Would a large house with a strong personal growth list do a better job with marketing?
This was always a possibility and I explored it by having my agent submit to six or seven houses. With the exception of one editor who was overruled by her editorial board, these houses felt the fictional approach was too unusual and perilous. Will my responses to editorial and marketing suggestions be warped because they re from my own staff? We encourage a lot of independence at Allworth, and I adopted the vast majority of editorial suggestions that were made. I also had the benefit of three editorial readings plus input from others on staff. In dealing with our distributor, I think I made a mistake by being too willing to meet marketing goals. I agreed to change the subtitle to obscure the fact that the book was fiction. Luckily I was later saved from my own mistake by the reaction of the reps. Will the reps have a negative view of this kind of self-publishing? I had my Associate Publisher present the book at a sales conference in the morning. When I arrived in the afternoon, I hear
