How to write a book that sells: a literary agent on how to find and research a book idea that can sell.
In my house, I have one big white bookshelf where I keep all the books I’ve ever worked on, either as a literary agent or an editor. Some have sold well; some haven’t sold well.
My greatest wish? That they were all bestsellers.
Each of those books took 2+ years of my life to work on, and I know that the time and energy and love I put into them is only a tiny fraction of what the author put into them. So with all that hard work, shouldn’t they all have found their perfect readership? Should every author be able to write a book that sells?
It’s heartbreaking, but the truth is: most books don’t find their perfect readership. And most don’t sell as much as they could.
There’s no magic bullet to fix this–in the nearly 10 years I’ve been working on books, I haven’t figured out the perfect algorithm to spit bestsellers out every time. (If you have it, send it to ME @ sell all the books .com.)
But one thing I’ve noticed…
The one thing I have noticed is that there are all kinds of ways–big and small–to inch your book closer to that zone of bestsellerdom. And so very many of them happen before one word is ever written. They happen before I sign an author, or a publisher offers a book deal, or a marketing team brainstorms a campaign.
They happen at the idea phase and at the platform phase. When you’re deciding “what is my book?” and “who am I as an author?” Those are questions no agent, editor, or publisher can answer for you, but those are the answers that will fuel each action you’ll need to write a book that sells.
So where do I tell my authors to start?
At the bookstore.
Nine times out of ten when I’m chatting with a potential author, I ask them to take a field trip to a bookstore and see what’s happening in their category or genre. I do this, too, when I’m researching a book idea or trying to help an author with positioning their book.
So today I’m sharing exactly how I research a book idea and how I tell my authors to research their own book ideas so they can write a book that sells.
