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/lit/ - Literature

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1139084 No.1139084 [Reply] [Original]

Okay Lit, 4 months in the making and I finally finished a book.
456 pages long. Bouts of writers block and nights of agonizing sleeplessness finishing just one more page.

Now... what? Do need to copyright before I submit to a publisher? Do I need to have an outside party review and proof read before I copyright? And just how exactly do I submit to a publisher anyway?

>> No.1139092

It's already copyrighted. Everything with any artistic merit is, automatically, on creation. Yes you should have someone proof it. There's a bunch of directories with publishers. Research them and find some that are especially suitable for your work, and send your work to them.

Then receive rejection letters and kill yourself.

>> No.1139090

now you edit that piece of shit draft.

>> No.1139094

>four months

Get it edited before you do anything else.

>> No.1139097

>>1139092
Like who? Is there someone I can specifically pay?

>> No.1139098
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1139098

>Then receive rejection letters and kill yourself.

I lol'd.


What's the book about OP?

>> No.1139101
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1139101

>>1139097
>pay
you're doing it wrong OP

>> No.1139102

>>1139084
At fist I thought it was a madman writing. but then I looked and saw it was a kindly old man. Scruffy albeit, but like an old grandfather.
.
.
.
One that didn't touch me at night while mommy was sleeping in her bed.

>> No.1139108

>>1139097
Do it yourself.

I'm not being a smarmy dick, you're supposed to edit it yourself and then type it out again after your rearrange everything for structure and grammar.

When it's good, THEN you send it to a publisher.

>> No.1139112

>>1139098
It's about a Beta who meets a submissive woman online. He pretends to be an Alpha for her and bites off more than he can chew.
BDSM, some 'punishment' scenes, a few breakdowns; but the book is more about him learning to be a man rather than BDSM.

>> No.1139115
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1139115

>>1139108
Also, read it out-loud when you edit it.

>> No.1139120

>>1139108
Okay. So reread the entire book. Again... Haven't done that 500 times already.
But you're right. I should do it again. And again until it's perfect.

What can I expect when I send it off?

>> No.1139123
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1139123

>>1139120
Rejection letters.

>> No.1139124

>>1139120

Really depends on the quality.

Make it the absolute best you can before sending it to anyone.

>> No.1139131
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1139131

>>1139112
Sounds good, but doesn't.

>> No.1139138

>>1139123
>>1139124
So it's that hard to break into writing? This was just for fun. I started it as a fun little exercise one day.
Before I knew it I was writing for real and 4 months had gone by.
I think I would like to make a career out of this.

>> No.1139150

Post here, let us proof it for you.

>> No.1139159

>>1139150
Now that; that will get your shit stolen.

>> No.1139160
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1139160

>>1139138
You know OP, it is hard. It's like marriage. Everybody is in love when they get married (not counting shotgun weddings), but there are very few couples that stand out, stay in love and stay married. Writing successfully is similar, it takes something special.

Best of luck with your career!

>> No.1139196

OP don't forget to be unappreciated in your time, and kill yourself after collapsing under the weight of your own genius

>> No.1139208
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1139208

>>1139196

A requirement. Also, living through the occasional drug overdose helps. Try a freak one, you know, the ones where the writer takes uppers and downers and anyone that knows anything about drugs would call it a death wish.

>> No.1139229

Don't look at it for a month. AT ALL. Not one page. Don't even think about it. Do other shit. Play some video games. Go out and try to get laid. Fly a kite. Whatever, just don't look at it and try not to think about it.

Then, in a month, go back and read the whole thing again with your refreshed brain. Make notes on your new thoughts on everything as you go through it.

Then start writing your second draft. Your second draft will be like your first draft except with all the stuff that doesn't work fixed or taken out.

Nobody's first draft of ANYTHING is good. Ever. The second draft is where good shit is made.

>> No.1139232
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1139232

>>1139229
Some great writers leave there stories untouched for decades. This is good advice.

>> No.1139241

>>1139232

some great writers die untouched as well

move into a shack in the woods OP, and be alone with the world

>> No.1139243

2nd Draft = 1st minus 10%. You'll find plenty of lines that need culling and tweaking.

>> No.1139275

Well a month is a bit too long, but I'll try two weeks or so.
I'm really eager to ship this out and see how ti fares. I'm really proud of it.

>> No.1139336

>>1139275
>a month is a bit too long

No, it isn't. That's the entire point. It's vital that you get some mental distance from this thing before you start taking it apart.

>I'm really eager to ship this out and see how ti fares. I'm really proud of it.

Sending it out before it's ready is novel suicide. If you don't take this seriously and give the second draft the attention it's due, it will be rejected for reasons you are GOOD ENOUGH TO FIX. You'll be horribly discouraged and probably give up and kill yourself.

I don't want to see that happen to you, /lit/tle bro.

Even if you think it's good now, I ASSURE YOU, you can make it fifty times better with the second draft.

>> No.1139353

>2 drafts

Try more like 20.

>> No.1139355

OP, if you really need somebody to tell you what direction to go in, make a quick read of On Writing by Stephen King. He has a lot of useful tips as far as self-editing goes.

>> No.1139364

Nothing pre-3rd draft is worth publishing, EVER.
Even then Id suggest you go through about 5 drafts before you send it to a literary agent.

Remember that editing isnt just a refining process, dont be afraid to experiment with dropping adding or altering plot points ect. Its not like its permanent, you can always revert it if you dont like it.

>> No.1139421

>>1139364
This just isn't true and could potentially be bad advice. Some people, including some famous writers, are extreme perfectionists and write every sentence like its the fourth draft. Sometimes good writing is destroyed by making too many drafts.

>> No.1139457

>>1139364

On the Road

>> No.1139463

Vonnegut wrote in paragraphs. He'd rework that paragraph until it was perfect. Nabokov wrote on index cards. He'd write out a part on an index card, and then he'd rewrite it on another, a little better. He'd do that until that section was complete, then he'd have stacks of index cards on his desk.

Everybody telling you that anything less than 3rd draft, whatever, and that the second draft should be the first -10%, they all read "On Writing" by Stephen King, or watched Finding Forrester, and now they think they now the only way to write.

However, since you wrote at over 100 pages-a-month, I'd have to say that your first draft is probably utter shit. Go edit it.

>> No.1139539
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1139539

>>1139463
this.

>> No.1139553

i wrote 9 pages last night for my book. it was a graphic rape scene. i felt pretty good writing 9 pages in one night. the scene isn't finished, and editing that will take even longer.

but 456 pages in 4 months and you think its completed? shit, you are about to experience a whole new level of disappointment and grief if you start sending it out to publishers right now.

>> No.1139781

Find yourself a literary agent first, don't even think about sending it straight to a publisher unless you want it to be heaped in with the slush pile.

>> No.1139948

>>1139781

This. If you so badly want to be published, why don't you look into the basics of getting published? Why don't you pick up one of the many very good guides to publishing your novel? Why don't you ask Google "how to get published" and read the many articles on the subject? All of those will tell you that you DO NOT SEND YOUR MANUSCRIPT TO PUBLISHERS. This is very basic knowledge, and the sort of shit you should have probably taken a couple of minutes to Google at some point after you decided to write a book.

Most of the time, publishers will not even read it. You can spend a lot of money posting your MS around dozens of publishers and not get a single response, because you'll be lucky if some guy on work experience leafs through the first few pages before rejecting it. If it comes from an agent, that's some guarantee of quality because instead of yet another would-be writer saying "read my book, it's awesome!" they have a respected agent whose job it is to FIND good books saying "read this shit, it's awesome!". And your agent will know who to approach and how best to approach them.

>> No.1141571

>>1139948
i wanna ask where the best place to find a reasonable "established" agent would be.

>> No.1141606

hey everyone, should i write only for the fuck of writing then edit my story much later, or only write when i feel really inspired THEN edit everything later?

>> No.1141665

>>1141606
if you have to ask this question, maybe you should ask whether or not you should be writing at all.
writing should come naturally and if you aren't cut out for it, then you aren't cut out for it. not everyone is. which is apparently why it is so hard to get anyone to read your manuscript.

>> No.1141681

>>1141665
that's not true. writing is ridiculously hard for some people.

the only prereq is having to write sometimes

>> No.1141683

>>1141606
editing can be done at anytime, writing not so much.

>> No.1141698

>>1141665
It's this kind of bullshit that discourages plenty of really great kids from writing and it pisses me off. I've been a writer for some time and I say that writing is fucking hard.

The ideas come naturally, which is why I can understand where the whole natural argument comes from, but the general interpretation is that the writing itself should just flow from the writer's hands, as if some higher power were only using his hands as puppets. It's bullshit because it implies that Rand wrote Atlas Shrugged in a day, or that Wallace wrote Infinite Jest in his free time before bed.

Bullshit.

These niggers spent years working on their work as do most writers, and they would both tell you that it was a metric fuckton of hard work. You tell me if that feels fucking natural.

Captcha: Fuck You

>> No.1141706

>>1141698
who cares about dead people anyways? boo hoo i'ma famous author, might as well be a pussy and kill myself.

i got a david foster wallace book for 10 cents and even that was too much to pay for it

*if writers can't handle the criticism of someone saying if they have to ask, maybe they should give up... then writing for a wide audience might not be for them.

>> No.1141710

>>1141698

Fucking this. I've written 2 books, currently working on my third, and its still just as hard as the first time.

OP, don't let anyone tell you that you aren't cut out for it. If you love writing, keep writing, and tell everyone to go suck their father's cocks.

>> No.1141713

>>1141706

1/10

>> No.1141718

The best work isn't written...it's re-written