Waiting for the right stuff

With Vertigo out later this year, and one or two other non-fiction and short fiction collections in the pipeline, our thoughts recently turned to the big one – the first published novel. With the website in development, it would be ideal to have details of our first novel ready for when the site goes live.

We’ve received several manuscripts, which is pleasing, considering they arrived before we’d started putting our name out there. Some have been better than others, although at this stage there’s nothing which jumps out and screams ‘Publish me!’ One or two could be interesting with some work, but right now we have nothing ready to go.

As a new publisher, it’s a bit of a chicken and egg – with no back catalogue, you have no track record with which to convince writers that they should be submitting to you. However, if you go too early and publish something which isn’t up to scratch, you run the risk of soiling whatever reputation you may have.

So what to do? How long do you play the waiting game? Do you hold out for something utterly brilliant to thud onto your desk? Or do you take a chance on something that you think could work, having asked for rewrites and edits and the like?

With this in mind, I sought out the advice of Lynn Price, editorial director of California-based Behler Publications and resident editor within Litopia. If I had a pound for each time I’ve seen Lynn thanked by writers for the advice she offers, I’d have… hell, I don’t know, but I’d be damn rich.

‘You're certainly right that books build your reputation,’ Lynn told me. ‘And it's smart to have a bang-on book to open your gates. In my case, I knew a lot of writers, so I came out with several books at around the same time.

‘As to how long to wait till you're sure? That's hard to say. It's a gut feel in your radar that pings because you feel confident about promoting the book, the author has a good platform, you have a solid, identifiable readership, and the content is unique to everything currently in the store shelves. Fiction is hard to sell, and it's vital to understand the fiction marketplace.

‘My litmus test is, it has to be beautifully written, and I know I can sell it, given all the other parameters. I won't take something that needs a lot of work because it's too easy for the work to fall apart during the editing process. I'll make recommendations to the author about what I love and what I feel needs work. If they want to fix it and resubmit six months later, I'm good with that.

‘I won't/can't take something that I feel I'm taking a chance on because it's too expensive. I have to feel 100% committed. I wouldn't worry too much about not seeing great manuscripts yet; you haven't put your company name out there. Once you begin publicizing your company, you'll have a lot more to choose from.

‘The most important thing is not to make a round hole fit a square peg. Wait for the right book to come to you.’

Quite often, when you ask for advice, you already know the answer – you just can’t see the wood for the trees. Reading Lynn’s words, it became blindingly obvious.

So, the challenge to all you writers out there is this. We’re waiting for the ‘right book’. Get writing, get editing, get polishing and get submitting.

Cover story

While editing continues on the stories that will make up the first edition of our Vertigo anthology, we've got a big decision to make - how to pitch the cover art.

Regardless of the saying, people do judge a book by its cover. Okay, the final decision on whether to purchase might come down to other factors, maybe the back cover blurb or the first few lines of page one, but the cover can either hook a browser or confine your book to a long life on the shelves.

I received five uncorrected proofs in the post today to review, none of which I'd heard a word about. Of those five, one jumped out a mile - Prophecy of the Sisters, by Michelle Zink. It had by far the most striking cover art and it was the one to which my attention was drawn. Sure, I checked out the others and read the blurbs, but Zink's novel had its hook into me.

We need Vertigo to be a success. We're starting Nemesis from scratch, and that goes for finance too. Vertigo has to sell, in order to generate cash for future projects. What's more, we want this to be a regular anthology, and for that reason alone it's important that the first editon is well-received.

The reasoning behind the title of the anthology is that these are stories that will leave you feeling uneasy, disorientated, out of kilter with life. The artwork needs to reflect that, and look damn cool doing it.

So the choice of cover art for Vertigo is vital. Obviously, the stories have got to kick ass. But to get folk to buy the thing in the first place, we need a knockout front cover. Easily said, not so easily done.

Quirky by name, quirky by nature

Someone asked me the other day why, given our surname, we hadn’t gone for a name like 'Quirk Publishing', or 'Quirk Books'. We did think about it. But there were two problems.

First, we didn’t want it to appear that this was a self-publishing venture to get my work into print. It most certainly isn't, but folk often put two and two together and make whatever damn number suits their theory.

The second reason is that there is already a successful independent publisher going by the name Quirk Books, who up until recently dealt mainly with non-fiction. I've been following their adventures for the last couple of years and they hit the big time earlier this year with a novel, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.

There are 600,000 copies of P&P&Z in circulation, and the follow-up has been announced - Sense and Sensibility and Sea Monsters. Makes sense, I guess. The cross between period drama and zombies caught the imagination of both readers and the publishing world and the chaps at Quirk Books pounced on the publicity generated, and good luck to them.

Was P&P&Z merely a gimmick of an idea? Or is there something more substantial beyond the concept? I can't say, as I've not read the book yet. But it has worked, that's for sure, and it's a soaring success story that gives hope to a small publishing house trying to find its wings.

On another note, a quick word of thanks to everyone who has wished us well with Nemesis. There are exciting times ahead, and we're glad you're along for the ride.

And on yet another note, talking of success stories, Our Kid seems to have suddenly become obsessed with Harry Potter. He's six, and was hooked on the first movie from the age of two, but fell out of love with young Harry when he discovered 601 on the Sky remote and Power Rangers: Jungle Fury and Ben 10 soon ruled.

But he now has Harry Potter tapes on what appears to be a continual loop in his bedroom and has started to ask to see the films again. I even found him watching Philosopher's Stone earlier while wearing his glasses. We usually have to glue his glasses to his face to keep them on.*

What's more, he actually seems to know what is going on now. We have a few of the books, so that's the next step. You have another fan, JK.

Till next time.

(* A slight use of poetic licence here. Of course we don't glue his glasses to his face. That would be cruel. We just nail them on)

Adventures in publishing. Warts and all

Welcome, one and all, to the blog of Nemesis Publishing.

We’re about to set off on a long (and, frankly, petrifying) journey into the world of books, as we try to get a small publishing house off the ground and fight for a seat at what appears to be an already crowded dinner table of crazed zombies ripping each other’s heads off in search of the tastiest morsel of flesh.

But we want in there.

We want to get a foot on that first rung of the ladder. And keep climbing. And we want you along for the ride.

We’ll be updating this blog regularly – daily, when feasible – and it will be a warts and all look at how the business develops. Your input is welcome; if there’s anything you want to ask about Nemesis, or publishing in general, leave a comment and we’ll endeavour to answer. If you have an idea for a blog topic, let us know.

Right, let’s rewind a little.

Nemesis began to take shape a couple of years back, when we had the idea of providing a platform for Isle of Man fiction writers. The plan was to publish a regular anthology, in typical paperback format, featuring long ‘short stories’ – 5,000 words or so, give or take the odd thousand.

And thus, Vertigo was born. The concept was simple – hard-edged, gritty and dark stories, in any genre, from crime to kitchen-sink drama to fantasy. We got the publicity machine rolling and the submissions started coming in.

Now here we are, in July 2009, with the first edition of Vertigo set to be in shops for Christmas this year, and a second in the pipeline.

But we’re not stopping there.

We have several non-fiction projects in the pipeline, and, through word of mouth, some full-length fiction manuscripts have been turning up on our doorstep and in our inbox.

We won’t be flooding the market with half-baked ideas in order to make a quick buck. We aim to start slowly, a book or two for the first couple of years, and build from there.

Our website is being developed, under the care of the crack web team at Isle of Man Advertising & PR, and until that is up and running, submissions can be sent to us at nemesispublishing(at)gmail.com – for fiction, a cover letter, one-page synopsis, first three chapters, Times New Roman and double-spaced. You know the drill.

What else?

You can follow Nemesis on facebook here

You can follow this blog on facebook here

You can follow us on twitter here

And that's about it for now, folks. Thanks for reading. We hope you stick around and enjoy the ride.

Cheers
Emma and John Quirk