It’s one thing to write your book; it’s another to write about your book.
They’re very different types of writing. For one thing the audience is sometimes completely different.
When you’re writing your book, you’re writing for readers.
When you’re writing about your book, particularly before it’s published, you’re probably writing a book proposal for agents and publishers in hopes of landing a book deal. And that’s where I want to focus in this article.
As someone who’s been shaping nonfiction book proposals for well over twenty years, I have developed a method for describing books in a way that attracts agents and publishers. I’m excited to share it with you.
Ready to get started? Here are the five steps.
1. Capture Their Imagination
Often the best way to begin your book’s description is with a story or brief anecdote. The human mind grabs onto stories. We can’t resist them.
Which story, you might ask.
Tell a story that points to the pain your book will relieve or the problem your book will solve. If you’re writing a book about decluttering, for example, tell a story that illustrates the pain of not decluttering.
The point is to tell a story that in some way leads to the problem your book will solve, which brings us to step 2.
2. Help Them Relate to the Problem by Broadening It
You just relayed a narrative that points up the problem your book solves. Good! Now it’s time to make a comment that universalizes or at least broadens how many people have that problem.
In other words, this problem is relevant not just to the people in the story. It’s relevant to a whole market of people.
You may want to refer to a study or statistic to back up how widespread the problem is.
3. Emphasize the Painful Consequences of the Problem
Now it’s time to turn up the heat. What will happen if the people who have this problem don’t get a handle on it? What will the consequences be?
This step is important because it increases the need for your book!
If I get a little scrape on my finger, I’ll probably just ignore it. But if I’m bleeding all over the place, I’ll do something about it.
Your job at this point is to make sure reviewers understand that the problem your book addresses is no mere scrape.
4. Point to Your Book as the Solution
Now shift gears and write about how your book is the solution to the problem. Your book is the guide that will help readers alleviate the pain.
Include why you’re a credible authority to offer a solution. Do you have a relevant degree? Are people already listening to your advice on this topic? Do you have relevant experience to which you can point? Depending on the problem, all of these are possible sources of credibility.
5. Give Them a Preview of the Journey
Finally, give reviewers a preview of the journey your book will provide them. How will the content of your book take them from point A to B to C and so on until they reach a happy ending?
That’s the role of the very last step. Give enough detail that we get a sense of the journey, but realize your book proposal will likely include a chapter-by-chapter synopsis as well, so leave room for that.
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It can be daunting for a writer to describe her book compellingly, but following the above steps increases your chances of attracting agents and publishers to your book so that you can land a deal and get your book into the world.
Question: Let’s tackle step 1 together in the comments. What’s a story you can use to introduce the pain your book will solve? You can leave a comment by clicking here.
Step 1 from my book: The Quest to pass on a Legacy to serve and behold, threatened by a malevolent evil plot to delude and dismantle England and Madeira’s 500-year treaty placing Madeira and its archaic roots of the Masonic order in jeopardy.
Good start, victor! Thanks for commenting!
Such great perspective- thanks for sharing it!
My pleasure, Alexandra. Thanks for taking the time to comment!
This is so helpful because it details the steps in a new way, more than problem to resolution for the reader. Now to edit my proposal from the one I naively thought was so good! I especially like the introduction as a spark to the agent’s
Imagination.
Glad to hear it was helpful, Lisanne, and may your proposal be received favorably!
Thank you so much!
Step1: A girl who thought her name should have been “Libby”, who believed had her daddy allowed it, not worried about his baby girl being picked on about a can of peaches, her life would have, could have been different. My story is a about a girl who finally learned to accept her name, finally reconciles everyone along the way who didn’t see her, turned from their knowledge of her abusers and for reasons she’s given up on knowing, never came to her rescue. My book begins with a letter to my mama in heaven, to tell her “I’m going by Lisa Anne, mama. I thought you’d like to know.”
My book doesn’t relieve a pain or solve a problem. It provides an entertaining disaster narrative and then goes on to show how various interests bias the theories on the cause of the tragedy, leaving the true cause undetermined over 40 years later. My hope is that readers will come to the book for the narrative and then use the analysis of it as a model to think more critically about “official” determinations about other things.
I would argue your book most certainly solves a problem–the problem of nothing to do or boredom or want of entertainment!