by Susan Rand

Created on: April 05, 2007   Last Updated: May 14, 2007

If you are working on a novel, your goal is probably to sell your book, either to a publisher or online. Of course you, yourself, must be satisfied with your work, and hopefully, you will enjoy the process, but if you want your book to succeed, you must write to satisfy readers: an agent, a publisher, and most important, your market - the people who will buy your book.

People buy books for various reasons: to be frightened, intrigued, consumed by the characters and their experiences. They read to learn different things, to live vicariously through characters whose experiences are different than their own. They enjoy experiencing characters' experiences as they strive to overcome obstacles to reach their goal. Readers want to cheer for the winners and sympathize with those who lose in the end. People's lives are infinitely interesting to other people, even if they're made up. To read a book is to enter into a different world, and yes, to escape our own, if only for a time.

When an author sits down to write a book, she enters into a contract with the reader. The reader's part is to buy the book, and to recommend it to his friends. For her part, the writer promises the reader that she will take his hand and guide him safely through the world created in the book. She promises she will not suddenly push him off the path into an abyss, or put boulders - big or small - in his way, to trip him up. She will not lead him down side paths that lead nowhere. She knows that readers have many other activities to distract them, so she will make the book as intriguing, easy to read and compelling/enlightening as possible. She will do her best to ensure that he experiences what the characters experience fully and vividly, so that when he finishes the book he will feel that the events in the book have happened to him. To the extent you are able to accomplish this, your work will stand out above the pile. Fortunately for authors, many readers are easily pleased when it comes to choosing a good read, and what is "great" for one may be borrrring to the next.

Publishers are not so easily pleased. Publishing is a BUSINESS. Long ago, publishers kept a list" of authors they knew would sell, and sell big. These sales financed the publishing of lesser or unknown writers. That is no longer the case. Many of the big-time publishing houses are owned by Japanese or Chinese conglomerates who see them as an investment. If there's no, or almost no return, the investment is pulled and placed elsewhere.

These days, publishers operate on the bottom line. The book must SELL. The Reader/Writer Contract will help your book stand out.

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