Tens of thousands of nonfiction books are published every year, and yours can get published too!
To get your nonfiction book published, you’ll need to know how to develop your ideas and write a book that stands out from the crowd. And you’ll also need to know how to get editors’ attention, how to work with agents, editors, and publishers, and ultimately how to sell your book to a publisher.
Sell Your Nonfiction Book covers everything you’ll need to know to develop your idea, write a book, and sell it to a publisher. It covers every step starting with developing the initial idea for the book, to storyboarding, researching, writing, and finally selling the book to a publisher.
Innehållsförteckning
Introduction ix
PART 1: PLANNING 1
1 Developing Effi cient Work Habits 3
Establishing a Routine 3
Taking Advantage of Opportunity 5
2. The Process of Publishing a Book 7
The Planning and Research Phase 7
The Writing Phase 9
The Marketing Phase 9
The Publishing Phase 10
3 Storyboarding 13
4 Articles That Turn into Chapters 17
Finding Ideas 18
Article and Chapter Structure 20
The lede 21
Lede devices 21
The body 23
The ending 24
Approaching Editors 25
Article Format 27
5 The Business of Writing 31
Contents
iv Sell your nonfi ction book
PART 2: RESEARCH 35
6 Researching on the Web 37
The Basic Google Window 38
Advanced Search 38
Customizing Google 42
More Google Search Tools 44
7 Researching in Libraries 49
Online Catalogue 49
Databases and Articles 50
Dictionaries, etc. 51
Web portal 51
Other libraries 51
In-Person Library Research 52
8 Building an Online Workspace 53
Designing a Book Blog 55
Starting your blog 56
Some tips for improving blog usefulness 59
9 Organizing Persuasive Writing 61
Attention 61
Interest 62
Action 63
Legitimate appeals 63
Dubious appeals 64
Unacceptable appeals 65
Documenting Your Sources 67
Decide what’s common knowledge in the fi eld 67
Understand the perils of plagiarism 68
Offer your own opinions, and back them up 69
Use transitional phrases to smooth the reader’s path 69
Blend quotations into your own work 70
Cite your sources 71
For general readers 71
For specialist readers 72
Create your own style guide 72
Interviewing Techniques 73
Face-to-face 73
Contents v
Email interviews 75
Effective email is courteous email 77
PART 3: WRITING 79
10 Starting the Writing Process 81
Basic Nonfi ction Storytelling Devices 81
In medias res 82
The scene 83
Plot 83
Showing and telling 85
Dialogue 85
Suspense 86
Characterization 86
Climax 87
11 Some Basic Writing Elements 89
Readability 90
Structure 91
12 Semantics and Style 93
13 Writing Transparently 97
Quirks of Diction 98
Problems in Sentence Patterns and Rhythms 98
Clumsy Rhetorical Devices 98
Dead Phrasing 99
Clichés 100
14 Word Choice 101
Latinisms 101
Greekisms 102
Hype Words 102
Vogue Words 103
Euphemisms 103
Economic euphemisms 104
Military/political euphemisms 104
Aging and death euphemisms 104
Sleepwriting 105
15 Editing 107
Substantive Editing 109
vi Sell your nonfi ction book
Line Editing 110
Copyediting 110
Editing Tips 111
Finding Outside Editing Help 111
16 Common English and Style Errors 113
Punctuation Mistakes 113
Grammar and Usage Mistakes 116
17 Manuscript Format 119
18 Libel and Other Legal Pitfalls 123
PART 4: MARKETING 129
19 Rules for Marketing Your Book 131
Book Proposals and Outlines 132
20 Researching Publishers and Agents 139
Places to Look for an Agent (and Further Advice) 142
21 Reading Contracts 145
Delivery of “Satisfactory Copy” 145
Permission for Copyrighted Material 146
Grant of Rights 146
Proofreading and Author’s Corrections 147
Advances and Royalties 147
Author’s Warranties and Indemnities 149
Copies to Author 149
Option Clause 149
Going out of Print 150
A Word of Advice 151
22 Is Self-Publishing Right For You? 153
Print-on-Demand 154
Serious Self-Publishing 155
Should It Be an E-book? 156
Is Writing Nonfi ction Worth Doing at All? 157
Appendix I: Editing Exercises 159
Appendix II: Checklist for Nonfi ction Writers 171
Om författaren
Crawford Kilian has been teaching and writing online since the 1980s. He developed Capilano University’s first online writing course, and taught how to write for multimedia and the web. Kilian has published over 20 books as well as hundreds of articles in print and online. He is a contributing editor of The Tyee.ca, and runs numerous blogs. His Self-Counsel Press books include Writing for the Web, Writing Science Fiction and Fantasy, and Sell Your Nonfiction Book.
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