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(Writing) submitting work to an editor
I know I've been down this route before but it was 'here we go again' this morning when I got into the office mailbox. There is a guy saying he wants to write regularly for my company, has given me a pen name (which I don 't like but still ...) a synopsis and the first three chapters, told me there are a lot more books to come, too.
OK, so there were typoes in the email for a start. Make allowances ... download synopsis and chapters -
- and I cannot open them. He has not thought about sending them in a universal format I can read. TEXT would have done for starters. But then, he didn't ask for the guidelines, either. I've sent them and asked for everything to come in a format I can open and read. If he had done that right off, my answer yes or no would have been with him this morning. Now it will be a 24 wait, IF he sends them in a way I can open.
Last week I had a very long email from someone outlining the three books he has written, they are a trilogy and he wants to place them. Can he start by sending me book 3. Sometimes I do have to wonder ...
Someone else wrote to tell me he has a blood and guts book of 90,000 words which he will be pleased to split into 3 if we want it ... which ignores the fact we want 40,000 words.
A package turned up, registered, all sorts, containing a manuscript carefully printed out in double spacing, the whole bit. I don't want paper submissions. I can't deal with paper submissions. How do I get it into the computer to turn it into a book if it is on paper? What was even more annoying was finding out the author is on line, he could have asked for the guidelines, saved all that paper and postage and simply emailed it to me as an attachment!!
All of this is as a result of writers not doing that simple thing, asking for guidelines. These were specific queries too, I am discounting the mass mailings which offer me Pulitzer prize winning short stories and the like ...
Comments
:)
Absolutely. Also not reading guidelines - it must be annoying to keep seeing the same simple mistakes over and over, Dorothy.
Incidentally maybe the bloke wanting to send book 3 wants it to be like Star Wars when books 1 and 2 are prequels?
Basic advice, keep within the word count of the publisher. I've mentioned it before, we take 40,000 words. Someone sent me a disc with a 90,000 word book on it, all in capital letters. As was the covering letter.
Then there was the mauve handwritten note saying he wanted to write a book -
The man in the South of England who told me that geniuses do not use computers or typewriters and he would be writing his work in longhand, as all great authors do. He has since sent me lengthy letters saying publishers do not understand him, they keep moving (he doesn't update his W&A obviously) and then sending me magazines with no covers, 'but I'm sure your customers will like them.' The latest is a Sept 2009 catalogue of ours, with envelope (ours) w8ith two cut out drawings of a lady/man ... and no letter.
Aww bless, was it in crayon too?
We received a 5 page handwritten story, complete with illustrations, about a dragon who visited the Isle of Wight. The covering letter said it had come from a Hampshire writing group and that they knew we would like it, as we were on the Isle of Wight. I wrote back with a page of advice for said writing group, about checking whether someone published short stories, typing them properly, etc. and guess what? Not so much as a thank you. Some writing group that was!
I'm guessing "the writing group" is the top stream from a reception class (ie 5 year olds) in Hampshire.
dorothy, these are hilarious.
What is irritating is the amount of people who ask for the guidelines and who never ever write anything for us.
There was the time when an author sent us a story for an anthology.I didn't bother with contracts, not for a story, just said it was accepted and I would be paying everyone before too long. I was busy writing £50 cheques for everyone who had a story in there, when his invoice arrived - for £25. That's what I paid him. If he had waited a week ...
Awwwww, poor man.
How much more action do you need, Dorothy? :)