Dear Ally, How Do You Write a Book

by Ally Carter

  My advice to teens is to make writing a part of their daily lives. I know so many kids who want to write—but they never actually do. It’s as if they’re waiting for some magical alignment of the stars or something. Ninety-five percent of what I know about writing comes from doing it—writing, rewriting, trying, struggling, crashing, burning, and occasionally succeeding.

  DEAR KRISTIN NELSON,

  As an agent, have you ever signed a writer in their teens? Would you?

  Several years ago, I offered to represent an author who was only fifteen. Because she was underage, her parents needed to be on the call when I offered representation. This author had multiple offers and, alas, didn’t sign with me, so I didn’t get the pleasure of representing her. But not for lack of trying! Fun side note: When I first met Marie Lu, she was just nineteen—still a teen!

  Yes. And no. The truth of the matter is that it’s probably easier to get a book published than it is to write a publishable book.

  So many people who set out to become writers want to skip right over the get-really-good-at-writing part and go straight to the beautiful-people-star-in-the-movie part, but I’m afraid it doesn’t work that way. (Which you know! Because you’re reading this book!)

  Honestly, very few authors are able to sell their first book. Or their second. Or their twentieth. And most of us will tell you that, in hindsight, we’re glad it worked out that way because those first books weren’t good enough.

  Once you are writing at a professional level, you could very well get something published eventually. Maybe not your first “good” book. (Sadly, sometimes a book is ahead of its time. Or slightly behind the times. Or there might be other reasons that will make it harder to publish.)

  But I can guarantee you that agents want to sign and work with amazing new writers. Every editor I know would love to find the Next Big Thing.

  Sadly, I have no doubt that, through the years, there have been a lot of really amazing books that never got their chance. For example, for years the big traditional romance publishers maintained imprints dedicated to writers and characters of color. Oftentimes, those books weren’t shelved with the rest of the genre. They weren’t carried by many stores, and even when they were, they were hard to find. The reason? Publishers maintained that there wasn’t a big market for diverse romance. Well, then self-publishing came along, and as soon as authors were able to sell their books directly to readers—when they were able to cut out the traditional publishers—sales of diverse romance novels went through the roof, proving that the demand had been there all along. Publishers just hadn’t been willing or able to see it.

  For decades, a lack of diversity behind the scenes in publishing has translated to a lack of diversity on bookstore shelves. I know for a fact that a lot of really amazing books by amazing writers never got their shot. But I think that might be changing. Organizations like We Need Diverse Books (check them out at diversebooks.org) are doing tremendous work. More doors are opening every day.

  In the meantime, all you can do is keep writing. Keep challenging yourself. And know that the first step in becoming a traditionally published writer is always—for everyone—writing.

  What matters now is that you keep writing!

  DEAR MAGGIE STIEFVATER,

  How many rejections did you receive before you found an agent?

  Dozens. Hundreds. Billions. I began submitting query letters when I was sixteen, and began receiving rejection letters by the bushel (this was because my novels were terrible). I have rejections from my current agent and my current publisher (they were right). I never found the piles of rejections particularly discouraging, though; they were concrete proof that I was trying. Moreover, they started getting encouraging once I started getting better. Agents would write little handwritten bits of encouragement on them: “Not for me, but probably for someone!” So I could kind of track my lumpy progress.

  How many rejections did you receive before you found an agent?

  Shannon Hale About 100?

  Marie Lu 600+

  Melissa de la Cruz Probably 6.

  Daniel José Older 40

  Stephanie Perkins 3

  Kody Keplinger Too many to count.

  Marissa Meyer 8 or 9

  Alex London None! I stumbled into my agent.

  Sarah Rees Brennan 1

  Jesse Andrews Dozens

  Soman Chainani 16

  Holly Black I sold my first book without an agent.

  Kiersten White 50

  Zoraida Córdova 0

  Dhonielle Clayton 25

  Eliot Schrefer 0

  Z Brewer Combined rejections from three books = 248. (Yeah … I know. I sent them to EVERYONE, which isn’t a wise approach.)

  This might be the hardest thing about this business. Even now, ten years and fifteen books into my career, I ask myself this question almost every day, so I’m not sure it’s something you ever really get over.

  When I was first starting out, it was especially hard to know. That’s why, before I started querying agents, I made a deal with myself. I decided to enter my book in a contest run by my state’s writers’ association (something most states have and pretty much anyone can join). I told myself that if I won the contest I’d take that as a sign that I was ready to take the next step.

  Well, imagine my surprise … and my joy … and my fear … when I actually won the contest. Even then, I was about to talk myself out of submitting to agents (it’s a scary thing!), when I got the judge’s notes back, and saw that he’d asked only one question: Why hasn’t this been published?

  That was it—the sign I’d been waiting for! So I took the next big step.

  Now I’m of the opinion that you need three things before going pro.

  1.OBVIOUSLY, YOU NEED A FINISHED BOOK. Not an idea. Not a draft. Not even a second draft. Nope. You need a book you’ve rewritten a whole bunch of times and polished to perfection—a book you can put in a drawer for six months while you work on something else and still like when you read it again with fresh eyes.

  2.YOU NEED REALLY POSITIVE FEEDBACK FROM PEOPLE WHO WILL BE HONEST WITH YOU. Maybe that’s your parents or your friends or your teachers. But personally, I think it’s also worth your time and effort to enter some contests. Just watch out for scams, because there is no shortage of people looking to take advantage of writers and their dreams. For that reason, you might want to start with the contests associated with writing conferences and organizations. If you are a student in grades seven to twelve, you might want to consider the Scholastic Art & Writing Awards (artandwriting.org). It might be good to “compete” (for lack of a better word) against a whole bunch of people who, theoretically, have been working just as hard as you have—maybe harder! It’s important to know how you stack up.

  3.YOU NEED TO BE READY (EMOTIONALLY, PHYSICALLY, SPIRITUALLY) TO GO PRO. That’s what you’re trying to do. You’re not trying to “get a book published.” You’re trying to begin a publishing career, and you need to be ready for what that means. Rejection. Deadlines. Pressure. More rejection. Paralyzing self-doubt. Rejection. Disappointment. Joy. Rejection again.

  And crying.

  So, in short, try to get some independent feedback from people who know a good book when they see one. And then try and ask yourself if you’re ready—not your book, you—for all that this business entails.

  There’s no shame in setting a book aside and writing another one. And another. And another. Until you feel like you’re ready to “go pro.” It’s not a decision to be taken lightly.

  DEAR JENNIFER LYNN BARNES,

  You wrote your first (published) book when you were very young. What do you know now that you wish you’d known then?

  I wrote my first published book when I was nineteen; it came out a couple of years later. Looking back, I’m not sure that my experience was much different from any other published author, except that I wrote my first four published books while I was still in college. Every author has to learn how to manage their t
ime. For me, this meant not only balancing class work and writing but also balancing writing with having a life! I didn’t want to look back on college and feel like I’d lost out on having a real college experience because of writing, so I made a rule for myself that I would only write when my friends were sleeping. Even when I really wanted to, I didn’t turn down social invitations or extracurricular opportunities to stay home and write. Writing late at night meant that the only thing I was missing out on was sleep (and I compensated for that by avoiding morning classes when I could and sleeping in).

  Basically, I think young writers should try to do three things: read a lot, write a lot, and do things that aren’t reading and writing. Sometimes, people get the idea in their head that being a writer means not loving to do anything but write, but I’m a big believer in cultivating multiple passions. Every experience you have will give you more to write about, so one of the most important things as a young writer is to make sure that you’re giving yourself the opportunity to pursue interests, passions, and opportunities outside of writing, even once you start publishing.

  The other big piece of advice I have for young writers is to avoid saying or thinking, “I want to be published by the time I’m [X] years old.” In the long run, it doesn’t matter how old you are when you publish your first book. The most special thing about the books you write will never be your age. Ultimately, readers won’t care how old you were when you wrote the book; they’ll care about the way the book makes them feel. And if you want to be a career author and not just someone who writes one book, then how old you were when you wrote your first book matters even less as time goes on. Most people in the publishing industry don’t even realize I was a teenager when I wrote my first book. My readers certainly don’t!

  Long story short, I recommend that young writers don’t define themselves as being young, but as being writers. You won’t always be a teenager, but you will always be a writer, so long as you write.

  Really, books come about in seven steps.

  STEP 1: WRITE AND REWRITE YOUR BOOK. This is no doubt the most important step. And it’s the step that most people never, ever do because it’s hard and a lot of work and there is absolutely no guarantee of success.

  Most people aren’t willing to give up all their free time for months—or years—in the hopes that someday, maybe, they might get rewarded for it. So if you’ve already completed step one, go, you! That’s a big accomplishment.

  STEP 2: FIND A LITERARY AGENT. This is the next step that a lot of people never make it past. Maybe because their book isn’t ready yet and they need to work on their craft a little more. Maybe because they’ve written a great book that’s just going to be too hard to sell to a publisher. Maybe because they didn’t do their homework and they’re querying the wrong agents. Maybe because they just gave up too soon. We’ll talk more about finding an agent in a little bit.

  Unless you want to self-publish (which we’ll also talk about later), step two will be necessary before you can move on to step three.

  STEP 3: SELL YOUR BOOK TO AN EDITOR AT A PUBLISHING HOUSE. Editors do a lot of things. They edit (obviously), but they also acquire books for their employers (the publishers), so this might be a little confusing because you might sometimes hear the terms editor and publisher used interchangeably. For the purposes of selling a new book, at least, that is kind of true.

  For example, this book, Dear Ally, How Do You Write a Book?, was acquired by David Levithan at Scholastic. (David is both an editor and an author.) So some people might say I sold it to David. Some people might say I sold it to Scholastic. They’d both be right.

  The key to remember here is that most publishers/editors will only look at books sent to them by reputable literary agents, so you can’t skip step two!

  STEP 4: WORK WITH YOUR NEW EDITOR TO MAKE YOUR BOOK AMAZING. Theoretically, your book is already really good—otherwise no editor would have bought it! But it’s a really tough world out there, and no editor is going to publish a book they haven’t tried to make as great as possible, so all editors will have edits.

  These might come as a letter with broad, overarching suggestions. I don’t feel like the villain’s motivation is really clear. We need a little more insight into her backstory.

  Or they might come as a very detailed line edit. On page 73, let’s tighten up paragraph four or cut it altogether.

  Or both.

  Whatever the case, this is a really important step, and it should not be taken for granted. Listen to your editor. Learn from them, and remember, this person is your most valuable asset within the publishing house. They’re the coach of your team, and it’s important to work together.

  STEP 5: YOUR BOOK IS COPYEDITED. At this point, the heavy lifting is pretty much done. Now your editor will send your book to a copy editor (who is different from your overall editor).

  Copy editors are the comma gurus and the grammar goddesses. They go through your manuscript with a fine-tooth comb and make sure it is as close to perfect as possible. Then they’ll send it back to your editor, who will then send it to you to accept/reject their changes or fix any big mistakes they might find.

  STEP 6: YOUR BOOK GOES INTO TYPESETTING. After all the commas are fixed and the typos are found, your editor will send your book “into typesetting,” which means it disappears for a while, and the next time you see it, it will look almost like a real book.

  It will have fancy fonts and cool chapter headings, and it will be so surreal you’ll want to cry. At this point, you’ll want to print it out and do one last read-through because this is your very last chance to fix any errors that might have slipped through (although there will still be proofreaders checking for errors after your work as the author is completed).

  You’ll need to type all of those up and send a list to your editor and maybe say a prayer and cross your fingers because …

  STEP 7: YOUR BOOK IS A REAL BOOK. Congratulations! It’s done, and you’re finished.

  Now it’s time to get started on a new book and do it all again!

  DEAR ALAN GRATZ,

  Was your first novel published on the first try?

  I sold my first book through the slush pile. It was the third book I wrote. The first two were never bought and published, and received dozens of rejections. The book I finally got published, my first novel, was rejected fifteen times by publishers before someone said yes.

  DEAR DAVID LEVITHAN,

  So how was this book acquired, from your side of things as the editor?

  Wearing my proverbial editor hat here (and not my author hat) … here’s how it worked from the publisher point of view (in this case, Scholastic).

  I’d worked with Ally on four novels, and one day, she told me she had an idea to do a writing guide for YA writers. I said, “Awesome! Send me a proposal.” So Ally worked on a proposal and sent it to Kristin Nelson, her agent. Then Kristin sent it to me. I had a couple of notes on the proposal, so Ally revised it so it would make sense to all the people who were going to be reading it. Once I had the proposal in hand, the next step was for me to take it to our acquisitions meeting. (Note: I usually need a full manuscript to bring to this meeting, but since Ally was someone we’d published before, and since her proposal was so detailed, I didn’t need her to write the whole thing.)

  The acquisitions meeting is the place where all of the heads of all of the departments for our trade division get together to talk about the books we’ve been submitted. An editor has to be VERY enthusiastic about a book to take it to the acquisitions meeting. There, the department heads (sales, marketing, publicity, and others) and the key sales reps (from national accounts, indie accounts, and online accounts) will weigh in on whatever materials they’ve been given to read—in this case, the proposal. We’ll also make a projection on how many copies it will sell, and run the numbers—this is called a P&L (for profit and loss statement). While we certainly look at the numbers, I can honestly say that what matters the most is the read. In this case, everyone
thought this book was a great idea, and that Ally was the perfect person to write it. So I then got to go back to Kristin and make an offer. After we went back and forth on a few of the terms (this pretty much always happens), Kristin accepted the offer (after talking to Ally, of course), and as a result, we had a deal—and you now have a book in your hand that’s published by Scholastic.

  DEAR DAVID LEVITHAN,

  Anything you’d like to add here about the role of the editor, since you’re the editor of this book?

  I think a lot of people are confused about what an editor does—at worst, they think it’s the same as a teacher correcting a paper. But the editor does much more than that. My allegiance is threefold—to the author, to the story, and to the reader. For the author, I am there to be a sounding board, and to help draw out the best book possible. I am there to make suggestions (sometimes many, many suggestions), but I am never there to make demands. The author has the final say (their name is on the book, not mine), so my job is to be a voice as strong as the ones in their head, advocating for what I think will bring out the best in their writing.

  My allegiance to the book is to make sure it goes out into the world in the strongest way possible—not just in the writing, but in the cover art and design, the marketing, the cover copy, and the interior design.

  As for my allegiance to the reader—I always say that I am the readers’ representative during the editorial process. My role is to read it as they would read it, and to point out things that might be confusing, or might be boring, or might be uneven. Then I go back to my allegiance to the writer, to figure out how to make it better. It’s also VERY important for editors to point out everything that IS working, as well as the spots that aren’t—I believe writers learn as much from praise as they do from criticism.