Article Archive: The Practical Writer

Chris Parris-Lamb of the Gernert Company offers advice on submitting query letters and manuscripts, and when to embrace or eschew self-promotion.

Literary agent Matt McGowan, who represents Eula Biss, John D’Agata, Brian Evenson, and many others, answers writers’ most commonly asked questions.

Gigi Rosenberg provides crowdfunding tips for writers looking to raise money for research trips, workshops, and publication.

After a hotly contested auction among ten major publishers, twenty-eight-year-old Claire Vaye Watkins’s debut story collection, Battleborn, has arrived.  

Three authors who followed very different paths to publication in 2011 speak about what they learned after their books were published, including hard lessons about publicity and reviews, readings and events, and advertising and sales.

The agent of Jami Attenberg, David Mitchell, Carolyn Parkhurst, Matthew Quick, and others offers guidance about publishing credits, MFA programs, and unagented submissions.

Gabriel Cohen, coordinator of Sundays at Sunny’s, one of New York City’s longest-running literary reading series, talks with John B. Thompson, author of Merchants of Culture: The Publishing Business in the Twenty-First Century, who demystifies the complexity of the book-publishing industry in the United States and in the United Kingdom.

The former executive editor of Alice James Books reveals her strategies for editing a strong book.

When is the best time in your career to look for representation, and when should you call off an author-agent relationship? Terra Chalberg, whose clients include Lori Ostlund and Glenn Taylor, tackles these questions and more.