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About Chuck Sambuchino

Chuck Sambuchino is a freelance editor of query letters, synopses, book proposals, and manuscripts. As an editor for Writer's Digest Books, he edits the GUIDE TO LITERARY AGENTS and the CHILDREN'S WRITER'S & ILLUSTRATOR'S MARKET. His Guide to Literary Agents Blog is one of the largest blogs in publishing. His own books include the bestselling humor book, HOW TO SURVIVE A GARDEN GNOME ATTACK, which was optioned by Sony Pictures, as well as the writing guide, CREATE YOUR WRITER PLATFORM. Connect with Chuck on Twitter or at his website.

Recent Posts by this author:

  • 5 Encouraging Reasons To Build Your Writer Platform
  • What Are the BEST Writers’ Conferences To Attend?
  • Why “Keep Moving Forward” Is My Best Advice For Writers Everywhere
  • 3 Pieces of Advice For Aspiring Authors
  • 5 Tips on How to Write a Novel Synopsis
  • Do You Need Multiple Agents If You Write in Different Genres?
  • Why Writers Must Make Themselves Easy to Contact
  • 11 Frequently Asked Questions About Book Royalties, Advances and Money
  • The Difference Between Your “Current Platform” and “Future Platform”
  • Why You Should Only Query 6-8 Agents at a Time
  • Should You Pitch (and Sign With) a New Literary Agent? The Pros and Cons…

    • 5 Encouraging Reasons To Build Your Writer Platform

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    PhotobucketThis column excerpted from my book, CREATE YOUR WRITER PLATFORM (Nov. 2012, Writer’s Digest Books), a guide on how to build your visibility, brand, and network to better market yourself and your books. The book includes lots of interviews with literary agents and platform-heavy authors.

    I understand why people don’t get enthusiastic about platform building. Writers want to—shocker—write, and then (maybe) spend time talking about their writing journey. But building a blog? Tweeting? Volunteering to be a guest contributor to local radio stations all in the hopes of impressing literary agents? “If I did that, I wouldn’t have time to write!” is something I hear writers often say.

    Building your writer platform means increasing your visibility, reach and network in the marketplace. It means creating channels through which you have the ability to sell books. The planks of platform include a successful blog, social media, article writing, public speaking, and more. In today’s publishing environment, nonfiction authors need platform to get the attention of publishers, whereas fiction authors simply want platform, as it will increase their value.

    While creating a platform is not something writers generally get excited about in the morning (“Today, I’m gonna build my platform! I’M SO HAPPY!!!!”), I often tell people that there are definite upsides to the endeavor. Here are 5 off the top of my head:

    1. Platform gives you a degree of control. In a previous WU column, I discussed how frustrating it is to have such a lack of control over the sales of your book. But platform building means you’re establishing concrete, solid connections through media outlets, with other professionals, and/or through social media channels. If you build these avenues, you can use them to sell books later. Creating a platform is an opportunity to, as writer Alexis Grant once put it, “make your own luck.” If you host a contest on your blog or speak at a writers conference, you are taking matters into your own hands, not waiting on an outside party to possibly have some luck spreading the word about your work.

    2. You are your book’s ideal marketer. [Read more…]

    What Are the BEST Writers’ Conferences To Attend?

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    "What writers' conference would you recommend? Which one is the best to attend?" I get this question all the time. I’m guessing that people decide they’re going to "do it right” and hit up a big event — and they are just trying to make sure that they get some serious bang for their buck. Now, to answer the question, let's just acknowledge immediately that there is no definitive answer. It will be different for everyone, so we must examine three things: 1) the different kinds of writers’ … [Read more...]

    Why “Keep Moving Forward” Is My Best Advice For Writers Everywhere

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    GIVEAWAY: I am (again) excited to give away a free copy of either the 2013 Guide to Literary Agents or Formatting & Submitting Your Manuscript, 3rd Ed., to a random commenter. Comment within one week; winners must live in Canada/US to receive the book by mail. Good luck to all! (UPDATE: Chad Lynch won.) Keep moving forward. That is probably the best advice I can give you as you continue toward your writing goals, whatever they may be. Just keep moving forward. 2011 was a strange year … [Read more...]

    3 Pieces of Advice For Aspiring Authors

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    This column excerpted from my book, CREATE YOUR WRITER PLATFORM (Nov. 2012, Writer's Digest Books), a guide on how to build your visibility, brand, and network to better market yourself and your books. The book includes lots of interviews with literary agents and platform-heavy authors. When I’m instructing at a writers' conference, occasionally someone will raise their hand and try to point out flaws in my instruction. Here are some common examples regarding fiction: “Wait a minute, … [Read more...]

    5 Tips on How to Write a Novel Synopsis

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    GIVEAWAY: I am (again) excited to give away a free copy of the 2012 Guide to Literary Agents to a random commenter. Comment within one week; winners must live in Canada/US to receive the book by mail. Good luck to all! (Update: Kaitlyn B. won.) I've never met a single person who liked writing a synopsis. Seriously -- not one. But still, synopses are a necessary part of the submission process (until some brave publishing pro outlaws them), so I wanted to share 5 basic tips today regarding … [Read more...]

    Do You Need Multiple Agents If You Write in Different Genres?

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    GIVEAWAY: I am (again) excited to give away a free copy of the 2012 Guide to Literary Agents to a random commenter. Comment within one week; winners must live in Canada/US to receive the book by mail. Good luck to all! (Update: Julia Monroe Martin won.) I just got back from our awesome-yet-exhausting WD writers' conference in NYC. During our agent panel, the four literary agents got a lot of intelligent questions from the crowd. One of the questions, which I hear frequently at events, was a … [Read more...]

    Why Writers Must Make Themselves Easy to Contact

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    I always tell people that my biggest challenge of my job in helping people find literary agents is correcting bad information on the Internet. This is no doubt my biggest challenge on a day-to-day basis in helping people get published. But if I had to pick a second frustration -- one that drives me absolutely bonkers more often than I'd like to explain -- it's the fact that so many writers make themselves difficult to contact and hurt their writer platform. I cannot tell you how many times … [Read more...]

    11 Frequently Asked Questions About Book Royalties, Advances and Money

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    If you’re going to wheel and deal with literary agents and editors, you’ll end up spending more time than you’d like discussing rights, contracts, advances, royalties and a whole lot of other boring important stuff. That said, I want to address the most common questions regarding how advances and royalties work. In other words, how does the payment process work when you sell a book? Here are some FAQs: 1. How do writers make money? You sign a contract with a publisher. In exchange for … [Read more...]

    The Difference Between Your “Current Platform” and “Future Platform”

    By

    This column excerpted from my book, CREATE YOUR WRITER PLATFORM (Nov. 2012, Writer's Digest Books), a guide on how to build your visibility, brand, and network to better market yourself and your books. The book includes lots of interviews with literary agents and platform-heavy authors. Ah, platform. It's that dirty word writers hate. It appeared several years ago like a bad dream -- a word publishing bigwigs used to describe a writer's ability to sell their own work through a writer's social … [Read more...]

    Why You Should Only Query 6-8 Agents at a Time

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    This column excerpted from my book, the GUIDE TO LITERARY AGENTS (Writer's Digest Books), the biggest database anywhere if you're seeking a literary agent. One of the most common questions I get at writers conferences is this: Can I query multiple literary agents at once? My answer is that not only yes you can, but you're encouraged to. After all, though an agent will usually reply quickly (bless you, e-mail), they may take three whole months to get back to you, only to send you a form … [Read more...]

    Should You Pitch (and Sign With) a New Literary Agent? The Pros and Cons…

    By

    This column excerpted from my book, the GUIDE TO LITERARY AGENTS (Writer's Digest Books), the biggest database anywhere if you're seeking a literary agent. One of the most common recurring work blog items I get complimented on (besides my headshot, which my wife has called "semi-dashing ... almost") is my "New Literary Agent Alerts," a series where I spotlight new/newer literary agents who are open to queries and looking for clients. At writers conferences, a frequent question I get is "Is it … [Read more...]