The First-Book Market: Where and How to Publish Your First Book and Make It a Success [Paperback]

Jason Shinder (Editor), Amy Holman (Editor), Kathleen Adams (Editor)

Book Description

Publication Date: May 15, 1998 | ISBN-10: 0028622480 | ISBN-13: 978-0028622484 | Edition: 1

Presents resources for first-time authors with lists of awards and publishers who deal with unpublished authors and has advice from contemporary writers on how they got their first book published.

Editorial Reviews

Amazon.com Review

This is a great resource for anyone with a first book in the can or in the works. Editor Jason Shinder has gathered together a formidable amount of information on awards for first-time authors and publishers seeking first books. Sandwiched between Shinder's lists are all kinds of treasures: contemporary poets and fiction writers talking about their first books; the stories behind the first books of classic American writers; and information about arts organizations, health insurance for writers, and related publications.

Writing a book isn't easy, getting published isn't easy, and staying in print thereafter isn't easy, either. Prose and poetry writer Terese Svoboda reminds us that "the point of it all is not the book party and certainly not the royalty statement, but the wonderful moment when the story or poem comes together." Henry David Thoreau, we learn, paid for the publication of his first book, A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, which was a miserable failure; "I have now a library of nearly nine hundred volumes," he is said here to have written in his journal, "over seven hundred of which I wrote myself." And Anna Monardo relates the 12-year struggle between the time she first started taking notes toward writing her novel The Courtyard of Dreams and its eventual publication; the book was remaindered a mere 15 months later.

But take heart. What we learn from this book--and particularly from Shinder's very thorough Promotional Action Plan Worksheet--is that a writer's work is far from done when the book is done. Take, for instance, Terry McMillan's all-out campaign for her first novel, Mama. Feeling that the book's publicists were not doing as much as could be done, McMillan sent out over 4,000 letters to her publisher's sales reps, bookstores, various organizations, women's studies programs, college librarians, and readings series. She visited bookstores and autographed copies of her book. The upshot? She did 40 readings, 7 television shows, 6 radio shows, and 14 newspaper interviews, and received over 30 reviews. "The day before my publication date," McMillan writes, "I had sold out of my first printing." Granted, this is Terry McMillan we're talking about. But all that legwork certainly couldn't have hurt. --Jane Steinberg

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: John Wiley & Sons; 1 edition (May 15, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0028622480
• ISBN-13: 978-0028622484
• Product Dimensions: 8.1 x 5.5 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 14.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 3.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,731,802 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Discover books, learn about writers, read author blogs, and more.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

23 of 25 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Jason Shinder did the research so you don't have to., October 22, 1999

By 

"no_spaces_or_special" - See all my reviews

This review is from: The First-Book Market: Where and How to Publish Your First Book and Make It a Success (Paperback)

First Book Market gives me key information on where and how I can get my book published. It includes, among other things, deadlines, addresses, hints, guidance, and awards. Creating a first book takes time. First Book Market frees me to put my energy into my book. With First Book Market, I don't have to reinvent the wheel. Jason Shinder has pulled together hundreds of otherwise disparate sources offering generous tips from those who have gone before us. It's like applying to college; without a guide to help, we face a daunting task. This book makes the daunting fun.

11 of 13 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Title should be: Writing Contests for Unpublished Writers, July 10, 2000

By 

LeighPerson (Carrollton, TX USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The First-Book Market: Where and How to Publish Your First Book and Make It a Success (Paperback)

The only information for where to publish your first book is on 31 pages out of 308, but the information is only the very basic, IE: publishers' addresses and phone numbers. The rest is for writing contests and stories on writers who have won writing contests. I would suggest going elsewhere to find the type of information that this book implies it has. The phrase, "Don't judge a book by its cover," certainly applies to this one.

19 of 24 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars Disappointing book with a misleading title., December 8, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The First-Book Market: Where and How to Publish Your First Book and Make It a Success (Paperback)

I bought this book on-line because its title promised an information-packed guide for aspiring writers. What a terrible disappointment and waste of money. There are no procedural guidelines about submitting manuscripts and approaching publishers. Rather, this book is just a collection of random, almost irrelevant musings (considering the title's promise of a fact-filled, how-to type manual) and a listing of essay contests.