If you haven’t had a chance to take our quiz yet, I highly recommend taking it before you read this article. Additionally, if you haven’t taken a look at our membership options, I think they are pretty neat. Desert– Trend riding Grassland – Trend weaving
"by holding to their unique energy they will eventually break through and have success due to sheer force of will alone" Oh my good gracious I have never felt so called out bahahaha! This is so helpful.
I don't think that's true at all. It completely depends on what you are trying to do. If you write romance you're almost assuredly going to break in as a desert. If you ghostwrite books as well. I don't have a lot of trad publishing customers though. I absolutely do not think that is true, though.
I have a friend who ALWAYS, and I mean ALWAYS, has the #1 book for any publisher he works for because he is on top of trends and his publishers want quick results, so they usually publish within 6 months of him delivering a draft. He barely has social media and no list, but he just knows how to hit trends. It definitely means you have to be more mercenary, though.
It makes sense that established authors can be aquatics or grasslands or anything they want. But things seem a bit different for debut authors or folks still trying to attract a literary agent. There is a lot of "know your comps" and "be different but not too different" advice flying around.
That sounds like a mindset block to me. Plenty of copywriters, ghostwriters, and other writers break in without doing any of that stuff. If you look for Forest advice, you are sure to find it, but the publishing industry by and large is run by deserts hiring Deserts to write Desert books for a mass audience. Additionally, Editors are usually grasslands, and they are looking at Aquatics to find and create trends, so yes, big deals happen with Aquatics because they have to, as I mention in the article. Once Madeliene Miller writes Song of Achilles, though, there are like a million Deserts who fill in that trend.
"by holding to their unique energy they will eventually break through and have success due to sheer force of will alone" Oh my good gracious I have never felt so called out bahahaha! This is so helpful.
Forests, despite all being special snowflakes, are predictable in very similar ways :)
lololol it’s so true.
Seems that being a forest (or mayyyyybe a tundra) is the only way for a debut author to break into traditional publishing.
I don't think that's true at all. It completely depends on what you are trying to do. If you write romance you're almost assuredly going to break in as a desert. If you ghostwrite books as well. I don't have a lot of trad publishing customers though. I absolutely do not think that is true, though.
That's good to hear!
I have a friend who ALWAYS, and I mean ALWAYS, has the #1 book for any publisher he works for because he is on top of trends and his publishers want quick results, so they usually publish within 6 months of him delivering a draft. He barely has social media and no list, but he just knows how to hit trends. It definitely means you have to be more mercenary, though.
Oh and he's definitely a Desert, for SURE.
It makes sense that established authors can be aquatics or grasslands or anything they want. But things seem a bit different for debut authors or folks still trying to attract a literary agent. There is a lot of "know your comps" and "be different but not too different" advice flying around.
That sounds like a mindset block to me. Plenty of copywriters, ghostwriters, and other writers break in without doing any of that stuff. If you look for Forest advice, you are sure to find it, but the publishing industry by and large is run by deserts hiring Deserts to write Desert books for a mass audience. Additionally, Editors are usually grasslands, and they are looking at Aquatics to find and create trends, so yes, big deals happen with Aquatics because they have to, as I mention in the article. Once Madeliene Miller writes Song of Achilles, though, there are like a million Deserts who fill in that trend.
This is comforting to hear. And thanks for taking the time to chat - this feels like the pep talk I need :)