5 ms·

> Bello was a hotly anticipated new author that was preparing to publish her first book I don't know anything about the inner workings of the biz. How does som

> Bello was a hotly anticipated new author that was preparing to publish her first book I don't know anything about the inner workings of the biz. How does someone who hasn't published her first book yet become hotly anticipated? I get the second book being hotly anticipated, but the first?

samatman 4y ago
The short answer is Twitter. It's the long answer as well.
forbiddenvoid 4y ago
Many first time novelists already have a track record of publishing poetry and short stories in smaller publications. It's often the way novelists are able to attract an agent, and by extension a publishing contract. At that point the 'anticipation' is often just the effect of the publisher's marketing efforts.
verve_rat 4y ago
That was my first question too. I guess samatman is probably correct, this is what the old boys club looks like when it is not just old and boys. We are not part of the "in" group, so we just don't see the noise.
tiahura 4y ago
By checking boxes.
dhosek 4y ago
A lot of uninformed answers about this question. The process of getting a first novel published goes something like this (I'm eliding a lot of the hard work involved to be able to answer the question and failure to progress can happen at any stage of the process): 1. Write the book 2. Query agents until someone agrees to represent you. 3. After development work between agent and author,¹ the agent will then shop the work around to one or more editors at publishing houses. 4. If multiple editors are interested in purchasing the work, there can either be an auction where they bid to publish the work or an editor can issue what’s called a pre-empt where before it can go to auction, they’ll offer a large advance hoping to guarantee their house gets the book. It’s the multiple editors interested in the work that generates most of the pre-publication buzz for a debut author. Yes, it can help to have published some prominent short works before the first novel, but it’s exceedingly rare for someone to gain much notice from this. Outside of a very short list of prominent magazines (the big national mags: The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Harper’s plus a very short list of smaller publication The Paris Review, Granta, McSweeney’s), the sad truth is that most of the readers of literary magazines are writers² and maybe literary agents scouting for new talent.³ When someone without at least an agent if not a previously published book has a story in The New Yorker, it’s a major event which was at least in part why “Cat People” was such a big deal when it was published a couple years back. ⸻ 1. Starting in the 80s, this has become increasingly where a lot of editorial work on fiction happens. 2. This is the big conundrum for publishers of said magazines and a generally unspoken but widely acknowledged reality. I have an incubating project that will maybe with a few years’ of cultivation, expose a small number of non-writers to some of the best stuff available online. 3. The magazines that agents look at is not much longer than the first list. Looking at the table of contents of the past few years’ Best American Short Stories will surface almost all of the magazines in agents’ reading lists.
- zrobotics 4y ago
  >I have an incubating project that will maybe with a few years’ of cultivation, expose a small number of non-writers to some of the best stuff available online. I'd be interested in this, since I enjoy short stories as an art form but discoverability is poor. Any current recommended resources for finding short works? I don't care about hipster cred for 'discovering' an author, just for finding new short literary fiction that isn't being published in the major magazines.
  - dhosek 4y ago
    I like the annual prize anthologies (for short fiction, that would be Best American Short Stories, the O. Henry Prize Stories and the Pushcart Prize Anthology (the last includes poetry and essays, and genre identifications are sometimes incorrect). I also get recommendations from writers that I follow on Twitter. My incubating project has my own recommendations showing up little by little at https://litjunction.com https://litjunction.com (anyone who wants an invite can email me at don.hosek@gmail.com and I'll throw one out—right now I’m focusing on making sure that as much of the lobste.rs excess as possible is pulled out of the site but I can handle a small influx of new contributors/commenters etc.)
ycombinete 4y ago
Nietzsche was hotly anticipated in academic circles, before he published The Birth of Tragedy. There are a lot of ways to show promise in academia long before your first book.

samatman 4y ago

The short answer is Twitter. It's the long answer as well.

forbiddenvoid 4y ago

Many first time novelists already have a track record of publishing poetry and short stories in smaller publications. It's often the way novelists are able to attract an agent, and by extension a publishing contract. At that point the 'anticipation' is often just the effect of the publisher's marketing efforts.

verve_rat 4y ago

That was my first question too. I guess samatman is probably correct, this is what the old boys club looks like when it is not just old and boys. We are not part of the "in" group, so we just don't see the noise.

tiahura 4y ago

By checking boxes.

dhosek 4y ago

A lot of uninformed answers about this question. The process of getting a first novel published goes something like this (I'm eliding a lot of the hard work involved to be able to answer the question and failure to progress can happen at any stage of the process): 1. Write the book 2. Query agents until someone agrees to represent you. 3. After development work between agent and author,¹ the agent will then shop the work around to one or more editors at publishing houses. 4. If multiple editors are interested in purchasing the work, there can either be an auction where they bid to publish the work or an editor can issue what’s called a pre-empt where before it can go to auction, they’ll offer a large advance hoping to guarantee their house gets the book. It’s the multiple editors interested in the work that generates most of the pre-publication buzz for a debut author. Yes, it can help to have published some prominent short works before the first novel, but it’s exceedingly rare for someone to gain much notice from this. Outside of a very short list of prominent magazines (the big national mags: The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Harper’s plus a very short list of smaller publication The Paris Review, Granta, McSweeney’s), the sad truth is that most of the readers of literary magazines are writers² and maybe literary agents scouting for new talent.³ When someone without at least an agent if not a previously published book has a story in The New Yorker, it’s a major event which was at least in part why “Cat People” was such a big deal when it was published a couple years back. ⸻ 1. Starting in the 80s, this has become increasingly where a lot of editorial work on fiction happens. 2. This is the big conundrum for publishers of said magazines and a generally unspoken but widely acknowledged reality. I have an incubating project that will maybe with a few years’ of cultivation, expose a small number of non-writers to some of the best stuff available online. 3. The magazines that agents look at is not much longer than the first list. Looking at the table of contents of the past few years’ Best American Short Stories will surface almost all of the magazines in agents’ reading lists.

zrobotics 4y ago
>I have an incubating project that will maybe with a few years’ of cultivation, expose a small number of non-writers to some of the best stuff available online. I'd be interested in this, since I enjoy short stories as an art form but discoverability is poor. Any current recommended resources for finding short works? I don't care about hipster cred for 'discovering' an author, just for finding new short literary fiction that isn't being published in the major magazines.
- dhosek 4y ago
  I like the annual prize anthologies (for short fiction, that would be Best American Short Stories, the O. Henry Prize Stories and the Pushcart Prize Anthology (the last includes poetry and essays, and genre identifications are sometimes incorrect). I also get recommendations from writers that I follow on Twitter. My incubating project has my own recommendations showing up little by little at https://litjunction.com https://litjunction.com (anyone who wants an invite can email me at don.hosek@gmail.com and I'll throw one out—right now I’m focusing on making sure that as much of the lobste.rs excess as possible is pulled out of the site but I can handle a small influx of new contributors/commenters etc.)

ycombinete 4y ago

Nietzsche was hotly anticipated in academic circles, before he published The Birth of Tragedy. There are a lot of ways to show promise in academia long before your first book.