182: May 2025 Q&A

 

Welcome to the May Q&A episode! Topics discussed include:

  • suggestions for improving romantic tension 1:44

  • how to handle your book being on submission 4:20

  • interpreting responses/rejections from publishers 6:28

  • what I've noticed about the current state of trad pub 9:30

  • advice for approaching a revise and resubmit request from a publisher 16:20

  • how I think about my writing career and how my agent factors into that 18:25

  • what to do next if you have 100 pages written 20:10

  • suggestions for levelling up as a writer 21:07

  • my dreams for my career 21:41

  • how to create interesting characters and character relationships 26:18

  • how to know when your book is done and ready for the next step 28:03

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MAY Q&A

Friends, welcome to your big creative life podcast and welcome to the May Q and A episode reminder that the last Tuesday of every month is a Q and A episode. So if you have a question about something, exit this. If you have a question about something you want me to answer, whether it's related to writing, editing, mindset, querying, personal, stuff, business, whatever, you can submit it at the link.

 

This month we have a ton of questions to get through, and I'm actually not going to be able to answer all of them, just because there are like, 20 Questions or something. It's insane. So I think next month I will try to answer the ones that I didn't answer this month, and I suspect that a lot of these were submitted by the same person. I don't know that for sure, but please don't submit more than one question, just so we have just so I have enough opportunity to get through all the questions,one, maybe two questions. If you have two burning questions, that's fine. But I because I don't know for sure, I'm gonna try to just again answer as many as I can. Um, let me see. Let me get to my notes. My cat's meowing.

 

This cat, she's like, I don't know what's going on with her. She's going through something where she's super annoying. I mean, I love her. She's adorable, but she's super annoying right now. Okay, question number one suggestion, suggestions for improving romantic tension, increasing the feeling of inevitability that the couple will get together. I can give you some tips for for improving and increasing tension, but I don't know that we want to necessarily increase that feeling of inevitability that a couple is going to get together. I don't know if that should necessarily be the goal it. And some of this is going to depend if you are writing romance like a romance novel, or if you are writing in some other genre that has a romantic subplot, because in romance, a hallmark of the romance genre is that the couple always ends up together at the end of the book. So it is inevitable, and the reader is going to know that it's not a surprise if they're picking up a romance novel that the character gets a happily ever after, or at least a happily ever after for now. So it's inevitable in that sense. And I suppose you could argue that in other genres where there's just a romantic subplot too.

 

But what you want to what you want to keep in mind, and my first suggestion is to throw obstacles in the way of these characters on their own, but then also, what's going to prevent them from getting together in the first chapter? We don't want to make things too easy for them, so throwing obstacle obstacles in their way, creating that conflict that's going to bring up tension between them. Just automatically,there's always that push in, that pull between the characters too, will they, won't they? And what you have to remember about tension, romantic tension, sexual tension, plot tension is it can't always be a 10 out of 10. Sometimes there's an ebb and flow of tension. Not every scene can be 10 out of 10. Balls to the wall. Like so much tension, you're gonna explode, because that's not sustainable and and think of it like a roller coaster, if that helps, where there are peaks and valleys, you're just gonna go up and down throughout the book they maybe they take two steps forward, one, step back, two, step forward, back, and it's just this progression over the course of the book. But yeah, make sure the tension is not always at a 10 out of 10. We need some room for the characters to breathe and recover a bit and have time when they're not together, or if they are together, maybe things are calmer, like you just need that balance in the story.

 

So that's something to keep in mind. But then really, in order for there to be that believable level of romantic tension, the characters have to be believable on their own. So make sure that you've got really strong characters, strong as in, fleshed out and solid, not necessarily physically or emotionally strong, just nuanced, complex characters on their own. Question number two, oh, we have a we have a number of questions that are about, like, being on submission and the traditional publishing process. So I'm going to answer all of those in a row. We have like five maybe. So just know that we're going to talk about traditional publishing and that path for a few questions. Um, number one, how do you handle being on some or two, I guess our second question, how do you handle being on submission, slash advice for surviving, surviving the submission trenches. Honestly, this is the same as querying. I think you got to focus on what you can control, because at that point, if you're on submission, you've done what you can, and you have to just kind of release it and focus on what you can control, which is work.

 

On something new, right, getting your next project ready, working on that, staying busy, leaning on your support system, doing what you can to take care of yourself and really being kind to yourself. Because submissions hard. It's really hard to wait. You have to wait to hear back, just like query querying writers do. Let me, let me take a step back actually,and talk about what this means, what this person, person is asking. So in traditional publishing, the first step is to get the agent right. You have to query to get an agent, because 99.9% of the time you can't submit your manuscript to a big publisher without an agent. Occasionally, they will have calls for submission. They'll open up where you don't have to have an agent, but that's how it works The vast majority of the time. So you have to get the agent first, and then once you have an agent, you'll probably do some edits on your book, and then your agent will send your book to publishers, they will submit it. So that's what being on submission is. It means that your agent has submitted your book to a number of different editors at different publishers, and you are just waiting to hear back. You're waiting for people to read your book. You're waiting for them to hear back if they have feedback, if they're interested in buying it and acquiring it and then publishing it, which at that point you get a book deal. The book gets published. Yay.

 

So yeah, I think it's a matter of just taking care of yourself and focusing on what you can control and also celebrate, because, again, it getting on submission is a massive accomplishment. I just realized I went all over me. Okay. Next question, how do you interpret responses slash rejections from editors while on submission?It's, well, stepping back slightly, I do think it's a good idea to know how your agent plans to handle this, because they could send in every rejection, every response to you as they come in, or they could wait and send a few at a time, and just like, pull out one or two lines of feedback and send that to you.

 

So that might be good to get clarity on your agent. Gonna handle it, just to manage your own expectations, so that if you're like, Oh, I'm not hearing anything, well, it doesn't necessarily mean that your agent hasn't heard anything. They might just be waiting to update you. Um, so you you have to, I think it's important to believe editors with their feedback, but also balance that with knowing that they are they have to maintain their professional good relationship with the agent editors that publishers are reliant on agents to send them books. And then of those books they're hoping to find one that they like, they can acquire, they can publish. And then agents are required are dependent on editors, right? They have to send their books, their clients, books, to editors in the hopes of getting them published. So they have a working relationship. The editors know the agents. The agents know the editors. So I can't imagine an editor would ever be so blunt, to be like, this book is hot garbage. Why the fuck did you send me this? Like they're going to be diplomatic and how they word their feedback.

 

But if an if an editor, just says, Hey, I enjoyed this, but it's not for me, don't read into that more than it is. There could be something that they're not telling you that's a possibility, but they're passing so spiraling about why is just not going to do any good. Now weigh their feedback too. If you're getting, if you're getting just general, vague feedback, then okay, but if you're getting specific feedback and it's to the point where multiple people are telling you the same thing, then that's something you need to consider. And the benefit of having an agent is that they will talk you through all of this. They will advise you, like you're not on your own, to interpret editor feedback and to just know what to do automatically, whether that's edit the book based on the feedback or send it out to a different round of editors, your agent is going to be able to weigh in on all that. So it's not up to you to decide what like on your own, what that means, but sometimes agents or sometimes editors just don't love a book enough to want to acquire it, or they just can't acquire it for any number of reasons.

 

So it might not have to do with the book's quality, like the that it's not good enough. That happens in querying all the time. Like agents will get a manuscript and they're like, Yeah, this is good. I like it, but I don't love it enough to offer to represent the author. There's just not that spark, and the editor needs it. They can only publish so many titles a year. So they have to be selective. Edie.Oh, my God, this cat. Okay. Next question, what are your thoughts in the current state of traditional publishing? Like, what are your thoughts in submission, wait times, current trends, etc. I can't speak a lot to trends, a lot of that's just genre specific. And other than saying the trend cycle is obviously long, because publishing is so slow.

 

You write your book, you edit your book, you query, it takes you some time to find an agent, then you edit the book with your agent, then you send it out, and then once you get the book deal, it's an additional year and a half to two years on top.Of it before the book comes out, before the books published like it just moves so slowly. So trends? Yes, there are trends, but it's not a case of it turning over every month or two, because traditional publishing just moves so slowly.Yeah, I just, I don't know a ton about trends, so I'm not the right person to give you advice on that, but I current state. Otherwise, I will say a couple things that I've noticed. I've been on submission twice.

 

Editors want books that are like 95% ready to go, meaning they just don't have the bandwidth to acquire books that need a significant amount of editing to bepublishing ready. And it's the same thing with querying. It's the same thing with agents. Agents just do not have the bandwidth to always, you know, if they see a kernel of potential in something, maybe they could still take it on and work with the author to shape it. But they can't. Obviously, I cannot speak to what publishing was like 30,50, years ago, but I've always heard that editors just had more bandwidth to work with an author to shape a book. There wasn't as much pressure of time and to churn books out. So I just get the sense from how people talk about it, that it's changed. And I think that's certainly true that, like there always is going to be a bit of editing, because once you get the book deal, you and that editor are going to go, you're going to do some editing on your book before you hit, hit publish, before you publish the book.

 

So it's not like there's no editing that happens at all. There always is. But the book has to be really solid. It has to be really polished, and the editor has to see potential in it and have the be able to take that on to help you shape it. So it's got to be really ready. Submission, wait times. Submission, wait times. It just varies. It depends on the editors that you're submitting to. It depends on the time of year. It depends on how persistent your agent is with following up with people.The first time I was on submission, I had interest from an editor after two weeks who took it, who wanted to take it to acquisitions, and then that ended up falling through. That was right when COVID hit the second time. I also, we also had an editor who was interested in after just a couple weeks and took it to acquisitions that ended up falling through.

 

And then the longest, I don't know, I want to say three or four months. But it can take longer than that. Like, it can take a long time because the editor has to read the book. They have to have other people read the book. They have to take it to acquisitions. Like it can move very, very quickly. I mean, you hear stories about people getting book deals after, like, a weekend, and there's a seven way bid for it, and it's crazy. Like that happens, but in most cases, it's a lot slower.The only other thing I will say is that, like, I've had this sense since I started querying the first time around, honestly, like the last five years, six years, that agent or that publishers are just overworked, like the people who actually work at the publisher, the editors, the marketing people, like everyone, has so much on their plate. They're juggling so many different projects, that they're stretched very thin, and that is part of why they just don't have the bandwidth to do a lot of the heavy editing, and also why you still have to do some of your own marketing and social media stuff, even if you get traditionally published, because the publishers just don't have unlimited resources and time and budget for you to, you know, for them to do the work for you.

 

There's also a big level of burnout. I mean, this is not, this is not something that I like exclusively know. This is the common knowledge that there's a lot of burnout in publishing, and people leave, and then they don't get replaced. Their workload gets spread among people who are already like maxed out. It's tough. It's a tough job. So you've got to be have that, have that understanding and just know that you're going to have to pull some of your own weight when it comes to promoting and marketing. Because of that. I think the only other thing I would say is, one other thing I've noticed is, like,certain books tend to get a lot of weight behind them, if in terms of support from the publisher, if there's a splashy if there's something significant about it, like if it was a book that was auctioned for a significant, significant amount of money for debut author, if it's someone who's already well known and established and film rights have been scooped up right away, then it just seems like some books get more weight.

 

Behind them than others do, and it's not always a case of which is the quote, unquote, better book, which is frustrating. I don't really understand the inner workings of that and why that is, but it's not an equal playing field. But if you think about a publisher as a business, which it is, then maybe it makes more sense. If they're spending more money on in advance, they want to make sure that they're getting that they're getting that investment back. But, and it comes down to selling. I mean, that's the other thing. Is, like an editor will only acquire, be able to acquire a book if they think they can sell it. So how this works? Sorry, I can't remember if I touched on this already in this episode or not.

 

So bear with me if I if repeating myself. But if an editor gets a book that they're interested in, they're like, Oh, I like this. I want to try to acquire it. I want to try to buy this book. They will have other people read it. They will take it to acquisitions. And acquisitions is a department that basically runs the numbers. They look at comp titles, they like, think about how they position the book, and then ultimately they give the editor permission to acquire the book, like offer to buy it or not. So that's the process. And yeah, an editor, like a publisher, just has to know how to position it and think that they can sell it before you'll get a book deal. And that's always been true of publishing, but I just have this sense that it's more true now.

 

Next question, advice for approaching an editor R and R, advice for tackling major revisions, not changing point of view or tense or things like that, but the plot an editor R and R is a revise and resubmit. So sometimes, if an editor likes the book, they take it to acquisitions. They can't get approval to buy it right away. They will go back to the agent, back to the author and say, Hey, we love this, but we can't acquire it as it currently is. Could you make some changes to it and send it back and we'll see if we can get if we're interested in that version of the book. I can't really give you any specifics. Kind of the theme of a lot of these questions is, it just depends on your situation. It depends on your agent, depends on the editor you're going to have. You should have a call with the editor or a detailed edit letter, or at least an email with the suggested edits. So you should know already what those changes are that you're going to be making in terms of tackling editing your book, any type of editing, whether it's your own self editing, working with an editor, an RNR, is to always tackle the big picture stuff first. So if you need to rewrite chapters, if you need to change your opening, if you need to rewrite the ending, you need to repurpose things, move things around, write new stuff, all that comes first. So do that first on your own editing pass, and then once that's done, then you can go back in and refine what you have. Don't try to edit as you go. It's kind of similar to getting the first draft out. But I other than that, I can't really give you specifics.

 

Yeah, it's just the editor is gonna have a vision, or at least not. They won't give you, like, exact specifics about things to do, probably at least they she didn't. In my case, I did 2R and Rs, essentially, but we were at least on the same page, and I kind of knew what the what the editor was looking for in terms of changes. So you're going to know that, and your agent will be able to help you as well, at least, at least like, weigh in on on the edits.

 

Next question, how do you plan out your writing career in terms of deciding what genre you'll write in, what you'll work on next, what role does your agent play in those discussions? I'm going to answer this just for myself, because I don't know how it works with everyone. I feel like it's important as someone who is not yet published, but hoping to be soon, I think it's important that I establish myself as a certain type of author, like carving out a little niche for myself in the thriller genre, before branching out. I would love to write in other genres, but thrillers, that's what I queried this agent for. This is I wrote another thriller that I'm hoping will go on submission soon.

 

It will Go On submission soon, not hoping I just, I am gonna get notes back this week on my last round of editing before we send it out. So that's my that's my genre, that's my space. I queried this. I'm writing this. I want to get this published, and then maybe down the road, we can think about pivoting, but I do think it's an important thing for an author brand, at least in the beginning, to have that level of consistency. Just for me, I can't, I can't make general statements about all authors, but just for me, that's how I think about it, and I think my agent would agree.

 

Otherwise. I don't know that I can really share much more beyond that. I imagine that my agent will step in more once I get a book deal and have some published books to weigh in on, like, Okay, what project makes net make sense next? But I haven't really gotten to that point yet. Anytime I'm working on something new.Always like, Hey, here's what I'm thinking. And they're like, Yeah, sounds good, so I just kind of run it by them as an FYI about, like, this is the next thriller that I'm thinking of.

 

Next question, I have about 100 pages written, what do I do next? Keep writing. Submit it somewhere for feedback. Burn them half kidding. Okay, definitely keep going. If you have 100 pages written that is a significant chunk of a book, which is awesome the way I recommend approaching the writing process. Of course, you can do it differently, but this is just what I recommend. Get the first draft out, let it be messy, let it be rough, power through, get it done as quickly as you can, and then go back to polish it and edit it. So keep moving forward. Don't submit it anywhere for feedback. Don't hire an editor yet. I don't think that's a good use of your time and energy and money unless you're truly looking for someone to give you feed like to help you shape the story. But if you have that already figured out, then just power through and do a couple rounds of editing yourself. Once the draft is done, before you you get feedback on it. I would say that's just my take anyways.

 

Next question, suggestions for leveling up as a writer on a craft level. Any resources you recommend craft books, videos, classes, etc. If you have a literary center near you in your city, definitely recommend checking that out, taking some writing classes. Writing classes. There are also writing classes online you can take, whether you want, just like a one hour zoom webinar on something or, like a multi week kind of meet virtually at the same time, sort of a thing. I'll also put a plug in for my writing classes. I have trainings that you can buy that are really inexpensive. Trainings on characters, on self editing, like editing your own draft. And then I also have a full online course called idea to book that takes you through everything you need to know, from idea to like, fully written, edited book. So you can check that out at the link in the show notes, I have a link of ways to work with me, and that lists all my workshops and the online course. So definitely check that out. There's a podcast episode I did, like a couple years ago that's on three books I recommend for craft so you can check out that podcast episode if you want some book recommendations.

 

Specifically, I don't read a ton of craft books, or really listen to any writing podcasts or consume any writing content honestly, just because I create my own stuff and I don't really want to clutter my own process and what I think and what I've learned from working with clients, so I try to just kind of keep my head down. I did listen to querying stuff when I was querying, but yeah, next question, what are your goals and dreams for your author career and editing career?Okay, I'm going to be very honest. Since you asked, I'm always honest with y'all, but I have hinted at this on social media and maybe talked about this on the podcast, but my sense of the freelance editing field is that it's going to get smaller over the years as more and more people use AI, which breaks my heart, because I've shared before that I don't think you should use generative AI, something like chat, GPT, at any point in the writing process, brainstorming, outlining, developing your characters, finishing scenes, writing the book, whatever. I just don't think you should use it.

 

But people are using it, and it's getting more and more acceptable, accepted, and I can look at the explosion of chat, GPT and my new client inquiries. My business has gone down significantly. My revenue has gone down significantly, and I don't think it will vanish. I mean, there's always going to be people who want a human editor, Edie, this cat there. Always will be people who value that, and there always will be clients for that. But I think I'm going to have to pivot and shift how I make revenue. I don't think that the bulk of my revenue will come from that in five or 10 years. I just don't. So what this means for me, if I think about my long term vision and career goals, I would love to be a full time author and content creator, meaning earning content or earning revenue through brand partnership social media content, because I love creating content and also being full time author while also having a few clients, kind of like on the side, almost like editing and coaching is just, I still keep that up, and I still do that, and I still help writers in that way, but it's not the bulk of my revenue, because I, again, I just don't know if there's going to be enough demand to sustain that.

 

So yeah, and I from the outside if, like, a marketing or a business person were listening to me say that they might be like, Katie, shut up. You're going to scare away potential clients by admitting that. But I just want to be honest. I don't know. I mean, it could be unrelated. It could be not because of AI, could because of, could be because of the economy. But like nothing else, changed last year, and it's been almost a year that things have been down, nothing I didn't raise my rates like, nothing changed except chat, GPT, so yeah, and this is how I support myself. Like, this is my full time job. So I have to be smart, I have to be proactive and thinking about other ways I can bring in revenue before it gets to the point where I have, like, one client a month, and I can't, you know, pay my bills and sustain myself with that. So anyways, that's, that's my goal, and my big, like, big, big, big, ambitious, lofty goal and dream is to be a New York Times best selling author, to get film adaptations and TV adaptations made for my books like I want to be super, mega successful. I'm unapologetic about that. I'm very ambitious.

 

It has been a slower than I expected start to my author career, but that's what I want, so I'm putting that out there, next up, interesting characters and building relationships between characters. What makes people come back for more? What makes people connect with a story is the characters and coming back and really having that emotional response is the characters. And in order to have that, you need to have solid character so you as the author, knowing at least some things about their backstory. They have a clear personality, strengths and weaknesses. No perfect characters. Gotta have some weaknesses. They have unique mannerisms. They've got a clear arc in the story. They have a clear motivation or goal that they're working towards and with relationships, kind of whether it's romantic relationships or not, whether it's working relationship, friend relationship, whatever, lean into the differences between your characters, right?

 

They shouldn't be just copy and paste like carbon copies of each other. What are the differences that you can highlight in these people? Make it more dramatic, you kind of have to dial up the differences, amp up your characters and the plot and attention and all those things in fiction to make it interesting and dynamic. And it really comes down. Comes down to empathy too. Like, is there? Can your reader connect with your character and have empathy for them, even if they don't fully love the character, like if they're a villain, even if they don't fully agree with the choices that your character is making, is there some kernel that they can relate to and respond to and have empathy for, with the person? But in order to have all those things present, you've got to have, like, nuanced, complex characters. So that's really where the work is.

 

Next question. How do you know that you finished the final product of a book? Does it just feel quote, unquote, right? Or is there more to that? I have an episode that's on self editing your book, like something like three tips or four tips for editing your books that you can check out. And I talk in that episode about like, kind of knowing when you're done editing, in my experience, yes and no that you just kind of know because you're into your intuition can, with this can steer you wrong sometimes, like, if you're so eager to query or you're so eager to just publish your book, you might ignore that part of yourself that's like, I don't think it's quite ready, and just rush ahead because you're so excited.

 

So I would say, take the time, yes, listen to your intuition if you truly feel like you are done, but make sure that you have your ducks in a row, because you only get one chance to publish the book, submit it, suppresses query, whatever's next for your book. So I would think of this almost as a checklist, like, do you feel like you have solid characters? Are there any major changes you want to make to the plot because there are plot inconsistencies? Are there clear arcs for the characters? Is the pacing where it needs to be, not too fast, not too slow?

 

Have you gone through at least a few rounds of self editing. Have you showed it to at least one other person? If you can think of it as a checklist, and you've you've been able to say yes to all those things, and you realize is that you realize that the edits you're making to the book are just little things that aren't making the story any better. They're just making the story different. Then it's probably a time. Then it's probably a sign that it's just it's ready to go, and we could spend years polishing our books. So you do have to release perfectionism and just recognize it's never going to be perfect, but also balance that with you know, this checklist of making sure that you've done what you can to make it as solid as possible. Published as possible, too, no matter what's next for your book, whether it's trying for traditional publishing, self publishing, whatever.

 

Okay, so I think those are all the questions that I'm going to get to. I don't want this episode to be too long, and some of the questions were things that I have podcast episodes about. So if I didn't answer your question, number one, I will try to answer it next month. But then number two, also go back through the podcast. You can just on Spotify, on the Show page, there's like a little search bar, and you can type in whatever you want to learn about and chances are there's an episode that at least partially covers it. Thank you so much for listening. For more tips, advice, motivation. Check out at your creative life on Instagram, or you if you want to see any questions for like friends on Instagram, if you enjoyed this episode, the best way to show your support is to leave a review on our podcast or Spotify to help other people discover the show. Next week, all right, thank you for listening and sticking with me on all these questions. I hope that was helpful, and I'll see you next week.

Katie Wolf