CHAPTER 48

“STUDY THE MARKET!”

BY MICHAEL SEIDMAN

You’ve heard the advice again and again, read it in every how-to book you’ve picked up: Read the publication you want to submit to, read recent books by the publisher you’ve chosen to send your proposal to, and make sure that what you’ve written is what they publish.

The problem with that old chestnut is that too many freelancers “read blind.” They’ll look at the type of material (mystery, science fiction, general nonfiction) being published, but won’t pay attention to how the text is presented. I’m not talking about simple matters of format; I’m referring to language, taste, and myriad other things, including a book or magazine publisher’s self-image.

OPEN YOUR EYES

In the 1980s, I was editor of The Armchair Detective, a quarterly devoted to criticism, review, and commentary about crime fiction. Under my predecessors, the magazine had an academic tone; wherever possible, it seemed, contributors used footnotes. Not to put too fine a point on it, I hate footnotes. I find them intrusive. I dislike seeing that superscripted number next to a comment and then having to turn to the end of the piece to see what it’s all about. So when I took over the reins, I started editing pieces in inventory so as to incorporate the footnotes into the text. I made specific mention of this change of “style” in an editorial column and in the writers guidelines sheet.

I made other changes as well, and a casual browsing should have made them clear to anyone. More columns were added, written by professional mystery writers. And rather than being in-depth studies of the development of a character in a particular series (such as the growth of Poirot), these were freewheeling commentaries about anything that in any way related to the fiction under consideration. Review columns were sometimes presented as dialogues between the reviewer and a friend. Living American writers and the things having impact on their lives, from the Mystery Writers of America to newspaper reviews to fan reactions at a convention, were all fair game. Rather than a specialized version of the Journal of Popular Culture then, The Armchair Detective became a magazine that anyone who enjoyed a mystery novel would be able to enjoy. As the editor, I chose to make the magazine one I would enjoy editing and reading. And footnotes were only a small part of what I didn’t like.

In all fairness, it should be pointed out that my choices were not always popular and, while we didn’t lose many subscribers, we did receive more than a few complaints. The Armchair Detective was well-enough established by that time that certain things were expected, and my kind of rabble-rousing was not among them. At any rate, articles continued arriving festooned with footnotes. After a year, I began rejecting anything that crossed my desk in that format. I also chose fewer submissions that I considered academic or pretentious. I still attempted to maintain a balance: I couldn’t ignore the people who had helped build the magazine, but I did want other folks, the people like me, to feel welcome. If the writers had paid attention to what was being published, they would have not only understood what I was looking for, but submitted what I considered publishable.

An easily recognized difference between two similar magazines can be discovered by looking at issues of National Geographic and Scientific American. Both publications might cover the same story, but the voice in the former is much more informal. Most of its articles are first-person narratives, almost casual in nature. This doesn’t mean that the information isn’t there; it means that the approach feels like sitting down and having a drink with the authors while they regale you with tales of their discovery. In Scientific American, however, the articles are more scholarly in nature. For me, reading that magazine is like sitting in a lecture hall—after having missed the first half of the lecture.

The decisions made at these magazines are a result of the editors’ understanding of their markets and needs. As a writer, you have to come to the same kind of understanding. Who are you writing for, and what does that person need? The answer to this question takes priority over what you perceive as your needs as a writer. If a publication does not address the audience you’ve chosen or if you’re unable to write for its audience, it is the wrong publication for you. Expecting an editor to become so enamored of your prose’s brilliance that he will forgo his own vision of his publication is authorial madness.

DIFFERENCES WITHIN GENRES

I began with a discussion of nonfiction because, frankly, it’s a whole heck of a lot easier to discuss—the issues are more obvious. When it comes to fiction, the nuances you must look for are no less important, but they may very well be a whole lot more diffuse.

First, you must realize that, within any category, each editor brings particular literary beliefs to the job. As a writer, though, how do you go about noticing such differences?

You do it by bringing a critical eye to your reading. What was going on in the last horror novel you read? Was it splatterpunk? Was a child at the heart of the story, either as the source of evil or the answer to it (or both)? Was the same theme driving other novels you read by the same publisher? Does that give you a hint?

Crime fiction brings the same issues to your decision-making process. Is every book from a particular publisher a hard-boiled P.I. story? A cozy? Is an editor doing mystery (in the sense that there’s a puzzle built into the plot) as well as suspense? What about the levels of violence, gratuitous or otherwise? Do the criminals say oh heck, or do they use the kind of language criminals are like to use?

Questions about language, violence, and other aspects of the work being published by your target market have to be answered, by you, before your manuscript is put in the mail. The thing to remember, always, is that just because you’re writing in a category doesn’t mean that every publisher in that genre is, by definition, interested in your work.

WAIT, IT GETS MURKIER …

The lines aren’t always even that clear if one is interested in so-called “mainstream” or “literary” fiction. Especially when we consider book publishing. The first problem is defining those categories—something, fortunately for my sanity, beyond the purview of this essay. If a publisher’s list indicates strong support for some currently popular fiction mode—magic realism, postmodernism, deconstruction—and you’re writing something that uses Cheever or Updike as a model, you’re probably spinning your wheels if you submit there. (We’re also assuming that you understand terms like magic realism. I don’t. And I don’t even care to. Obviously, you wouldn’t submit magic realism manuscripts to me.)

The same problems apply to magazines that publish fiction. Reading magazines regularly is an urgent part of your job. And read with an understanding of the business: When Kristine Kathryn Rusch took over from Ed Ferman as editor of The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction, readers began talking about the differences they claimed to discover in the first issue under Rusch’s guidance. The fact that was missed all too often was that the stories in that first issue (and several after that) had actually been acquired by Ferman. The lesson is simple: Never take anything for granted.

In the magazine market, the differences between literary fiction styles are a bit more clear-cut than they are in book publishing. The stories in The New Yorker are not the same as those in Tri-Quarterly. Some magazines encourage various forms of experimentation in fiction; others define literary quality as any story that doesn’t have a point—vignettes taken from life. (Yes, there’s a certain cynicism on my part being revealed here. But a perceptive writer will make himself aware of that kind of feeling on the part of an editor; it helps determine what he’ll buy!) Again and again, read the publisher’s products looking for an understanding of what is driving the selections, digging for the philosophies that guide the editorial staff.

Some specifics: Is the language rich and lush, or is it plain? Does the editor show a preference for complex constructions as opposed to simple declarative sentences?

While considerations like those may seem beside the point—after all, you’ve written a wonderful piece and isn’t that all that counts?—the reality is that editorial taste goes far beyond simply choosing a story that fulfills a particuilar guideline. It is a function of the editor’s “literary” beliefs and understanding of what makes a good piece of writing, be it fiction or nonfiction. There is no way to argue with those feelings; all you can do is try to figure them out and, most vitally, appeal to them.

Once you begin to do that, you’ll have come to learn what the editor is really looking for: a manuscript that fulfills all the expectations we have when we open your envelope.

  MICHAEL SEIDMAN (mseidman.com) is an editorial consultant, serving publishers and individual writers. He is the author of The Complete Guide to Editing Your Fiction and Fiction: The Art and Craft of Writing and Getting Published.