The Business of Writing Way Back in the Day (#2)
I could have titled this "Finding a Publisher."
With my nicely typed, no mistakes manuscript all ready to go--how did I find out where to send it?
Writer's Digest big Marketing Book. (Bought each year's new copy for a long time.)
The procedure was to find a publisher looking for the genre of Two Ways West, historical family saga, write an introductory letter, and include it with a synopsis of the book, and stamped self-addressed envelope, and put everything into a box with my address and return postage, and put it inside another box with the publisher's name and address on it. Back in the day, they sold boxes that fit inside of each other for this specific purpose. Then off to the post office to launch the book.
Of course the hope was that the self-addressed stamped envelope would come back with an acceptance letter from the publisher, not the box with the manuscript inside. However, that's what happened time after time. And when it came back, the pages were smudged with food, coffee or wine and smelled of cigarette smoke.
To send it out again meant retyping the worst looking pages. And sometimes, retyping the whole book and always using carbon paper to have a copy.
Meanwhile, I started on another historical family sage based on my mother's side of the family, going through this same process. That book became the first one published.
But I didn't give up, I kept sending Two Ways West to different publishers. It did finally get published but by someone who turned out to be a crook. I can no longer remember all the details, but I do remember that I never got any royalties, As it turned out, the publisher spent all the money he made gambling and went to jail.
The 2nd publisher wasn't much better.
Of course, now it's been re-edited and republished.
Next, I'll move on and tell you what happened with Trail to Glory, 2nd historical family saga based on genealogy, 1st one published.
Marilyn
Two Ways West:
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