After the Book Deal: My Experience As A Traditionally Published Debut Author (Part 1)
To celebrate the one-year anniversary of my first book deal this month, I hereby submit to you a laundry list of all the various milestones, conversations, tasks, and other sundries that have occurred on my countdown to publication.
Since signing my two-book deal with St. Martin’s Press last summer for my debut suspense novel, Good Intentions, I’ve googled things like what happens after you sign your book deal at a big 5 and when do you get to see your book cover traditional publishing and how many copies sold does a publisher consider a success. So if you think you’ll stop obsessively googling things like odds of getting a literary agent for first novel or odds of getting your book traditionally published, sorry, nope, it’s not over. Now it’s: how soon after you sign a book deal do you get to see your cover? and what’s a good first print run? and what if my publisher hates my second book? And sure, I could have—and have—asked my editor and agent and published friends my questions, but I…um…I have a lot of questions. A frightening, embarrassing number of questions no agent, editor, publicist, sales team, marketing team, or published author friend should ever be subjected to.
This level of neurosis has only one acceptable outlet: the internet. But when I went to it with my questions, there was nothing. Lots of people out there talking about the highs and horrors of the query trenches, but once you get the book deal? Zip. Nada.
And I get it. I don’t want to piss anybody off either, or do anything to jeopardize my book deal, or inadvertently reveal Major Industry Secrets (I’m hoping someone would have handed me an NDA by now, if I’m really not supposed to be revealing when I got to see my cover for the first time or what my editorial letter was like). But one year into this ride, I’m pretty sure the world is not going to go to (further) shit by me revealing the things I am about to tell you.
So what am I going to reveal? Two things: First, I’ll provide a timeline of everything that’s transpired since I (verbally) signed my deal, then I’ll highlight some key takeaways and words of wisdom from my experience thus far. Hop in.
What Happens After the Book Deal: A Timeline
Please note that everything I share here can, will, and should vary by publisher, imprint, editor, author, genre, time of year you signed your book deal, readiness of your manuscript, quality of your manuscript, type of deal, size of advance, amount of organic buzz, current events, anticipated pub date, your Zodiac sign, etc. Also, you may not be asked for or given everything on this list and/or you may ask for and/or be given additional things that are not on my list. All that being said, I do believe this is a pretty reasonable order of operations and gives you an idea of some things you might get or ask for or be asked for if you publish your debut novel with a Big 5 publisher…
Day Zero: June 19, 2024 Verbally accepted a two-book deal with St. Martin’s Press! Aghh!! (I’ll write another post soon about my journey to publication and querying tips.)
1 Month After the Deal
My agent shared an update from my editor regarding Good Intentions’ anticipated publication date: Winter (January-April) 2026 (about 19-22 months after the book deal). My editor also asked if November 2025 (17 months after the deal) sounds like a doable deadline for my (unwritten) Book 2?
Virtual chat with my editor and agent to talk at a high level about several concepts I have for Book 2. We decided I would fix up and send her the opening pages of a completed manuscript I’d written.
27 days after the (verbal) deal, the announcement was posted to Publishers Marketplace! And it was the Deal of the Day!!
Exactly one month after the deal, my editor sent an editorial letter and line edits for Good Intentions.
10 days later, I delivered the revised manuscript back to my editor. She quickly sent back a few small responses and additional line edits, which I promptly accepted and addressed.
Met (virtually) with my in-house film agent to discuss strategy. When my deal was announced, some film studios and film/TV co-agents reached out to my literary agent, prompting us to get together and talk next steps. We decided it is worth investigating the possibility of teaming up with outside co-agents for film and TV prospecting. Shortly after, we signed on with William Morris Endeavor (WME).
2 Months After the Deal
I’m asked to complete SMP’s author questionnaire, which helps other SMP departments to get to know me, their new author!
3 Months After the Deal
Met (virtually) with my new film co-agents at WME. We collectively agreed to pitch Good Intentions as a potential film versus a series. After the call, there was an email chain between me, my in-house film agent, and my literary agent where we passed around suggestions for the film studios, directors, producers, and actresses WME would pitch to.
Hoping it might work as Book 2, I sent my editor the first 50 pages of that manuscript I’d fixed up. After she read, we had a phone chat where she explained she didn’t think this MS had the same emotional depth and character development as Good Intentions, and I agreed. Back to the drawing board!
About 3.5 months after the verbal agreement, I signed the actual legal contract with SMP. (This may seem like a huge amount of time, but is completely normal and actually about a month or two sooner than estimated.)
4 Months After the Deal
Good Intentions went to copyediting.
My editor, agent, and I started brainstorming authors to reach out to for blurbs.
I pitched Book 2 Option 2 to my editor. She did not love it. I remained calm and did not panic (too much).
I received my first payments from my publisher, for signing the contract plus delivering a copyediting-ready version of Good Intentions. (Advances are not paid out all at once, but generally in a handful of installments each time you hit a milestone, such as going to copyedits.)
I submitted Book 2 Option 3 to my agent and she loved the opening pages I sent her. I was thrilled because I secretly knew this was it, too! The voice and character came to me so easily, and I was having so much fun writing it. I start working on some more pages to present to my editor.
5 Months After the Deal
Plain bound galleys arrived at SMP and were distributed for blurbs and probably other purposes. Not to be confused with the ARCs, which came later (with my gorgeous cover on them).
Sent my editor the opening pages and a synopsis for Book 2 Option 3.
6 Months After the Deal
I received the copyedits for GI (as well as a style sheet and Macmillan’s in-house instructions for reviewing and providing comments on the copyedited file). Side note: copyeditors are geniuses. The things they catch! (On page 323, the GPS is giving instructions in yards, but on page 11, the GPS was giving instructions in feet—which is it?)
My editor dug the opening pages for Book 2 Option 3, so I got going on the MS!
My first blurb came in! Early Christmas treat for me! Thank you Lauren Ling Brown (USA Today bestselling author of Society of Lies, a Reese’s Book Club pick)!
My editor asked if I had any cover ideas in mind for GI (colors, images, vibes, etc.). She also requested an author photo and asked if there are any indie bookstores in my area that I frequent/am familiar with.
7 Months After the Deal
Author photoshoot! You pay for this yourself, if you go the professional route. But plenty of people have a friend with a nice camera willing to help out, so they go outside and take some lovely shots that work just as nicely. I had a photographer who’d done a headshot for me for my day job that I was thrilled with, so I called her up for this and we had the most fun day (yes, a whole day, from morning until night) trying on her giant stash of clothes and shoes for an impromptu Vanity Fair-esque editorial shoot featuring each of my female characters from Good Intentions!
My literary agency sent me my 1099 for the advance payments I received at the end of last year—make sure you save money for those taxes, y’all.
8 Months After the Deal
I got a glimpse of the sample pages of the interior design for GI! So I guess this really is happening!!
9 Months After the Deal
THRILLING moment: I got to see my draft cover of Good Intentions for the first time! It. was. perfect. I literally had no changes or suggestions to make it better.
First pass pages arrived in my inbox! So after developmental edits and lined edits, there are copyedits, but then after copyedits, there are first pass pages. These are your first peek at the typeset pages of your book—i.e., how they’ll appear in the final printed version! You’ll see all the font choices, chapter headings, how text messages will appear, what the title page looks like, etc. And it’s another chance to catch any mistakes that have made it this far.
10 Months After the Deal
Okay, so funny story: My editor emailed to let me know that there was an issue with the cover image that I fell in love with. Turns out, someone else had recently purchased the exclusive rights to the image for their book cover, so we could not use it. She told me not to panic (I immediately panicked) because they think they came up with a good solution. I held my breath, opened the file she sent, and…well, I wasn’t sure what I thought. It was very similar to the original—that was good. Same concept and colors. And actually, I did like how the flowers filled out the page a little more than the original version… But was I just convincing myself that it was okay? Maybe even better? I flipped back and forth between the original image and the new one all day before finally deciding, yes, I really did like the new one better! (And two months later, at the time I’m writing this, I love it even more!)
SMP marketing had some homework for me! They wanted: a 30-60 second video of me giving a quick pitch of GI and why I wrote it; an author Q&A to be used as a bookseller tool, and a 500-ish-word author letter to introduce myself and my book in writing.
I typed THE END on Book 2 and sent it off to my agent for feedback.
11 Months After the Deal
Joint cover reveal with St. Martin’s Press on Instagram! So many hearts, comments, and new friends!
Good Intentions started popping up on all the retail sites, Goodreads, etc.
I was email-introduced to my publicist, marketing specialist, and sales team.
I got a glimpse of the ARC design—gorgeous! And also, it revealed some exciting new information: the marketed print run for the hardcover and all the marketing efforts the team had planned (at a high-level, like “Goodreads campaign,” etc.).
My editor’s assistant drafted discussion questions and sent over for my review. These will be used in SMP’s marketing outreach to booksellers and book clubs.
My agency (my literary agent and a brilliant in-house reader/editor) provided developmental feedback and line edits on Book 2!
Received second pass (2P) pages for GI, to ensure 1P changes were reflected.
My first bookseller blurb arrived in my inbox! Thank you, Maxwell Gregory!
1 Year After the Deal
2P queries arrived (follow-up questions about second pass comments/changes).
ARCs arrived on my doorstep! Lots of crying, screaming, and general freaking out.
And “that’s it.” For now. In eight months, Good Intentions will be OUT and just as soon as I’m done freaking out about that, I will publish a Part 2 of this post to continue the timeline.
What I’ve Learned
Okay, so as you can see, a lot happened these last twelve months and now it makes perfect sense to me why it takes about 12-18 months, on average, from the time you accept your book deal to the day it gets placed on a shelf in a bookstore.
So what did I learn?
A lot.
But let me boil it down to a few takeaways and pieces of advice that I personally would have liked to come across back when I was googling what happens now that I have a big 5 book deal…
Make writer friends. For me personally, in the adult thriller/suspense space, this has been quite easy and perhaps one of the best parts of joining the pub club (I have never heard anyone else says pub club, so don’t go repeating it like it’s an actual thing). Several more established (some very established) authors have been extremely welcoming and helpful with offering advice, blurbing my book, and just understanding and listening when I’m freaking out about, well, everything. You might be thinking, meh, I’ve already got friends. But let me tell you: there is nothing like having friends that get (a) get what a big freaking deal this is and (b) YOU.
Pick a platform. I know, I know, only fiction writers need platforms. That’s what most of the articles and forums say. I respectfully disagree. You need some sort of connection to your readers—and yourself. Find a platform or two that you feel comfortable in, then get even more comfortable there. Focus on connection more than follower count. It’s good to start creating a community of friends and supporters now, even if it’s small.
Ask for stuff. I’m not saying you should hound your publishing team for a spot in Reese’s Book Club or a New Yorker profile or an international book tour (though, if those things are super important to you, I don’t see the harm in asking). But no, I’m talking about stuff like:
Asking local libraries and bookstores (in your town, nearby towns, towns you used to live in, towns you have some small connection to) to stock your books or host you for a reading or signing.
Asking authors you admire to blurb your book (do some research first, though, and talk to you editor and agent about the best strategy here—they might know the author, or the author’s agent, or an editor that the author has worked with).
Asking book influencers to read your book and share a review with their followers, or include your book in a roundup or stack post, or collab on a cover reveal, or host a giveaway.
Asking your friends, family, followers, neighbors, etc. to preorder your book, add your book to their Goodreads shelf, leave a review, etc.
There will be guilt. Okay, so at some point, you are going to have to produce your next book, whether it’s already under contract or you have to go back out on sub with a whole new manuscript or book proposal. And when this happens, it’s going to be different than it was before. It’s going to be harder (probably) and scarier (certainly) and you’re going to feel bad complaining (even to yourself) about how hard this is, because how dare you complain, right? There are thousands, maybe tens of thousands of writers out there who would kill to be in your Birkenstocks right now. You were once of them, vowing never to complain about or ask for anything ever again if only you could make this dream of publication come true. If only those other once-you authors could hear you now, complaining about “the pressure” and your “stifled creativity.” Boo hoo, those hypothetical authors taunt. Nice problem to have. But don’t listen to them. Do not feel guilty about these feelings. You can be simultaneously extremely grateful and extremely frustrated/scared/lost/stuck.
The cure for literally everything is writing your next book. Publishing has two speeds, each on opposite ends of the speedometer, and both speeds can be maddening or quite lovely. You could weeks without hearing a peep from your publisher (trust me, that does not mean they aren’t doing anything for you over there!), then suddenly it’s: here’s the cover! and let’s collaborate on a cover reveal! and look at this blurb that just came in! and can you film a quick video for us? and answer this Author Q&A? But no matter what happens (or doesn’t happen) or what you’re feeling (or not feeling), the cure is always working on the next thing.
No one really gets it, and that’s okay. As happy as your friends and family are for you, as excited as they are to read your book, as fascinating as they think your career is, no matter how many times you try to explain it to them, they will not understand or appreciate what you’ve accomplished at the level you understand and appreciate it. That’s okay. No one else needs to get it. Just you.
Additional Resources
When I said earlier that I couldn’t find ANY information on what happens after you have your book deal in hand, that was a small exaggeration for the dramatic purposes of this post. While I found it hard to come by exactly what I was looking for, I did come across some great resources I continue to keep up with on a regular basis. Here are some of my favorites, from the very best moles inside the publishing industry:
NYT bestselling thriller author Andrea Bartz’s Substack, Get it Write, offers tons of fantastic, specific “writing and publication tips and insidery thoughts” on the business of being a writer.
Courtney Maum is an author and publishing expert who literally wrote the book on book deals: Before and After the Book Deal. She also has a Substack by the same name.
Kathleen Schmidt’s Publishing Confidential Substack offers industry insider insights into “publicity, marketing, and almost everything else required to get a book into the marketplace.”
The Shit No One Tells You About Writing is a phenomenal podcast from two literary agents and two career writers who share detailed industry insights for unagented authors looking to nail the perfect query, as well as more seasoned authors looking to level up on their craft. There’s less focus on the publishing process post book deal, but it’s still a phenomenal and entertaining information source for authors. They also have a great Substack.
Thank you for sharing this part of your journey! It’s eye opening.
This was an insightful read; thank you for sharing!