New Authors: Reasons Why a Publisher Will Buy Your Book

You probably can't help it any more than I can ... that creeping, niggling, horrible feeling of doubt every time you pick up a writer's magazine and thumb through its articles. It starts in the back of your mind, worming its way through your subconscious until it's right there, blazing in front of you as clear as a headline:

I'm not a "somebody". I'll never get published.

So I'm sitting here thinking, and finally decided it was time to have an article that gives reasons why a "nobody" will get published if they work towards it. After all, every writer was a "nobody" at some point - Stephen King nearly gave up writing to work a 9-5 job before he landed his first book deal. You've got to start somewhere, and if you don't start at all, well ... at least you know where you'll end up.

Editors will buy a book even from new authors if they find compelling reasons to do so. If you take the time to address some of these common "reasons" for buying a book from a new author, you can design your submission packages around them.

Common Reasons for Buying a New Author's Book

1. They think a book will sell - Even though the push should be (in an ideal world) about the creative outlet, editors have to constantly think about the bottom line or they won't have any money to continue publishing. It's really that simple.

I list this reason first because it is often the overriding factor in buying a manuscript. The editor or publisher thinks the idea for an author's book is timely, the writing itself is superb, or the title alone will cause the books to jump right into consumer's hands.

Do your market research, and really tune your writing toward a concept that you can see, yourself, will sell and then weave this fact right into your submission packages.

2. They love it, regardless of commercial potential - When an editor finds a manuscript on their desk that grips them so strongly they can't put it down, they might decide to buy the book even if it doesn't look like it will be a best seller. Perhaps you've come up with a topic that is of great value to a cause or to the country, or maybe your characters and writing style are so superb that the editor becomes passionate about your book.