When my first novel, The Spaewife’s Secret,was picked up, not only did I not understand what it meant to work with a publisher, I honestly didn’t care. I was just excited someone other than my mother saw promise in my writing (shout out to all the mother’s reading half-finished manuscripts out there).
What followed was a lackluster experience that resulted in a book cover that made publishing the book feel more like a flop than a triumph. I know we’re not supposed to judge a book by its cover (pun intended!) but when it comes to literal books, a cover is everything and mine felt like a nothing.
What’s the lesson here – don’t settle. Take your time. Do your homework. Just because someone wants to publish something of yours doesn’t mean that they’re the right person. The right person might be you self-publishing it through one of the many available platforms or it might be an agent trying to sell your manuscript at auction.
Had I put in the time and effort to review the titles in their catalogue a little more closely, I would have noted how similar all the covers appeared and should have assumed that mine would have been no different.
This week we’ll talk a little about publishing, the red flags I should have but didn’t see and what you can do to avoid the unpleasant situation I unknowingly put myself in.
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