MSI Press Blog

  (photo by Frank Perez) It is Tuesday. Time to tall turkey. Monday's madness is over, and Wednesday will take us over the hump, so Tuesday it is--for some serious discussion with authors. Tuesday talks mean to address authors in waiting and self-published authors who would like to go a more traditional route or who would at least like to take their steps with a publisher by their side. Today's topic shares an important reason for a book being turned down by an acquisitions editor. While there are almost as many reasons for turning down a manuscript as there are manuscripts submitted, there is one reason that has nothing (or very little) to do with the manusciprt. It has to do with the author, and it comes across in the proposal, the cover letter, or the enote (if emailed), or in all of them. That trait is arrogance, and it will turn off an editor before the editor even reads the manuscript. After all, a publisher has to work with an author, and if they dynamics are poor, it wi...

It is Tuesday. Monday's madness is over, and Wednesday will take us over the hump, so Tuesday it is--for some serious discussion with authors. Tuesday talks mean to address authors in waiting and self-published authors who would like to go a more traditional route or who would at least like to take their steps with a publisher by their side.  Today's topic shares some real-life cases (book titles and author names changed, of course) of authors and would-be published authors lost contracts, from before being offered one to even after a book was published. They can serve as warnings of what not to do and, in converse, what to do in trying to secure -- and keep -- a publishing contract . Before being offered a contract (case: Developing School Discipline by Gordan Cruikshank): Arrogance. This attitude is perhaps the primary turn-off to an author being offered a contract even when the publisher is otherwise even very interested in the book. Remember, publisher and author working t...

Today's book excerpt comes from  An Afternoon's Dictation  by  Steven Greenebaum . This book has been in the Amazon top 100 among interfaith and ecumenical books on many occasions. PART TWO: DEALING WITH DEATH AND DYING CHAPTER FIVE   It wasn’t lost on me that the questions that most oppressed my mind and had me angrily demanding answers from God weren’t answered until halfway through the revelations that were placed before me. Still, what I desperately needed at that moment of crisis in my life was some kind of handle on death and dying. So, what I gravitated to first were the revelations about these two difficult subjects. I read them, reread them, and lived with them. In all honesty, being open to it required me to reorient my thinking about God as well as life and death—which is a lot to unpack! But it did comfort me and help me to begin to move ahead. Given how spent I felt, this was no small task. The mind is not the soul. Nor is the body. Sometimes, the mind...

  photo by Frank Perez It is Tuesday. Time to talk turkey. Monday's madness is over, and Wednesday will take us over the hump, so Tuesday it is--for some serious discussion with authors. Tuesday talks mean to address authors in waiting and self-published authors who would like to go a more traditional route or who would at least like to take their steps with a publisher by their side. Yesterday, I received a book proposal in the mail. Well, a proposal of sorts. The author had not his homework; he thought he was writing to a literary agent! Without any more prefacing, let me quote word-for-honest-by-gosh word the first paragraph: "I know that you have a set fee for helping me to get this manuscript to any one of the many interested book publisher, and that the most standard fees for your work ranges between10% and 15% which is fine with me. However, I would like to make a suggestion for you to present to any of them you may find that are willing to take on these works; this opt...

It is Tuesday. Monday's madness is over, and Wednesday will take us over the hump, so Tuesday it is--for some serious discussion with authors. Tuesday talks mean to address authors in waiting and self-published authors who would like to go a more traditional route or who would at least like to take their steps with a publisher by their side.  This week's conversation addresses the reason(s) that publishers almost never tell authors why a book was rejected. Typical, instead, authors whose works have been rejected will simply receive a short note that the book does not fit the publisher's needs without expressing how it does not fit or what those needs are. There are a few reasons why a publisher will not elucidate a rationale.  (1) The book really does not fit the publishing lines. Nuff said there. Sending a book about sports to a religious publisher -- it does happen (a lot) -- is a clear lack of fit and additional explanation is not needed. (2) The publisher does not have ...