You have the twistiest idea for a thriller ever, or a brilliant new theory on naps and productivity, or a memoir about teaching your dog to talk. You want your work published, and who wouldn’t? To become a published author, you need to find readers and sell books.
For some decades, the path was, if not simple, at least static: A would-be author finished a manuscript, sent it off to agents, then an agent shopped it around to editors, and when one acquired it, they began the process of turning the manuscript into a book. That’s not to say it was easy, and today, with more paths to publishing than ever – and it’s still not easy. There’s self publishing and hybrid publishing and traditional publishing, oh my!
One thing is certain: You want YOUR book to be a bestseller. But how does that happen? Who decides which books take off. . . and which ones flop? Is there a way to game the system, or is it based on hard metrics? Can your publisher or publishing method make a difference? Can you hire someone to guarantee your book takes off?
As the host of the podcast Missing Pages and a veteran of nearly 25 years in and around the book-publishing industry – as an editor, critic, writer, and author – I have a unique perspective on how to measure publishing success. I know about positive (and negative!) media, royalty statements, and asking for blurbs firsthand, among many other things, and I’m creating this collection so you can learn as much as possible about what really goes into making a book a bestseller, as well as what doesn’t make one whit of difference.
In Season Two of Missing Pages, we take deep dives into new ways writers and authors are hitting the bestseller lists, or ignoring them altogether, and still making bank. The important thing to understand overall about bestseller lists – whether they’re national, regional, genre-based, or reader-generated – is that they never tell the whole story. That’s why the links I’ve gathered may help you to get a fuller understanding of how the mysterious bestseller-list process works.
I’m starting with our Season 2 episode on Colleen Hoover, which may change your mind forever on how authors can reach the top of bestseller lists. Intrigued? Let’s start exploring the cogs that turn those bestseller-list wheels.
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