YA Debut Gets Six-Figure Deal: How did Scott Bergstrom Do It?

Scott Bergstrom made publishing news last November when his debut novel, The Cruelty, got a six-figure advance with attached movie rights.

Scott originally self-published his book, but not in the usual fashion. As an advertising executive, Scott knew that marketing was everything. He formed a LLC, NuCodex Publishing, which allowed him to display his book at the Frankfurt Book Fair. It generated a huge amount of interest, grabbing the attention of an agent - and Hollywood.

What is interesting about Scott's self-publishing story is that he planned on making a bestseller from the start. He did not spend time querying agents (which may have taken years). Instead he built success with careful planning.

First he chose to write a thriller (great for film adaptations), with a teenage main character (YA is very popular), using tried-and-true tropes from previously successful books/movies.

Then he drew on his own experience as a marketer to catapult his book into the limelight. And he began his plan when he had only written a few pages.

The moral to this story - think ahead.

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YA Debut Gets Six-Figure Deal, Sold to 16 Territories and Jerry Bruckheimer

By Sue Corbett, Nov 24, 2015 Publishers Weekly


A six-figure deal for North American rights to The Cruelty is the latest in a string of good things that have happened to Scott Bergstrom’s debut novel in just the past month. The manuscript, self-published a year ago, caught fire in October at the Frankfurt Book Fair with sales, so far, into 16 territories. “Every morning I wake up to more exciting e-mails,” said his agent, Tracey Adams of Adams Literary.

The buzz that those foreign sales generated ignited interest from Hollywood. In late October, Paramount secured the film rights, with Jerry Bruckheimer attached. (Yes, that Jerry Bruckheimer – Pirates of the Caribbean, Top Gun, Beverly Hills Cop.)

And, now, Bergstrom has a U.S. publisher for his thriller, which Adams describes as a “YA Girl with the Dragon Tattoo meets The Bourne Identity, with a dash of Homeland.” (Adams said she got one offer for the book based on nothing more than that description.) Jean Feiwel of Macmillan’s Feiwel and Friends won the book, plus a sequel, in a six-house auction. Publication is scheduled for winter 2017.

Read the rest of this fascinating article at Publishers Weekly. 

How a Self-Published Author Landed a 3-Book Deal with Little, Brown

I love reading self-publishing success stories. Every story is different, and each one contains valuable insights as to how the process of achieving that hard-won, and often elusive, success works.

After reading more than a few of these stories, I have noticed a pattern.

First, the author writes something that stands out, either because it unique, different, or appeals to something in readers in a way that touches them.

Second, the author finds a champion.

Authors, especially self-published authors, need someone to champion them. Back in the day, that job fell to publishers. But increasingly, publishers are doing very little to promote their authors' work. Promotion now falls on the shoulders of the authors, leaving them with a task that is Herculean. How can an author get noticed in a world that already contains entirely too much information?

In all of the cases in which authors have been successful, their success has ultimately been due to someone else taking up the mantle of promotion.

In this case, it was a book store owner. In other cases, readers on Reddit and reading communities have promoted books. Bloggers, ebook promoters, Amazon, and even Twitter have all been instrumental in helping authors achieve success.

The trick is to find champions who can help you get noticed.

Helpful articles:

15 Reading and Writing Communities That Can Boost Your Platform

Twitter: How to Build a Following - for Writers

Reddit for Writers

The 4-Hour Bestseller
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Three-Book Deal in Sheep's Clothing

By Sue Corbett, BookLife, November 16, 2015

John Churchman was sure he had violated it when, in early October, he dropped in unannounced at his local bookstore, the Flying Pig in Shelburne, Vt., with copies of the picture book he had recently published with his wife, Jennifer.

“I’m sure they were thinking, ‘How fast can we get this guy to leave?’ ” Churchman admits. But as he showed the book to store co-owner Elizabeth Bluemle, an eavesdropping customer said she’d buy a copy. Bluemle pulled over another store browser to take a look. That customer bought a copy, too. Bluemle was sold: she told Churchman she’d take another eight for her shelves.

Little did Churchman, a photographer who runs a “picture farm” (more on that later), know just how serendipitous a sale he’d made. Bluemle was so impressed with The SheepOver that she told the Churchmans she’d like to write a blog post about it. “We thought, ‘That is so nice. Of course,’ ” said Jennifer Churchman. “We thought she meant she was going to write about it in the newsletter she writes for the store.”

Instead, Bluemle, a contributor to PW’s ShelfTalker blog, wrote a post about what set the Churchmans’ book apart from many other self-published titles: the beautifully crafted photo-illustrations, the textured backgrounds, the extremely expressive animals, the heartwarming story of one animal coming to the rescue of another.

Bluemle’s blog post, published on October 2, almost instantly made the Churchmans a highly sought-after creative team. Multiple agents contacted them, wondering if they had considered shopping their book to a mainstream publisher. The first to reach them, however, was Brenda Bowen of Sanford J. Greenburger Associates.

Read the rest of this illuminating article HERE.

Romance Novel Finally Breaks The Post’s ‘No Self-Published Books’ Rule

The Washington Post, like many other highly influential book platforms, has always adopted a hands-off policy regarding self-published books. That has now changed with Serving Pleasure, an erotic romance which won a place on The Post's "best of" list for romance.

Does this mean self-published books have finally earned respectability? Probably not. The Washington Post is owned by Amazon, which - it won't shock you to know - published Serving Pleasure.

It would not be at all unreasonable to assume that perhaps a little suggestion was whispered in the reviewer's ear.

(The lady doth protest too much, methinks. Read on.)

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Romance finally breaks The Post’s ‘No Self-Published Books’ rule

By Ron Charles, Washington Post, November 24

It was bound to happen sooner or later: For the first time ever, a self-published book appears on one of The Washington Post’s best-of-the-year lists.

The distinction — bestowed on Alisha Rai’s erotic novel “Serving Pleasure” — marks a small but telling milestone. Long scorned as the “vanity press,” self-publishing now draws hundreds-of-thousands of hopeful authors. The vast majority of the books sell very few copies, but each year produces another rockstar — a EL James or a Hugh Howey — whose stratospheric success fuels more dreams and brings more legitimacy to the platform.

“Serving Pleasure” appears on The Post’s list of the year’s best romance fiction, one of several genre lists in Book World’s Best Books of 2015 package. Rai, who works as a lawyer by day, released “Serving Pleasure” through CreateSpace, Amazon’s independent publishing platform. (Amazon founder and chief executive Jeffrey P. Bezos owns The Washington Post.)

Our romance reviewer, Sarah MacLean, didn’t think she was doing anything particularly radical by including a self-published book.

Read the rest of this article HERE.

The Martian: How did a self-published novel become a top-grossing movie?

The Martian, a film directed by Ridley Scott (Alien, Blade Runner, Gladiator) and starring Matt Damon, grossed over $228 million. This is not an unusual occurrence in Hollywood. But how an obscure, self-published novel chock full of math and science ended up as a blockbuster certainly should be a question on every indie author's lips.

Like many authors, Andy Weir, a computer programmer, could not get an agent interested in his novel, The Martian. Weir, the son of a particle physicist father and an electrical engineer mother, spent years researching orbital mechanics, conditions on Mars, the history of manned spaceflight, and botany in order to write his survival story about a man marooned on Mars. While clearly a work of fiction, Weir, to use his own words, "scienced the shit out of it." The novel is laden with enough math and science to defend his premise, which is that a man can survive alone on Mars.

The plot of the book (and film) is fairly straightforward. Astronaut Mark Watney is lost and presumed dead when a manned mission to Mars is hit by an intense storm. Abandoned by the rest of the crew, and unable to contact NASA, Watney uses his knowledge as a botanist to grow food in the mission's artificial habitat. He figures he'll need to survive for at least three years. (Think Cast Away, but without the volleyball.) Eventually, Watney locates an old probe and uses it to regain contact with Earth. The rest of the plot follows the twists and turns of various disasters, recoveries, and attempts to rescue Watney.

Since Robinson Crusoe, survival plots have been sure-fire hits among readers. There is something deeply engaging about an individual's fight for survival. I believe this is because it is a theme we can all identify with, and, at a metaphorical level, it is one we all experience. Yet, this story was rejected by every agent Weir contacted, probably because of all the science. Science and math are not considered "marketable." (Neither are long sentences and words containing more than two syllables.)

So, how did Weir manage to find an audience?

First, Weir posted his book, chapter by chapter, in serial form, on his website. Then he published it on Amazon for 99 cents. After the book had gotten 35,000 downloads in less than three months, Weir was contacted by Crown and offered a contract. The rest is history.

If this story seems pie-in-the-sky to you, it is. In fact, it's a little like the hilarious Monty Python skit, "How to do it."

"This week on 'How to Do It' we're going to learn how to play the flute, how to split the atom, how to construct box girder bridges and how to irrigate the Sahara and make vast new areas cultivatable, but first, here's Jackie to tell you how to rid the world of all known diseases!" 

So, to paraphrase Monty Python, all you have to do is "write something marvelous, and when the world starts to take notice of you, you can jolly well write your own ticket." (Sadly, this is a commonly held delusion among young writers.)

Spawnling #2 weighs in: Find a platform that's bigger than yours

To answer the question "How could Weir's story possibly be true?" I consulted with someone I gave birth to (Spawnling #2). I figured he could give me an insider's view of how on earth (ahem) someone can end up with a movie deal after posting a novel on his website. After all, there are a billion websites out there. How did readers find his?

The answer, not too surprisingly, was to get onto a bigger platform. Spawnling #2 described reading a serialized book on a website after encountering it on Reddit (/r/books, to be precise). Reddit has a much longer reach than most individual websites can muster. After drawing attention on Reddit, lots of people began talking about the book, and it gained a readership. (Go here for other writing-related sub-reddits.)

You may be tearing your hair out right now, wondering how your historical romance can possibly appeal to a bunch of 20-something males on the west coast. (That's Reddit's demographic.) The truth is, it probably won't. But there is always a platform (meaning a popular site) for the sort of people who will want to talk about your book. It is up to you to find where your demographic hangs out, and how to reach them.

I've made your job a little easier by assembling these resources:

Top 5 Sites for Science Fiction Writers

Top 5 Sites For Mystery/Thriller Writers

Top 6 Sites for Romance Writers

Top 5 Online Resources for Children's and YA Book Writers

Top 5 Sites for Historical Fiction

Self-Publishing Success: The Little Rabbit That Could

Carl-Johan Forssen Ehrlin, the most famous author you have never heard of, has been making the news recently. His children's book, The Rabbit Who Wants To Fall Asleep, has been touted as an overnight success after it hit #1 on Amazon's bestseller list with seemingly no promotion.

How did Ehrlin's self-published Rabbit manage to garner the top position on Amazon? There was some speculation that he may have gamed the system by having everyone he knew purchase copies simultaneously (this has been done before) - but 20,000 copies? 

The mystery of how Ehrlin won such spectacular success - including a 7-figure advance from Random House - is finally revealed. Publisher's Weekly has conducted an interview with Ehrlin in which the author revealed how his book became a bestseller - step by step.

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A Self-Published Sleeper: Author of 'The Rabbit Who Wants to Fall Asleep' Speaks

By Claire Kirch | Oct 07, 2015, Publisher's Weekly

"Initially, Ehrlin focused on selling Rabbit at seminars he conducted before various groups and the classes he taught at Jonkoping University. The word-of-mouth praise that effort drove, he said, resulted in people talking about the book to the press. This, he said, propelled sales of the book in Sweden. After Rabbit became a bestseller in Sweden, Ehrlin decided to solicit “friends and their friends” to assist him in translating the book into approximately half a dozen languages so that it could reach a wider audience.

After the various translated editions were self-published in 2014, through Amazon’s CreateSpace imprint, the U.K. edition, Ehrlin said, received “the most attention.” This, he assumes, is attributed to the the fact that he gave away e-book editions of the title via Facebook.

"I did some ads there saying the book existed and [people] could try it for free and see if they liked it or not."

Ehrlin thinks that the people who downloaded the free e-books must have recommended the title to their friends, and those friends then sought out the print edition. “There was a correlation there” between the growing number of free downloads and sales of the print book," he noted. “Then the snowball started rolling, I think. There was a lot of word of mouth.”

Read the rest of this article HERE.

Indie Authors Get 7-Figure Deal for Self-Published Series

I am always interested in self-publishing success stories, because "How did they do it?" is the first question every Indie author asks.

I'd love to be able to answer that question, but each case is different. Sometimes, authors "get lucky" and their first book takes off. In most cases, however, it's a long hard climb.

Jasinda Wilder is a case in point. Before signing up with Berkley Books, Wilder had self-published 28 ebooks. If you look back at her history, you'll notice that she did two things: 1) She identified her market and followed the trends, and 2) She wrote like blazes, churning out one book after another, until she built a following. (It also helped that she was writing in a genre that has 30 million dedicated readers.)

Meredith Wild essentially employed the same strategy: She chose a popular genre, and produced a series. That's what publishers like, because that's what readers like. (It's called "brand loyalty" in the marketing biz.)

So, here is the (very qualified) answer to "How did they do it?" If you are a genre writer, whether you self-publish or go the traditional route (or both), producing a series is the main ingredient in the recipe for success. (Also, in case you haven't noticed, sex sells.)

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Two self-published successes sign with major publishers

LA Times

Like E.L. James before her, Meredith Wild has successfully sold her sexy romance novels on her own; the Hacker Series, about a savvy young businesswoman and the billionaire she falls for, has already made bestseller lists. And like James, Wild has left self-publishing behind to sign with a major publisher.

Forever, the romance imprint of Grand Central, will republish Wild's "Hardwired," "Hardpressed," "Hardline" and "Hard Limit" as e-books April 7, followed by trade paperback editions May 12. Until now, the books, which have sold 1.2 million copies digitally, have only been available in print via print-on-demand.

The upcoming fifth book in the series, "Hard Love," will be published by Forever simultaneously as an e-book and in paperback Sept. 15.

"The past two years have been an incredible whirlwind experience for me, and I'm thrilled that this partnership will allow me to devote more of my time to writing," Wild said in a release.

Meanwhile, self-published romance star Jasinda Wilder, whose sales of 28 e-books and novellas have topped 2 million, has signed with Berkley Books. Wilder will get a reported seven-figure sum for her new trilogy, which will launch with "Madame X" in November.

Read more HERE.