How to Get Your Book Published, Step by Step

It’s the dream of every writer: to walk through a book shop and see the book you wrote sitting proudly on the shelves. Or to sit at a table in that same bookshop, signing the opening pages of a stack of books for your adoring hands. But how do you get there?

The publishing process can be a little bit mysterious and intimidating, especially if you’ve never done it before. We’ll guide you through everything you need to know from inception to book deal and beyond.

There are three primary approaches to getting published:

1. submitting to a literary agent;

2. submitting directly to a publisher;

3. or self publishing.

We won’t go too deeply into self publishing in this article (though you can read more about the benefits and drawbacks of self publishing here!). Instead, we’ll focus on submitting your work for traditional publication.

Then, we’ll look at 10 important steps to take to get your book published, and how to get the most out of each one:

1. Writing the book! It’s amazing how many aspiring novelists or memoirists think they can skip this key step. If you’re writing academic or educational nonfiction, it’s a bit different; you’ll submit an outline and proposal before writing a complete manuscript.

2. Getting outside feedback to make your work as strong and appealing as it can be.

3. Plenty of revision based on the well-meaning advice you’ve received from your editor or peers.

4. Determining which of the three publishing paths listed above you’re most drawn to, and which would be the best fit for you and your work.

5. Researching publishers and/or literary agents who seem like they’d be a good fit for your book, based on what they’re looking for and who else they represent.

6. Compiling a cache of submission materials, including the all-important query letter, a synopsis, a sample of your book, and occasionally a marketing plan.

7. Taking a deep breath and hitting “send.”

8. Optional: joining your local writers’ union for support and guidance along your publishing journey. You don’t have to do this if you don’t want to, but we’ll look at some reasons why it may be helpful at this stage.

9. Sending your followup submissions when requested, and what that entails.

10. And finally, signing that pivotal contract that catapults your life in a new direction.

Ready?

Here are the individual steps you’ll need to take to get your book published. While this guide will deal primarily with traditional publishing, we’ll also touch on self publishing paths along the way.

1. Finish writing your book

The first and arguably most important step is to write your book! Some new writers make the mistake of submitting to literary agents with an incomplete project (we’ll look more at submitting to literary agents down below). Not only will this hurt your chances of publishing your current book, it could create problems for you later on as you try to build a career.

The exception to this is if you’re writing a nonfiction text, such as a reference book or academic book. In these cases, publishers are more likely to look at a book proposal and outline in the early submission stages. But if your nonfiction book is narrative nonfiction like an autobiography or memoir, it’s best to have the full manuscript drafted before you submit. And always draft a complete work of fiction before submitting.

2. Get outside feedback

Once you’ve completed a passable draft, it’s a good idea to get some input from others before you hit “Send.” This might be from fellow writers, beta readers, or a professional editor (or a combination of these).

The reason for this is when you’ve been staring at your work for months or even years, it can be hard to see it with an objective eye. You might miss silly, avoidable mistakes or repeating phrases. Beta readers and editors will look at the language in the manuscript as well as the broader story. They’ll ask questions like, Does this plot turn make sense? Is the ending satisfying? Do the characters feel relatable and authentic?

Taking this extra step ensures your book is as strong as it can be, improving your chances for publication.

3. Revise and polish

Then, take all the feedback you’ve received and apply everything that feels like a good fit for your story. You might receive some feedback you don’t agree with. If this happens, it’s good to consider where it’s coming from, but don’t feel pressured to take it on if it doesn’t feel right. At the end of the night, your name is the one that will be on the front cover of the book.

You may need to go through and fine tune your manuscript a few times. First, examine the characters and the story. Then, examine the individual lines and word choices. The perfect revised manuscript should have a cohesive story arc, dynamic characters that come to life on the page, and sentences that flow smoothly into the next. Once it reads like a book you might have pulled off the shelf, it’s ready to submit.

4. Determine your ideal publishing path

Now that you have something good enough to seek publication, the next step is determining how exactly you want to go about doing that. There are a few publishing paths you can take.

Big five publishers

Most of what you see on the shelves of your local bookshop come from the “Big Five” publishing houses, which are the major conglomerates that have a near-monopoly on contemporary literature. These are Penguin Random House, Hachette, HarperCollins, Macmillan, and Simon & Schuster.

Within each of these publishers there will be “imprints,” which basically means mini-publishers devoted to specific genres or audiences. For example, Gollancz, a prominent publisher of sci-fi and fantasy novels, is part of a group of imprints owned by Hachette.

To be published by one of these Big Five publishing houses, you’ll need to first submit to a literary agent. This is because these editors don’t liaise with authors directly; you’ll need someone to do it for you.

Independent traditional publishers

Then there are independent publishers, sometimes known as small presses or indie presses. They function exactly the same way as Big Five publishers, but they’re run by smaller teams (usually with smaller budgets) and will often accept submissions from agents or authors.

These can vary from a group of friends working out of a garage to award-winning editors with big-city offices and a staff of up to around 50. The benefit of working with one of these publishers is they’ll often give their authors more individualized attention. The downside is they won’t have as much money to spend on promotion the way a Big Five publisher would, and so you’ll be responsible for some of that hustling yourself.

Self publishing and/or publishing services

Then, there’s the option to take the reins yourself. Until fairly recently there was a certain stigma surrounding self publishing, but now the gates have eroded and plenty of authors are building successful careers out of self publishing. This is a great path for an aspiring author with a driven, entrepreneurial mindset.

The benefit of this approach is that you get complete creative control over your story, font, cover design, title, and everything else a micromanaging editor might try to finagle from you. The downside, of course, is that you have to pay for it all yourself. But! You get to keep all of the profits, instead of dispersing them across the business of a traditional publisher.

There are self publishing services available to make all this a bit easier. Self publishing services are sometimes conflated with vanity presses, but they’re not quite the same thing.

Vanity presses are services that pretend to be traditional publishers, asking extortionate amounts of money to make your book a runaway success. In traditional publishing, you should never have to pay anything except possibly some promotion in your own time (this is optional) and authors’ union fees (also optional). Vanity presses prey on new writers who don’t know any better and try to convince them this is how it’s done.

Self publishing services, on the other hand, work with authors who want to self publish but find the technical process a little intimidating. These services can include things like a professional book cover design, a marketing plan, press release, typesetting and printing, and so forth.

If you use these services, your book will still be considered self published rather than traditionally published. It may be more expensive than trying to do it all on your own, but you also may end up with a more professional looking product at the end. It’s up to you and your technical skills to decide if this is something that’s of value to you.

5. Make a list of publishers and/or agents

If you’ve decided that you want to pursue a traditional publishing deal, the next step is to compile a list of places to submit to. For Big Five publishers, you’ll need to research literary agents to present your work; for independent publishers, you can look for presses that accept direct author submissions. (You can also look at both; you don’t have to decide which is best right away.)

Our submission calls newsletter is a great place to find indie presses that are open to submissions from aspiring authors. If you’re looking for agents, Manuscript Wishlist (sometimes called MSWL) is the best place to peruse who’s open for submissions and what sort of thing they’re looking for.

Which brings us to our next, very important point: always search for agents and publishers that are a good fit for your book. There’s no point in submitting your gritty crime novel to a publisher that specializes in regency romance; you’ll get an auto rejection for not following the genre guidelines. Moreover, a publisher who doesn’t understand your genre isn’t going to be able to do a very good job of promoting it, because they won’t know what today’s readers of this kind of book are looking for.

Have a look at what these publishers or agents have represented before. Do they look like the kind of thing you like to read?

Then, make a huge master list of everyone you’re planning on submitting to. Arrange your list into A, B, and C categories: A for your top choices who you’d really love to work with, B for ones that you’re a little less excited about but still seem like they’d be a good fit, and C for ones that are sort of okay. Organizing them like this will ensure you’re not awkwardly offered a deal with your fourth choice while you’re still waiting to hear back from your first choice.

Be sure to keep an ongoing list or spreadsheet of who you’re submitting to and when, and what the ultimate result is.

6. Draft your submission materials

So by now you’ll have a list of who you want to review your novel, memoir, or short story collection. The next step is compiling what’s called a submission package. This will vary a little bit depending on what each publisher or agent is specifically looking for, but the overall pieces are pretty consistent. Here’s what you’ll need to put together.

Query letter

This is the first item the editor or agent is going to see. It’s a bit like a cover letter, and it covers a few essential topics in a relatively small space.

In your query letter you’ll introduce yourself, explain why you’re submitting, tell them very briefly what your book is about, and explain how it fits into the current publishing market. It’s quite a challenge to fit this into a single page! But not to worry—we’ve got tons of tips in our complete guide to writing a query letter here.

Synopsis

Next up is a complete summary of your book. For a novel or memoir, it will be a few paragraphs that tells the story from beginning to end. For a short story collection or essay collection, it will be a list of mini summaries of about a paragraph each.

A synopsis should be around one to two pages, and it should hit all the key plot points including the ending and the unexpected twists. The reason for this is that the person reading your submission materials needs to know that you know how to structure a complete, cohesive, satisfying story.

Writing sample

This is the biggest item on the list: the work you’ve written in whatever genre or medium it may be. It will give the reader a sense of your writing style and the kind of story they’re in for.

This can vary from one submission to another, so always read the submission guidelines very carefully. They might ask for the first three sample chapters, the first ten pages, the first fifty pages, or sometimes the entire manuscript.

If they ask for just a partial sample, they may follow up and ask to see the full manuscript later (so make sure you have it ready!).

Marketing plan

In some cases, you might need to present your book marketing strategy. Agents don’t generally ask for this (yet), but more and more independent publishers are including this as part of their submissions package.

I know what you’re thinking—shouldn’t this be their job?? In a perfect world, yes. But the publishing industry is relying more and more on authors to share or even take on the majority of the publicity for their book. A marketing plan shows that you’re willing to go the extra mile.

This might include things like blog writers or podcast hosts you want to connect with, or local newspapers who might be interested in featuring your work. You could also include literary festivals or writing conferences, or outlines for events you might pitch to your local bookshop or library. These will help you reach as many readers as possible.

7. Start submitting

Once you have your submission package ready, it’s time to send it out. This can be nerve wracking, and you may be tempted to talk yourself out of it. A finished book never really feels “ready,” but at some point you’re going to have to let it fly on its own.

And then… you wait. And wait.

8. Join a writers’ union

This part is optional; there’s no law that says you can only write if you’re part of an accredited union. But, writers’ unions are a really good place to look for support if and when things go wrong.

The best reason to join a union at this stage is that when you receive a contract from an agent or publisher (that’s the next step), a union can help break down the legal jargon and flag any questionable practices. If the publisher isn’t giving you a fair deal, or they’re taking too many of your rights away, a union representative will be able to explain this to you without the need for a law degree.

Later, unions can step in if your publisher doesn’t pay your royalties on time or if there’s some sort of disagreement about what’s in your contract.

9. Send your followup submission

Very often submissions will be done in stages. Remember above when we said your submissions package will usually involve a writing sample? If the person you’re sending it to likes the sample and thinks it has promise, they’ll then follow up with you to ask to see the entire book.

This is always a good sign, but it’s not a guarantee of representation or publication. At this point, you’ll send along your finished manuscript… and wait. And wait.

If an agent likes the full manuscript and decides to take it on, they’ll offer you a written agreement for representation (that’s the next step). Then, they’ll send your book around to acquiring editors on your behalf. If you’ve submitted directly to a publisher and they’ve decided to accept it, you’re ready to sign your book deal.

10. Sign that contract

You’ve been offered a contract. Congratulations! The contract you receive from an agent will be slightly different from a contract you receive from a publisher, and if you’re working with an agent, you’ll eventually get one of each.

An agent’s contract will outline their specific duties in regards to either your book or your career. For example, some agents might only want to represent your first book and see how it goes, while others might want to begin a long term journey. It will specify what their commission on your book sales is (usually around 15%).

A publishing contract will include things like distribution rights, publishing rights, film and adaptation rights, how much input the author gets on the final product, and a general timeline leading to the publication date. It will also break down the way you’re paid for your work and when. At this stage, you or your agent can negotiate things like advances and royalties.

A note on advances: these can vary widely from one publisher to another, ranging from just a few hundred dollars to the high six figures. Smaller advances are usually paid on signing; larger advances may be paid in instalments at different stages of the publication process.

Remember, it’s always a good idea to have someone look over your contract before signing, whether that’s a lawyer, union representative, or friend who’s experienced in the publishing world.

Additional steps to take after signing

If you made it this far, give yourself some serious props! But there are a few more points to hit before your physical book makes it onto the shelves.

Discuss editorial changes

After you’ve signed with a publisher, your book will undergo professional editing. They’ll assign an editor to work with you and make suggestions to improve your manuscript at a line level as well as a broader story level. Books have been known to undergo huge changes, even changing the book title or have a new ending written, before being released onto the shelves.

Your freedom within this editing stage varies from one publisher to another. Some will never change a manuscript without the author’s consent, while others might take more authority over a manuscript on their list and make changes that they feel best serve the finished book. Usually, the editors and the author can discuss any disagreements and reach a happy medium.

Cover design, typesetting, printing

Once the edits are done and you’ve submitted what’s called the final manuscript, the version that’s going to print, things begin to happen behind the scenes. Your publisher will hire a cover designer to create a snappy cover design for the book; the manuscript will be thoroughly proofread, properly formatted, and finally sent to the printers.

Like editing, the amount of input an author has on a cover design can vary between publishers. You may be sent a questionnaire prompting ideas for what you’d like to see in a cover, or you might be sent a few different versions and asked for your input. Other publishers, unfortunately, don’t ask the author and just do what they think is best.

If having a say in the cover is important to you, you can stipulate this in your book contract when you first sign it.

Begin pre-publication marketing

Welcome to the home stretch. As your publishers get your book ready for release, you and the marketing team will start getting the word out.

This will likely include social media and blog campaigns, as well as features in newspapers or podcasts. If you haven’t already, you’ll develop your own author website to share photos and updates about your writing life. You may also sign books or develop bonus content for presale readers.

While book marketing could be its own entire article, it’s a good idea to familiarize with what other authors are doing to promote their books. You can look at things like giveaways, ARCs (or Advance Review Copies), and events with your local bookshop or library.

Release day!

Your book is now available to order! You are now officially a published author. Some writers find this part a little bit anticlimactic; you’ve spent all this time developing your book and getting everything in place to give it the best possible chance, and now… life goes on pretty much as it always has.

But! You get to rest easy knowing you’ve put something powerful into the world. Your book may help someone through a tough time, or make a difficult journey a little easier.

Now, it’s time to start the next one.

How to improve your chances of publication

As you can see, breaking into the current market is a big job, and it comes with a lot of competition. Here are some tips to give your book its best chance of success.

Create healthy writing habits

Did you know that only a small percentage of people who want to become authors ever finish a book? Many writers begin with great ideas, but run out of steam before they reach the end. Developing a strong, disciplined writing habit will ensure you make it to the finish line.

This means setting aside a targeted amount of time each day or every few days devoted to your writing goals. You might also set word count goals for each writing session to break down a full-length book into manageable steps.

Get beta feedback before submitting

One of the biggest mistakes new writers make is submitting an unpolished manuscript before it’s truly ready. To give your book the best possible odds, look for some constructive feedback before you send it out.

This could be from beta readers, a writing group, or a professional editor. They’ll offer feedback on how the plot progresses, the key elements of your character development, and any silly mistakes you missed in your own revision. That way when you submit it to an agent or publisher, it will already be of publishable quality (instead of a rough draft).

Individually tailor each submission

This is one of the best things you can do to make your submission stand out. Whether you’re submitting to a publishing house or a literary agent, there are ways you can structure your submission package so that it feels like a good fit for that particular person.

The big one, of course, is to always follow the submission guidelines like your life depends on it. Don’t submit a full manuscript right up front if they only want the first fifty pages, or fifty pages if they only want ten. Don’t submit upmarket literary fiction to a publisher that specializes in young adult horror. Check if they want a synopsis that’s 300 words, 500, one page, two pages, and so forth. Simply confirming that you’ve checked every box will put you ahead of eighty percent of the slush pile.

Beyond this, you can also look for clues in their website or submissions call. Some agents will say things like, “I’m hoping to find the next [popular book club read]” or “Some of my favorite books are [some books that are sort of like yours].” You can steal those titles and work them into your query letter as comp titles. Or, look at who they’re already representing and say “I see that you represent [this amazing author], and they’ve been a huge inspiration to me.”

Even though this person is receiving thousands of submissions every week, they want to know that you’ve chosen them for a reason. No one likes to be a random number in a little black book.

Develop an iron skin

Rejection is, unfortunately, a baptism by fire in the publishing landscape. No one, not even Sally Rooney or Stephen King, gets accepted on their very best try. What sets published authors apart from the despondent hopefuls is that they just didn’t give up.

Know that the well meaning disappointments are something everyone experiences, and you just need to push through it if you’re going to succeed. Alternatively, you could work on producing a self-published book instead. But that’s an entirely different journey!

Take the next step and get published!

By now you’ve learned that while most writers have lofty publishing aspirations, only a few make it past those pearly gates. But you can improve your odds of becoming a professional writer with some foresight, knowledge, and iron-clad perseverance. Good luck!