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About this Book
New Updated Version!
More Information, More Inspiration
A Book-of-the-Month Club
Selection!
A Quality Paperback Book Club Selection!
A Writer’s Digest Book Club Selection!
• The elderly woman’s adventure in solitude...
• The housewife’s battle with obesity...
• The gay man’s guide to pleasuring women...
• The farmer’s cookbook...
• The teenager’s solution to a puzzling national obsession...
• The home baker’s directions for giant cookies...
• The gym teacher’s belly flattener...
• The alcoholic’s chronicle of addiction...
• The elementary school teacher’s encyclopedia of all things disgusting...
Best-sellers all...
Ordinary people all...
More nonfiction books are breaking the 100,000-copy sale barrier than ever
before. Amateur writers, housewives, and even high school dropouts have
cashed in with astonishingly simple best-sellers.
This guide, by best-selling author Marc McCutcheon, shows the
reader how to get in on the action by identifying lucrative publishing
niches and filling them, not once, not twice, but year after year.
Table of Contents
The Don’’t Skip This Introduction Introduction 1
Some thoughts on the best home business
anywhere……How much can a modestly successful author make?……Fiction vs.
Nonfiction……Do you have to be a high school dropout to do this?
Chapter One
Could You Have Written Any of
These? 11
A select representation of the hundreds
of titles that earn thousands and even millions of dollars for their
authors every year
Chapter Two
Nonfiction Success Stories 29
Make a sizable income writing nonfiction
books...A score or more best-selling titles you could have written
Chapter Three
What Kind of Nonfiction Book
Should You Write? 41
Nonfiction’’s top-selling topics……A
rundown of the basic nonfiction categories……A critical ingredient for
author success
Chapter Four
How to Know if Your Book Idea
Will Fly 59
Avoid listening to family and
friends……Testing your idea……
The Great Book Idea checklist
Chapter Five
Why You Don’’t Need a College
Degree 76
Establishing credibility……Where to
find expert information……
Contacting experts……Collaborating……""With a foreword by……""
Chapter Six
Do You Need an Agent? 92
Fees……Duties and
responsibilities……Representing yourself……
Sample agent/author contract……Choosing an agent
Chapter Seven
Toughen Yourself to Rejection 111
Don’’t feel like the Lone Ranger
Chapter Eight
The Query Letter 115
Be professional……Sample letters……
What to include……What to omit……Anticipate rejections
Chapter Nine
The Proposal 133
The parts……Sample of a successful
proposal……Proper format
Chapter Ten
Negotiating Your Book
Contract 152
Figuring advances &
royalties……Negotiating the advance……
Handling subrights……Sample contract
Chapter Eleven
Promotion 176
Working with your publisher’’s
publicist……Obtaining prepublication blurbs……Promotion to-do
checklist……Resources
Chapter Twelve
Lean and Mean: The Secrets to
Full-Time Writing Success 193
It’’s a business……1,000 words a
day……Focus……
A writer’’s checklist for success
Chapter Thirteen
A Grab Bag of Tips 209
Beating the block……Entitling
titles……
Writing tips……Finding more time to write
The Author’’s Bundle of Rights
230
Standard Format for Book Proposals and Manuscripts 232
Resources
Helpful Books 233
Helpful Magazines 234
Helpful Websites 235
Organizations 236
University News and Public Information Offices 238
Glossary 245
Index 250
About the Author 264
About the
Author
Former literary agent and best-selling
author Marc McCutcheon has thirteen books currently in print, including
Descriptionary, The Compass in Your Nose & Other Astonishing Facts
About Humans, and Roget’s Super Thesaurus, all Book-of-the-Month
Club selections.
The editors at Amazon.com recently voted Roget’s
Super Thesaurus one of the "Ten Best" reference books published in the
last several years.
Marc doesn’t hide the fact that he is a high school
dropout. "I almost invariably get unpublished authors’ complete attention
when I tell them I dropped out of high school. Something about being an
autodidact fascinates people and gives them hope that ‘if he can do it, I
can do it.’"
He lives with his wife, Deanna, and two children, Kara
and Macky, in South Portland, Maine.
Reviews
" Chock-full of practical, immediately usable ideas anybody can utilize to
make serious money writing books."
—Marilyn Ross, coauthor of The Complete Guide to Self- Publishing and Jump
Start Your Book Sales
"A perfect business plan for nonfiction writing success!"
—Priscilla Huff, 101 Best Home Businesses for Women
"Comprehensive and engaging this book will save you time, energy, and
frustration."
—Michael Larsen, literary agent, author
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