Are you a new and emerging author and do you need help querying your novel to get representation?
Here are some tips and tricks on how to get your work published or even just looked at.
iPub Cloud International is a non-profit 501c3 boutique publishing house whose mission and goal is to diversify the publishing industry.
So if you want to write a book, we’ve provided some advice, tips, and tricks on how to query your book.
First, you need to write a query letter or a book proposal, or sometimes you’ll need both.
Most publishing houses will require the use of representation, like a literary agent, to be able to send manuscripts, query letters, or book proposals.
But right now, iPub Cloud International is accepting unsolicited manuscripts, so manuscripts without the need of representation, like a literary agent. However, iPub Cloud requires the use of a proposal, like a query letter.
Query letters and book proposals are supposed to get the attention of a publisher or literary agent for your book idea or manuscript.
The difference between a query letter and a book proposal is a query letter is a brief persuasive introduction of your book to a literary agent or publisher and a book proposal is a more detailed comprehensive document that provides a deeper dive into the book’s concept, market, and your author qualifications.
For query letters, you want to include a brief summary or synopsis of the book, your author qualifications and experience, a request for the literary agent or publisher to consider your book.
Query letters often include a pitch or hook to entice the agent to read more.
You also want to include the word count of your manuscript.
And query letters are typically short and you want to aim for about a page or less.
For book proposals, which are more extensive, you want to include a detailed summary of the book, a market analysis that includes the target audience of your book and the potential sales of it.
Include an author platform, bio, or any credentials, and also include a marketing plan for the book.
You also want to include a word count of your manuscript and some sample chapters or portions of the book.
And book proposals will typically be longer, ranging from 20 to 30 pages.
So a brief summary, for fiction books, you’ll typically query your book with a short query letter and if successful, you’ll submit a book proposal with a portion of your manuscript.
iPub Cloud International is super excited to get these tips, tricks, and advice out there to help new and emerging authors, to get their stories heard, their ideas out there, to diversify the publishing industry.
Here’s some additional tips and tricks for querying your work.
Batch your queries if you’re sending them to different literary agents. We recommend like a batch of three and then waiting a couple weeks for feedback to come through from those batches and then send a new batch out.
Expect results for unsolicited manuscript requests to range around six to eight weeks.
If you’re querying to a literary agent, make the query personal to the literary agent to stand out.
Include in your query where your book fits in the space that you’re pushing for. This is also known as the competitive set or comp set.
This includes who your target audience is, what your work is competing with in terms of other books and other authors as well, and comparing and combining other authors and books into where your niche is.
An example of this is taking two well-known authors and saying that your book is similar to their styles of work.
So for an example, this book is Emily Henry meets Brandon Sanderson in a romantic fantasy book or something like that.
Also, a big tip is to have your query letters and book proposals be well-written and formatted.
This is very important into whether or not these agents and publishers will even look at your query letter or book proposal.
Got more questions about getting published? Leave a comment below, or visit our website at ipubcloud.org to learn more.
