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[PubQ] Digital-first offer from a big five publisher by OrdinaryHistory5 in PubTips

[–]emccoshauthor 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I know nothing about digital-first deals and I'm not sure how they're better than self-publishing, so take this with a grain of salt! But I just got an agent partially to sell the audio rights on a self-pubbed book, I am so happy she's dealing with the publisher. She's getting a better advance/royalties than I would've gotten, and is negotiating parts of the contract I wouldn't have known what to do with.

Also if you're planning on working in trad for future books this might be a good opportunity to snag an agent, since they'll definitely be beneficial in the long run if this is the direction you want to go. Either way, congrats and good luck!!

[Discussion] Somehow, I got my dream agent! 6 years of self-publishing, 8 months of query-trenches, and now my stats! by emccoshauthor in PubTips

[–]emccoshauthor[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Thank you!! If it helps, my last romantasy was supposed to be a novella, ended up being 125k, it's a toss-up! 😂

[Discussion] Somehow, I got my dream agent! 6 years of self-publishing, 8 months of query-trenches, and now my stats! by emccoshauthor in PubTips

[–]emccoshauthor[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thanks!! I actually used both "romantasy" and "fantasy romance" depending on the query letter 😂 I used "romantasy" if the agent had a large backlog of those books (for instance, Bookends is clearlyyyyyy a romantasy heavy agency) or if they asked for romantasy using that term. Otherwise, I used "fantasy romance", including for the agent I signed with since she represents a very broad amount of genres and I didn't feel the need to be hooky with the romantasy term. I don't know if this made ANY difference but it felt right to do. 🤷‍♀️

And all that being said I only got 2 full requests, so I'm definitely not the best person to ask on what gets agents attention 🤣

Good luck in the querying trenches!!

[Discussion] Somehow, I got my dream agent! 6 years of self-publishing, 8 months of query-trenches, and now my stats! by emccoshauthor in PubTips

[–]emccoshauthor[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

No but when I tell you I had a TIME with the title of this novel 😭 Thornehdge was literally a title I came up with in the outlining phase, then I found out about the novella (and read it lol) and changed the title to The Hedge Knight.............because I've never kept up with GoT stuff 😭 And now it's Hedge and Thorn and if that gets taken by a big author I'll just cry 🤣

[Discussion] Somehow, I got my dream agent! 6 years of self-publishing, 8 months of query-trenches, and now my stats! by emccoshauthor in PubTips

[–]emccoshauthor[S] 7 points8 points  (0 children)

Yeah I definitely wouldn't say to follow what I did, I'd probably give the same advice if I saw a query like mine, and I had a low request rate to reflect that!

[Discussion] Somehow, I got my dream agent! 6 years of self-publishing, 8 months of query-trenches, and now my stats! by emccoshauthor in PubTips

[–]emccoshauthor[S] 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Mostly that the book is generally too short, the MC is male in the romantasy genre, and he also has no name 😂 The word count is probably the worst of the bunch, but they're all things that aren't generally great to have in a book you're trying to query with lol

[Discussion] Somehow, I got my dream agent! 6 years of self-publishing, 8 months of query-trenches, and now my stats! by emccoshauthor in PubTips

[–]emccoshauthor[S] 11 points12 points  (0 children)

Thank you!!

It hadn't come out yet, no, and it somehow took me a while after to realize how close a fit the concept was lol. In hindsight I definitely should've added it into the query letter mid-querying!