Track Changes: Selling Your Book (Part 2)

 
Track Changes: Selling Your Book (Part 2) Listen to the podcast
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In the second look at how books get sold, former Little, Brown
and Delacorte senior editor Kate Sullivan, Senior Content
Development Manager for New Leaf Literary & Media, walks us
through all the steps an editor takes between receiving an
agent’s pitch and signing a deal memo to acquire a book.
Acquisitions meetings, P&L statements, and TI sheets, oh my!


This episode is brought to you by The Slow Novel Lab, a six-week
creativity and writing course from Printz-winning novelist Nina
LaCour. For the summer session, beginning June 7, Nina will
donate 50% of profits to Direct Relief, a humanitarian aid
organization working with underserved communities. Learn more and
sign up for the Slow Novel Lab here.
Catch up on the series so far:

Episode 1: Publishing 101


Episode 2: Agents: Who Are They, What Do They Do, And How Do You
Get One?


Bonus Episode: Publishing in the time of COVID


Episode 3: Selling Your Book (Part 1)
The following agents were interviewed for this episode:

We meet Jennifer de Leon as she prepares for the release of her
debut young adult novel, Don’t Ask Me Where I’m From, on August
4. Though Jennifer has been writing for years, she quickly learns
that there’s a lot about Capital-P-Publishing that she doesn’t
know. (Hear her First Draft interview here.)


Kate Sullivan is the Senior Content Development Manager for New
Leaf Literary & Media. For 13 years, Kate worked in the
editorial departments of three separate Big Five publishers,
eventually becoming a senior editor.
Discussed in this episode:



Faye Bender, partner and founder at The Book Group, is Jenn’s
agent.




Caitlyn Dlouhy, publisher of Atheneum/Caitlyn Dlouhy Books at
Simon & Schuster




Holly Root, literary agent and founder of Root Literary




Seth Fishman, literary agent at The Gernert Company




Chris Colfer, actor and author of Land of Stories




BookScan


More Information:



“The Book P&L: How Publishers Make Decisions About What
to Publish,” by Jane Friedman




“What Book Editors Do” by Nathan Bransford




“Publishing Myth: Editors Don’t Edit” by Nathan Bransford;
good follow: a Q&A with Peter Ginna, who has 30 years of
book editing experience and put together the collection What
Editors Do: The Art, Craft, and Business of Book Editing




“PubCrawl Podcast: Publishing 101 Submission and Acquisition”
featuring Sarah Jae-Jones and Kelly Van Sant




“How to Handle an Editor’s Call With an Offer” by Kristin
Nelson, founder of Nelson Literary Agency and one of the
agents we spoke to in the Bonus Episode of Track Changes
(Publishing in the Time of COVID)




“First Book: Acquiring Minds” on NPR’s Pop Culture Happy Hour
blog




“The Waiting is the Hardest Part” by Joanna Mackenzie on the
Nelson Literary Pub Rants blog




 


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Track Changes is produced by Hayley Hershman. Zan Romanoff is the
story editor. The music was composed by Dan Bailey, and the logo
was designed by Collin Keith.