would you recommend for a first-time memoir writer? (Submitted by Mary Reynolds Thompson, August 2011)

A: I disagree with this assessment from Writer’s Relief. I think that proposals are very important for memoir. I always advise memoirists to do a complete proposal, including Overview, Chapter-by-Chapter Summary, Author Bio, Marketing & Publicity, Competitive Titles, Manuscript Length and Anticipated Delivery, and Sample Chapters. As an acquiring editor, I have often personally bought memoir on proposal, meaning they weren’t complete. And I always appreciate a full proposal because it helps editors understand how to position the work.