Writing a Novel Part XVI: Inside the Publishing Process

​Written by John Edward Betancourt

When it comes to the writing process as a whole, everything you do is all about getting you to that final goal of finding yourself published. The endless hours of planning, the long nights searching for that perfect word or sentence, the constant rewrites and carefully piecing together a query letter are the ingredients that go into seeing your name in print, and seeing your book in stores. It's really what every novelist dreams of and believe it or not...it's possible to find yourself published well before your novel is with an agency or a publisher.

Now I'm sure some of you are saying, duh John, it's called self publishing. But that's not what I'm getting at. I've said it before and I'll say it again, traditional publishing is where I have always wanted to be and well, I had the distinct honor of having my work put into print by a regional publisher and that's what we are going to talk about today. The wonder of getting an official credit under my belt and what the publishing process actually looks like, and all of this came courtesy...of the short story market. 

In fact, I'm of the opinion that short stories as a whole are a lost art. It seems as though everyone swings for the fences for the novel and the novel alone and while that's not a bad thing, I've always found short stories to be wondrous to read. It's so amazing to see a complete tale come together in quick fashion and truthfully I am a firm believer the master of the short story in this day and age is the maestro himself, Stephen King. Now I had written a few and sent them out right before I settled in to write a film called Hurricane Kid and honestly, I didn't bank much on hearing back from publishers on them. Not because I thought they were terrible stories, but simply because I wasn't sure there was much of a market left for them these days. 

How wrong I was. In the middle of writing Hurricane Kid, I heard back from one of the publishers; Evil Girlfriend Media. They were all about a horror short story that I had written entitled An Undying Love and well...they wanted to publish it in an upcoming anthology series, Roms, Bombs & Zoms. It took a while for me to process the fact that someone out there was actually willing to pay me for my story, but once it soaked in, I was over the moon. But me being the workaholic that I am, I saved the celebration for another time because there were quite a few things to get out of the way first for this story. Obviously, there was a contract to sign and all that legalese, but more importantly, there was going to be editing work done for this story, and this is where I fell in love with traditional publishing.

It wasn't a complex process, after all, this was a short story, but I was still enamored by all of it. Not only was this an up close and personal look at how an anthology novel comes together...this was a taste of the big leagues. There were deadlines to meet for going over the publisher's and editor's notes and those notes were fascinating. Each one was in no way negative, and while I know that may not always be the case, it was a great way to kick off my publishing experience as the notes questioned certain words that I had used or outlined what a quick edit of a sentence or two was going to look like. It was done in such a professional and clean fashion that there was little I was going to dispute or fight for, minus a few things here and there because these notes did something important...they made the story better.

It was crisp now, and it flowed all that much better and that was all thanks to the watchful eye of the brilliant folks over at EGM and I will always be grateful for this opportunity because those notes were filed away for a rainy day to continue to make me a better writer. But the magical moment, the time to celebrate came in the fall of 2013 when the book was finally released to the public. I got my digital copy and that was cool as all hell, but nothing compared to the moment when my author's copy arrived in the mail. Because in my hand...was the finished product and to be able to hold it in my hands and see the pages in front of me...well let's just say it was a special enough moment that I needed a tissue or two.

Because that moment was something far more important to me. It felt as though I had finally made a giant step forward, and the pressure that was mounting in my mind to do something, anything and make progress in my career had finally come and well...it made me hungry for more. It helped me finish Hurricane Kid and more importantly, I knew it was time to return to Fallen Angel and see this through to the end. But before I made it that far, I needed to give it one more thorough look before starting the querying process over again. So, armed with newfound confidence and knowledge, I cracked open Fallen Angel one more time, ready to give it one more pass, and that's where we will pick up next time. Until then.