Publishing is legalized gambling.”

That’s an aphorism I’ve heard several times from publishing professionals, and there’s some truth to it.

Publishers place a bet on an author and her manuscript, meaning they pay an advance as well as all the costs of production (editorial, marketing, printing, paper, glue, etc) and marketing (advertising, mailings, publicity, exhibit banners, etc.). Then the market decides whether it was a bet worth making, meaning the publisher either makes a profit or not.

As an author pitching your book to publishers, it’s important to make sure 1) you are a safe bet and 2) you do an effective job of convincing publishers of the same.

How to Make Sure You’re a Safe Bet for Publishers

You’re a safe bet when enough readers part with their money to buy and read your book. So how do you make sure those readers exist? I think one of the best ways is to serve a community of people long enough to have a good sense of the book they need and want; then write it.

How to Convince Publishers You’re a Safe Bet

And how do you do an effective job of convincing publishers you’re a safe bet? To answer that I’d like to share an adapted version of an exchange I recently had with writer Linda Ganzini. Linda is writing a narrative history of her family’s fascinating story. She wrote to me:

“I wanted to ask your opinion on something. I signed up for Book Proposal Academy to teach me the ins and outs of writing a book proposal . . . . We concluded my story was not a memoir but a work of creative non-fiction, and so I needed a book proposal. Editors are now telling me I don’t need a proposal. I’m a little confused. I’ve spent months trying to put my proposal together. Have I gone down the wrong road writing a proposal? And do I need to complete my manuscript before submitting to literary agents? Thank you for your advice!”

I wrote back to Linda with a version of the following thoughts:

• I think of memoirs as being about the author’s past, not someone else’s, typically, but yes broadly speaking I can see how someone would call your book a memoir.
• As far as I know, the starting point for any decent-sized publisher and for any book submission, unless you’re already a known brand or the publisher already has a track record with you, is a book proposal.
• I doubt this editor is saying a book proposal is unnecessary.
• If you were submitting your first novel, you typically would need to have both a proposal and the complete manuscript. You would submit the proposal and hope for a publisher to request the complete manuscript.
• The closer a book gets to being like a novel (think memoir, narrative nonfiction), the more likely it is that a publisher will want to see a complete manuscript, but again this is not in lieu of the book proposal but in addition to it.
• It could be, Linda, that since your book is highly narrative in nature that agents/publishers who review the proposal with favorable interest will want to see the complete manuscript.
• Even if your proposal is turned down, creating one is still very helpful because writing a book proposal helps you develop your book’s concept and structure, your bio, your book’s place in the market, how to market it, and so on.

I hope you find this exchange helpful.

Question: If you’re reading this, you likely have a book inside you that you’d like to get published. So let me ask you: What steps do you need to take to make sure you’re a safe bet for publishers? You can leave a comment by clicking here.