At our last critique group meeting, one of our colleagues told us about his experiences so far working with a professional editor (overwhelmingly positive). He now has an editor as well as an agent, and the conversation at our meeting delved into all the business-of-writing stuff that we just basically suck at.

There’s a rant that wants to get started, but we’ll try to keep our cool.

It prompted us to face that we need to get back into some kind of habit of trying to sell our work. We’ve sent out queries in the past, and we’ve gone to conferences and pitched agents at the slam, but for several years now we’ve done very little marketing of any kind.

Why is it so hard for us? (Not just for us, we know.)

1. it takes time, time that’s already in short supply, so it cuts into our “real” writing
2. querying is a different kind of writing, so those mental muscles need a separate warm-up
3. the fact that it’s different from writing fiction makes it feel a bit perverse that it’s the package by which we are trying to attract representation for said fiction
4. it’s frustrating; we do get tired of hearing “thanks anyway”

That wasn’t too ranty, right?

Why don’t we self-publish then, if we’re so bothered by the traditional process? We’ve been asking ourselves that very question with increasing frequency. Of course, we already are self-publishing some stuff — you’re reading it right now. But we know that the amount of work involved with publishing a novel ourselves is enormous. Sending a batch of queries feels like a major effort, so it’s probably wishful thinking that we could solve that problem by taking on the entire workflow.

What we know for sure is that our current approach — waiting for psychic vibrations between us and an influential publishing magnate to generate a contract out of thin air — isn’t going to work. We need to carve out the time and follow some kind of strategy.