Realistically, can a freelance writer place a fiction manuscript with todays cautious publishers?
Fiction is our largest submission category and the toughest for the writers to get action from the publishers. About 25% of the religious (CBA) publishers’ book output is fiction compared to 55% or so from the general market (ABA) publishers. Freelance writing, especially fiction, has always been speculative and tentative from the writer’s point of view. Very few publishers commit to many books of fiction from writers with whom they have had no previous contact. The Writer’s Edge provides one more, but not the only, avenue of exposure for a writer to encounter the acquisitions editors of 45 active companies (we send monthly reports to over 90 companies, but almost half of them have said they would not review fiction). We know these publishers use our reports, track down some of the manuscripts, and recommend it to their constituencies. Full disclosure: We know that many, perhaps most, fiction listings receive no response from the publisher list. If your fiction entry passes our screeni
