Make A Living Writing Romance

In my last post I mentioned that it has been a good long time since I’ve submitted anything to a romance agent or a publisher.  A couple of mistakes and I lost my courage. Couple that with a proclivity to write but not much inclination to submit and well, you have the makings for a dry spell.

However, I am fully aware that if you actually want to see your romance novel in print, or on the electronic bookshelves, you have to submit to editors and agents.

So…

I finally started submitting again.  I realized that what I needed, besides some good old fashioned “suck it up” courage was a process.

(And yes, I am in the early stages of creating a downloadable checklist and tracking system so you can create your own submission process.)

Thus far the process looks like this:

Step #1 Create a list of all the publishers & agents in the romance industry, both electronic and print.

Step #2 Review each publisher and/or romance agent and make a second list for the specific manuscript you’re submitting. Make sure to check on Preditors and Editors – credibility matters.

Step #3 Rank them in order you desire to be published by. For example, if your dream publisher would be Kensington then they go at the top of your list.  This is who you’ll query first.

Step #4 Create a submission process that works for you. I decided that it was best to start each week off with a huge step toward my dreams and goals and that meant submitting my manuscript on Mondays. What a way to start the week, right?

So each Monday I’m going to submit to another publisher. However, there is a caveat to this because some publishers don’t like to have you submit to more than one house at a time. In this case, make a note on your calendar when it’s a reasonable time for them to get back to you and then submit to another publisher or agent.

Step #5 Review the submission process for the romance publisher or agent at the top of your list. Follow it to the T. Lick that envelope or hit send on your computer – make it happen!

Step #6 Do you still have that calendar out?  Great because you’ll need to make a notation on it about when to follow up with said editor or agent.  This is where good notes are important. Make sure you keep records of exactly what you sent them, what they’ve requested and when you sent it.

Step #7 Pat yourself on the gosh darn back because sending your hard work out into the ether to be critiqued and reviewed is tough stuff!

It takes courage, faith, and the ability to push toward your goals and dreams.

I did it tonight and you can too. Go ahead, what romance manuscript do you need to dust off? Get cracking! It’s not going to get published if it’s just sitting around.  (Oh, and if you want  a little incentive, word on the street is that Twilight was rejected 40 times!  That’s some perseverance that REALLY paid off)

I have to be honest here and say that it’s been a LONG time since I’ve submitted anything to an agent or an editor. I love the process of writing and creating romance and seem to get caught up in that enough that the submission process got pushed to the end of the priority list.

However, you simply cannot become a published author and many any money writing romance if you don’t submit your manuscripts!

Now that I have a revision process to adhere to, it’s time to start submitting again and I realized last night as I wrapped up the revisions for one romantic suspense manuscript, that I’m a bit fearful.

Submission Means Subjecting Yourself to…

• Criticism
• Rejection!
• Reality
• More revisions
• Negotiations (this is a good thing because it means someone is interested in your book but it’s also a stressful thing.)
• Networking
• Queries and synopsis writing!

I’ve never been a dive right into the pool kind of person. I’ll walk all the way around to the stairs in the shallow end and take my sweet time getting wet. Inch by inch.  However, sometimes if you  want something to happen you do have to dive right in. Set your fear aside and make it happen. There’s a lot to learn and a lot to enjoy about pushing past your fears.

In order to make the process easier, for me and for you, I’m going to work on creating a downloadable submission tracking system. Querytracker.net has a good system but it isn’t right for me. I want something on paper, that I can look at that keeps me organized and accountable. I want something that is systematized and automatic.

When a process is made simple and automatic, the fear is easier to push past. It becomes a habit rather than a stressful event.

So I’m going to get to work over the next two weeks to create a submission checklist and tracking system to make available over on the main website www.makealivingwritingromance.com.

In the meantime, please share your submission process. How do you get past the fear? How do you make it an automatic and easy process?

There’s no argument that the romance writing process is highly individualized. Some people write in a very structured manner, typing for an hour each day or working until they complete their word count goal. Others go on writing binges where they write for hours or days straight and then also have long dry periods where they may not write a word.

Some romance writers plot and plan every single detail before they ever start writing their manuscript while others, who call themselves “pantsters”, write by the seat of their pants. They just sit down and start typing out a story.

The Revision Process Is Just As Individualized.

You may sweep through your romance manuscript and make all the necessary changes in one pass. You may break down the process and make ten passes through your manuscript, each time focusing on a new step, dialogue for example.

You may dedicate a specific amount of time each day to your revision process or you may sit down and complete it all in one chunk of time. You may decide to revise 3 chapters a day, 100 pages a day, or for an hour a day.

So How Do You Create The Right Revision Plan for You?

There are three keys to any successful revision plan. They include:

1. Measurable goals
2. Structured time
3. A process or a checklist

Measurable Goals – The biggest goal to set here would be a deadline for having your romance manuscript polished.  A general rule of thumb, though you may be much more motivated and really amp the revision process, is to spend as much time revising your manuscript as you did writing it in the first place.  There is plenty of wiggle room here because if you had a whirlwind writing session and wrote your book in a week, it may very likely take longer to revise and polish it.  However, it’s a place to start.

Other measurable goals include smaller goals like a page count per day or a revised word count per day.  This strategy may seem restrictive however; it really helps you push through those days when you don’t feel so motivated.

Structured Time – You know what time of day you’re most productive, creative and energetic. This is the best time of the day to write and it’s the best time of the day to revise. Schedule your romance writing into each and every day and try to schedule it during your best time of the day.

A Process/Checklist – There are many phases to revising your romance novel. You want to make sure:

• Your scenes are fleshed out
• Your characters are consistent
• You use the 5 senses as appropriate
• Your dialogue works
• Your sentence structure varies
• Your pace, tone and POV are all appropriate for the scene

And so on….

Your revision checklist will reflect this. How you organize your checklist and structure your revision process is up to you. You may combine several elements or you may give your romance manuscript 20 passes, each time looking at a new element.

Here’s a sample RevisionChecklist.  It’s recommended to use this as a guideline for creating your own process customized to fit your style, goals and writing process.

Revising your romance novel is a required step to get it ready for publication. Make it easy on yourself and create a process that fits you.

The obvious answer is that it takes as long as it takes, right? I mean you want to submit a polished romance novel to agents and publishers.

That being said, if you give yourself “forever” to edit and polish your manuscript the cold hard truth is that it might never get published.

And since that’s what this blog and website are devoted to (helping you make a living writing romance) it makes sense that our perspective might be a bit different.

Create a Revision Deadline For Your Romance Manuscript

When you’re writing your book, presumably, you created a writing schedule that included daily writing goals.

For example, 1000 words a day. At this rate you’d have your first draft completed in around 100 days. Pretty good, right?

In order to continue on this very productive path, you’ll need to apply the same approach to your revision process.  There are a couple approaches to take:

• Edit/polish a certain number of pages each day.
• Create a revision checklist and create goals for each step of the checklist. For example if one step is to storyboard each chapter then that step would take one day. However, the “read the entire manuscript through once and take notes on changes to make” might take ten days.
• Set time aside each day to edit just like you did to create the first draft.

Revising and polishing your romance manuscript can be just as rewarding, if not more so, than creating the first draft. It’s a time to pull out the emotions and senses and to craft compelling scenes.

My best recommendation is that the revision process shouldn’t take any longer than it took you to write the first draft of your romance novel. If you took 3 months to write the draft then give yourself another 3 months, maximum, to edit and polish it.

And then get your hard work published!

Here is a FREE RevisionChecklist you can download or modify for your own purposes.

Enjoy!