If you want to be an author, writing the book is only part of the book. You might have written an amazing story, but that means nothing if you can’t convince agents and editors to look at it. If you want to be traditionally published, you still have to go through the work of submitting the book to publishers and agencies. Here are a few top tips and things to think about when submitting your book. Some of these are based on my own experiences, some are based on advice I’ve heard from agents and editors over the years.

Send to the right place

I was at a talk once by an editor who worked with non-fiction children’s books. The publisher she worked for only produced educational books, but she said they still got hundreds and hundreds of submissions of fiction. Those were a waste of time for everyone involved because it didn’t matter how good those stories might have been, they were never going to get published by someone that didn’t publish stories. Pay attention to what the publisher does and doesn’t accept. If they have a big notice on their website saying that they don’t accept science fiction and fantasy submissions, there’s no point submitting your sci-fi novel. If they only publish romance, there’s no point sending your horror. You are basically guaranteed to be rejected if you send the book to the wrong place.

Most places accept electronic submissions these days, but you used to have to print out sample chapters and post them in, which meant each submission cost actual money to send. Now, you don’t waste money in the same way, but you’ll waste your time and the publishers. Better to focus on finding a publisher who does print the sort of stories you’re sending them.

Spend time on the cover letter

When you send in a submission, you send it with a covering letter or email. Some books get rejected here if the cover letter makes it sound like the book isn’t particularly interesting or isn’t what the publisher is looking for. Take your time to craft a description of the book that explains the key concepts, genre, and target audience of your book in a few short sentences. You don’t need to explain all the intricacies of the plot in the cover letter, but you need to explain how it’s going to be marketed. You want someone to read your description and think, “Yes, I’d be able to sell a book like that.”

Keep your cover letter short, describe your book in a way that makes it sound interesting, explain who would be likely to buy your book, and then proofread the whole thing at least five times. I’m serious about this last part. You don’t want to be rejected because of a typo in your first sentence.

Get someone to check your synopsis

When you submit a novel, you almost always have to send a summary of the plot. This is called the synopsis and it describes the key events that happen in the book from start to finish. Different publishers and agents provide different guidelines for how long your synopsis should be – 1 page, 2-3 pages, 500 words, 1000 words, etc. You may end up writing your synopsis several times to fit with all these different submission guidelines. I always find this incredibly difficult because there’s so much that happens in a book and it’s hard to know what to cut out. As well, you need to create a synopsis that’s coherent. Again, this is something I struggle with because I know all the background and everything that I’m leaving out, so something will make perfect sense to me while it’s thoroughly confusing for someone else. When I’m submitting a story, I will get someone to check the synopsis for me. It’s important that this is someone who hasn’t read the book because they will be in the same situation at the person to whom you’re submitting the story with no prior background knowledge. They will be able to spot any points where you’re assuming knowledge the reader doesn’t have.

This is not a definitive list of advice, but hopefull this will help you out if you’re at a point where you’re sending your story off to publishers. Good luck.