Chad S. White is the author of 5 nonfiction books, including Email Marketing Rules (4th edition), as well as nearly 4,000 blog posts and articles about digital marketing, AI, and other topics. A former journalist, he’s appeared in more than 100 publications, including The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, The Atlantic, and AdAge.
The Union of Nations assembles? India’s Modi met with Putin and Xi
In my dystopian near-future sci-fi trilogy, the world is aligned around two superpowers:
The Global Assembly, which is composed of North America, Europe, and Oceania, but with leadership centralized in the former United States; and
The Union of Nations, which is centered on China, Russia, and India, but also includes Africa and South America.
If you’ve been following the news the past few days, you’ve seen an unusual meeting between President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia, President Xi Jinping of China, and Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India. Putin and Xi meeting isn’t uncommon, as they’re close allies, but Modi is new to the mix.
While India had been benefiting greatly from American companies shifting manufacturing out of China, President Trump has thrown US-India relations in turmoil since he took office. He’s not only strained relations with India by trying to take credit for the ceasefire between India and Pakistan, but he’s imposed 50% tariffs on India because they buy oil from Russia. This is forcing India to choose between the West and the East, and it looks like India is turning to China and Russia as alternatives to the US market.
Dystopian stories are fundamentally warnings, so my hope is this realignment is short-lived. With that in mind, you might be wondering, what might be the next step down the dark road of my dystopian vision? It would be the US withdrawing from or being kicked out of the United Nations, which then ultimately evolves into the Union of Nations.
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As I prepared to start querying last fall, I picked up the 30th edition of The Guide to Literary Agents. I noted all the agents I wanted to reach out to, then went to each agency’s website to learn more. And what I learned is that a book is not the ideal way to get information about literary agents.
Not only were some agents who were listed as open to submissions closed, but I found that several of the agents I was interested in had left their agencies. Yes, it was nice to have a list of reputable agencies, but it was a lot to wade through to have so much of it be out of date.
I quickly found my way to QueryTracker, which is how perhaps half of agencies accept queries. There you can search for agents by genre and learn what they’re looking for. They even list agents who accept queries via email instead of through QueryTracker, so it’s comprehensive and up to date. It’s a much better way to find agents.
The Most Useful Part of The Guide
I can see how this book would have been incredibly useful 30 years ago—or perhaps even 15 years ago, which was when QueryTracker launched. However, the latter two-thirds of The Guide dedicated to agents is of limited usefulness. What I would have preferred was listings focused just on the agencies and what they represent—and dropping the information on Member Agents, How to Contact, Terms, and Writers Conferences they attend. All that other information is best discovered on the agency’s website.
With the listings reduced, the much more useful first one-third of the book could be expanded. This part had essays on writing query letters, writing a synopsis, tracking queries, and more. If that content were bulked up, The Guide could be a much stronger rival to books like Get Signed by Lucinda Halpern and Funny You Should Ask by Barbara Poelle.
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I’m a big fan of learning by doing, and an even bigger fan of iteration. Every time you do something, you have an opportunity to learn and do it better next time. I think this includes publishing, so I was disturbed by some recent advice I read that full-throatedly discouraged writers from even trying to query and publish their first manuscript.
The person went on to suggest that aspiring novelists also consider their second, third, and even fourth manuscripts as “practice.” The advice appeared particularly aimed at writers who are college-age and younger.
My takeaway was: Don’t rush into publishing. And don’t publish until you can get an agent. They’ll tell you when you’re ready.
While that advice has the musty smell of the top-down, old world oligarchy publishing hierarchy, I believe it comes from a place of wanting to protect young writers from potential failures that might stunt their future writing careers. While that’s an admirable sentiment, the traditional publishing industry’s track record of predicting success is, let’s say, mixed. But more than that, what’s wrong with risking failure?
In the business world where I spend my days, failure is rightly recognized as being valuable experience—sometimes more valuable than success. Aspiring novelists of all ages should embrace that kind of mindset for six important reasons:
1. Manuscripts are different from books.
Finishing a manuscript is not the same as finishing a book. The latter requires you to …
Work with beta readers
Work with editors (i.e., developmental editor, copyeditor, proofreader)
Write front matter (i.e., table of contents, dedication), back matter (i.e., acknowledgments), and jacket copy (i.e., book description, author bio)
Get a cover made
Yes, all of that takes time and some of it costs money—and I appreciate that not everyone has the ability to invest significantly in their book. However, doing all of that (to whatever degree you’re able) gives you valuable experience and skills you’ll be glad you didn’t wait to start obtaining.
2. Publishing isn’t the finish line.
Today, authors are expected to build platforms and it’s hard to do that if you’re not talking about the books you’re working on and following through to publication. Publishing builds credibility.
Authors are also expected to do publicity. I can tell you from firsthand experience that it is a learned skill. I remember vividly my first conference presentation—I was terrified, but got through it and got better through practice. Since then, I’ve spoken in front of audiences as large as several thousand people, and spoken across the US, as well as in England, Denmark, and Australia. (Europeans are a tough crowd.)
And even after all of that, I can tell you I’m extremely nervous about the prospect of doing publicity for my upcoming sci-fi trilogy. It’s going to be a whole new set of questions that I’m not used to answering. I’ll be exercising some new muscles, and it will take some training before those muscles are strong. Why put off building these muscles?
3. Success is in the eye of the beholder.
The chances are very good that the number of books sold that you’d be happy with and the number that a publisher or agent would be happy with are quite different. For perspective, during the Department of Justice v. Penguin Random House antitrust trial in 2022, it was revealed that 90% of published books sell fewer than 2,000 copies. Half of published books sell fewer than 12 copies. And that doesn’t include self-published books, which would surely bring those numbers down.
I’m not sharing that to lower your expectations, but rather to say that if you were to sell more than 2,000 copies, you should be thrilled. You’d be in the top 10%! But your agent and publisher might be less thrilled.
4. Nothing wrong with having a back list.
In the wake of his success with The Fault in our Stars, I had the pleasure of hearing John Green speak. He mentioned that his first book, Paper Towns, had sold less than 1,000 copies … that is, until the success of The Fault in our Stars. Today, by all measures, Paper Towns is a very successful novel. It just took Green breaking out with his second book to bring a larger audience to his first book.
Relatedly, some books fail to be picked up by agents or publishers because the genre is out of favor or the book doesn’t easily fall into a clear genre, not that the story isn’t good. Yes, you could stuff it in a drawer and wait for the right time to come along (which some authors do), or you can move forward and see what happens.
5. Book success goes beyond book sales.
It bears repeating: Publishing builds credibility. As I explained in a recent post, having a book out there opens doors, creates opportunities, and makes you more valuable.
6. You can protect yourself with pen names.
Fearful that your book may not be good enough and want to protect yourself? Use a pen name. Did you release a book under your name that tanked? Use a pen name for your next book. Plenty of authors use a pen name to disassociate themselves from a novel that didn’t do well. Rinse, repeat.
It took me a couple of decades to find my reason for writing and my voice, but I recognize that some people find their voices much more quickly. Why wait to get out there and share what you have to say?
Ultimately, if you’re proud of your novel and have the means, you should publish it. Hard stop. Learn from the experience and then do it again.
“You have to be willing to try. Which means you have to be willing to fail. Either way, you’re winning.”
I hope everyone takes that to heart.
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It’s easier than ever to make some money as a writer, and harder than ever to make a living at it. That’s why this book by Jane Friedman is so timely.
The Business of Being a Writer walks you through the economics of book publishing—from nonfiction proposals and fiction queries all the way through to marketing and promotion. That’s roughly the first half of the book.
The second half is about all the other things a writer will likely have to do to make ends meet. She talks about creating a business model for yourself and all the elements that might be part of that, including freelancing, crowdfunding, donations, paid newsletters, serials, teaching, grants, and more.
For anyone who dreams of making it as a writer, this is the truth-telling book you need.
I give it 5 stars, 16 dog-ears, and 2 Post-its.
For me, The Business of Being a Writer pointed out some new avenues and resources I wasn’t aware of. But more than anything, it confirmed what I was already pretty sure about, which is that very few people can make a living by writing books alone.
In fact, I don’t know any full-time book writers. (If you’re one, I’d love to know you.)
All the writers I know have at least one other job. That’s not to say that their books haven’t been successful. Some of them have been hugely successful, but often that success doesn’t come directly from book sales. Instead, their books often open the door to many other much bigger money-making opportunities such as:
Paid speaking
If you have a book, especially a nonfiction book, then you have a story to tell. That can get you in front of corporate and consumer audiences. The best example that I personally know of is Jay Baer, who’s the author of 7 books, in addition to founding six multi-million dollar companies. Most of his books included extensive speaking tours, where he’d speak at industry conferences and at large corporations—sometimes more than 100 a year. That exposure helped propel his other businesses, which included a consultancy.
Savvy pre-release marketing move: Jay schedules lots of speaking gigs right after the release of his books and waives his usual speaking fees in exchange for the event organizers pre-ordering books for all of their attendees. That produced huge pre-order sales, which instantly make his books New York Times bestsellers upon release.
Conferences
… like starting your own conference. That’s what Joe Pulizzi did. He founded The Content Marketing Institute and its flagship event, Content Marketing World. His seven books helped him earn the name the Godfather of Content Marketing. He’s since sold CMI and Content Marketing World and started a couple of new businesses, including a new conference, Content Entrepreneur Expo.
Ann Handley, a 3-time author and frequent speaker, also runs a conference, the B2B Forum. Like Jay and Joe, Ann knows how to dress to impress and tell a great story on stage.
University teaching
Being a published fiction author is almost a prerequisite for getting a creative writing teaching position these days.
Education & coaching
Today, there are lots of educational opportunities outside of academia. While I don’t know Jane Friedman personally, she’s a great example of this. In addition to her books, she speaks, runs in-person workshops and online classes, and has her own newsletter.
Consulting services
While education and coaching is for consumer clients, consulting is for business clients. In addition to Jay, 2-time author Kath Pay also runs a consultancy. Writing a book is almost a form of advertising for consultants.
A book is also a great business card. Two-time author and former agency owner Simms Jenkins once told me that he’d walk into a meeting with a new prospect and put his books on the table and it was an instant credibility booster.
Paid newsletters
Many writers have found success on Substack, Beehiiv, and other newsletter platforms. Among fiction writers, they’re writing about writing or sharing poetry, short stories, and serialized books. And among nonfiction writers, they’re typically writing about the subject matter area that their book is about, or about the subject of their next nonfiction book.
Once you’ve built up a large newsletter audience, events are the next much-more-lucrative step. This is something that some traditional media organizations are only just finding out. For instance, WBUR, Boston’s NPR station, held its first in-person multiday conference earlier this year to celebrate their 75th anniversary. It was so successful they’re making the WBUR Festival into an annual event.
Editing services
Some fiction writers smooth out the spikes in their novel writing income streams by offering developmental editing, copyediting, line editing, or proofreading services. Publishing successful books yourself builds your credibility as an editor, creating a virtuous circle.
For me, the notoriety from my email marketing books have made me much more desirable in the digital marketing industry as a subject matter expert, consultant, and speaker. Overall, the direct profits from my book sales represent probably only about a quarter of the value my books have created for me.
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In a recent issue of Lincoln Michel’s Counter Craft, he interviewed author Benjamin Percy, who said, “I was on a plane the other month, rustling through the New York Times Book Review, and the person sitting next to me said, ‘You don’t see too many of them anymore.’ It took me a second to process what they were talking about. A newspaper. A physical newspaper. It was an antiquated novelty? I’ve had people make similar remarks when they observe me reading novels in public. I can’t help but increasingly feel that I am in the horse-and-buggy business, so I might as well lean into it.”
While I read the Times and all my other news online, it’s very rare for me to buy an ebook. I much prefer physical books.
In part, that’s because I already stare at a screen for 11+ hours a day on average, between work and writing. The last thing I want to do is read a book on my phone. I know Kindles are much easier on the eyes, but if you’ve seen any of my book reviews, you know I love to dog-ear and put Post-its in my books so I can easily find the best passages.
But I also agree with Benjamin that physical books are like mementos that remind us of the first time we read them and who gave them to us. They’re also a form of interactive autobiographical art. For instance, when someone sees the books on the shelves behind my desk, that tells them something about me.
Our little free library gets lots of use
While we don’t have a library room (my wife Kate would love to have the library out of The Beauty & The Beast), we do have a room’s worth of books scattered across the 15 bookshelves throughout our house—two of which are guarded by our homemade Rubik’s Cube Charizard.
We also have a Little Free Library. Honestly, Kate was the driving force behind setting that up. I was really skeptical it would see much use. But it totally has. I walk by it multiple times a day when I walk our dog, Peppa Pug, and the books are regularly turning over. It’s a joy to see so many people getting use out of it, including kids. If you’ve been on the fence about setting one up, I encourage you to go for it.
Excerpt from Lincoln Michel’s interview with author Benjamin Percy
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Grew up in Houston. I lived in the same house in Sharpstown in southwest Houston until I went away to college at Texas A&M.
Didn’t travel out of USA until 22. Prior to going to the UK to study abroad, I’d only left Texas twice—once to go to Disneyland in California and another time to go to Disneyworld in Florida. Since then, I’ve been fortunate to have visited 22 other countries, including Panama, Russia, Germany, and Australia.
Pug doggy daddy. Our 4-year-old pug is named Peppa Pug after Peppa Pig. She has her tongue perpetually out, even when she sleeps. (It’s her birthday today! 🎉)
Cuts own hair. I bought a pair of Wahl clippers during the first month of the pandemic and I’ve never looked back. It’s super convenient and only takes me 15 minutes to do.
Married on April Fools Day 19 years ago. My wife Kate and I got married in midtown Manhattan on W. 51st St. and got a price break by getting married on April Fools Day. We had our wedding photos taken at the Top of the Rock with the Empire State Building behind us.
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Don’t be fooled by the fact that the subtitle of this book includes the word “screenwriting.” This book is for anybody who wants to understand storytelling at a deep, technical level.
It covers story structure, down to the level of beat. Idealist, pessimist, and ironist controlling ideas. Character development and inner, personal, and extra-personal conflicts. How to handle the inciting incident. Designing acts and scenes. Selecting your cast of characters. And all with great examples from famous films you’d likely seen.
If I were creating my own masterclass on creative writing, this would be one of the core books.
I give it 5 stars and 13 dog-ears and 4 Post-its.
Essential story building blocks
In Story, there are two concepts that were particularly helpful to me as I’ve been writing my sci-fi trilogy. The first concept is that beats create scenes, scenes create sequences, sequences create acts, and acts create stories—with each of those marking a change. The beats mark changes in action/reaction, with those culminating in the turn of a scene, with those culminating in a final scene of a sequence that has a greater impact than the earlier scenes in the sequence … and so on, with acts culminating with the biggest changes.
All that’s to say that with every beat, scene, sequence, and act turns on a change of fortune for one of the main characters, either for better or worse. The more reversals the better, since those are usually born out of conflict and make for more of an emotional rollercoaster. That may seem intuitive, but keeping this top of mind has really helped me avoid flat scenes that don’t affect the characters.
One of my favorite scenes in the second book in my series features three worsening beats for the male protagonist, then two improving beats that has him looking on the bright side of things—only to have the chapter end the sequence with a full reversal of his fortunes, where he actually gets the thing he initially wanted but now no longer wants. Then the next chapter starts with it getting even worse. It’s a torturous ride and a lot of fun!
The negation of the negation
And the second concept is the Negation of the Negation. McKee explains it like this:
“A story that progresses to the limit of human experience in depth and breadth of conflict must move through a pattern that includes the Contrary, the Contradictory, and the Negation of the Negation. … Negation of the Negation means a compound negative in which a life situation turns not just quantitatively but qualitatively worse. The Negation of the Negation is at the limit of the dark powers of human nature.”
My takeaway is that love vs. hate, for example, is too black and white. The Negation of the Negation is a more interesting twist on hate, such as self-hate or hatred pretending to be love. I got really excited when I read about this, because it turned out my sci-fi trilogy already leveraged this concept, as the overarching extra-personal conflict is a war that’s masquerading as peace.
And a separate novel idea I’ve been outlining and amassing notes about involves a devotion to love lost that keeps the protagonist from moving forward with their life.
The Negation of the Negation is a fascinating concept that I’d never encountered anywhere else. If you’re working on your own story, see if you can fit it into this square of Positive, Contrary, Contradictory, and Negation of the Negation themes. It might show you how to uplevel your theme. It’s also fun to brainstorm potential squares as a starting point for a story.
And for all of you non-writers, it’s a concept that you’ll find in some of your favorite, most-gripping stories now that you know what to look for.
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In my day job as a marketer, I sometimes come across things that make me think marketing and book publishing aren’t so different. That happened recently while I was listening to the Future Commerce podcast, which had as their guest Rory Sutherland, the chairman of Ogilvy, one of the marque branding, advertising, and PR agencies.
He talked about the fragmentation of market segments into lots of smaller artisan brands. That sounds a lot like the rise of indie publishers and self-publishing.
He talked about brands co-creating products and content with their customers. That sounds like what happens in some author communities, on Substack with some serialized stories that are driven by reader feedback, and with some Kickstarter campaigns with tiers that bring funders into the story.
And he talked about how marketing is fat-tailed, saying, “10% of what you do delivers 130% of the value, but you don’t know what the 10% is in advance.” Now that sounds an awful lot like publishing—except the 10% figure is too high. We know from the Penguin Random House antitrust trial that just 4% of book titles account for the majority of publishing profits.
It’s an understatement to say there’s a fair amount of chance involved in success and, just as in R&D, you learn from your failures. Just today I was reading an interview in Agents and Books with Lindsay King-Miller, the author of This Is My Body, The Z Word, and Ask a Queer Chick, and she said, “Just because my first book didn’t launch my career like I hoped doesn’t mean it was a waste of time. … I made friends and connections and developed skills that I still use.”
I found that inspiring, and I hope any other inspiring novelists reading this do, too. I’m prepared to roll the dice a few times and see if I get lucky. I’m also prepared to learn from my mistakes and keep going. Whatever your dreams are, I hope you’re prepared to roll the dice and take some chances on yourself, too.
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Writing is hard. It’s gratifying to finish a scene or chapter you’re really proud of, but all the time spent getting up to that moment is difficult. As Stephen King argues in his book, On Writing, completing a novel is a game of momentum. That’s why when he starts on a new novel, he has a strict schedule where he dedicates himself to finishing the book in 3 months or so by writing and editing many hours each day.
I remember being incredibly despondent when I read that. I’m glad that Stephen King has the ability to do that, but I don’t. I’m not a multi-millionaire. To help support my family, I have a full-time job, which I happen to really like. And I have 3 kids, two of which are still at home, and one of which has special needs. Between therapy for kid 1 and piano lessons and jazz band for kid 2, and then making dinner and taking care of the house and myself, I’m feeling pretty fortunate if I have 2 hours a day to write on an average weeknight. Plus, I dedicate one entire evening a week to spending time exclusively with my wife, which I think has served our 19-year marriage very well.
Weekends are usually better for writing, but there’s still a lot to balance—and I want to balance all of those things because they’re all important.
But the issue of momentum remains. I do agree with Stephen King that it’s important to have it, and if you can’t get it by going fast, then there’s only one other way to get it.
The Other Way to Generate Writing Momentum
Since momentum is velocity times mass, scientifically speaking, the other way to generate momentum is to have mass. Literarily speaking, that means you need to have an idea you’re really passionate about.
Honestly, I didn’t have that in college which is when I attempted to write my first novel. It was about 40 space colonists who all collectively have the same dream over and over of landing on their target planet and setting up their colony ahead of others arriving years later. It was a way of using the cryosleep for training, so that when they finally arrive they’ll be incredibly well-trained and efficient. But one of the colonists falls in love with another and is rebuffed by them. Spurned, the colonist acts out by killing all of the colonists, causing the cryosleep simulation to reset. Long story short, this pattern repeats itself over and over to the point that the spurned colonist doesn’t realize it when they actually arrive on the planet and continues their killing spree, dooming the colony. Pretty dark, I know.
Despite working on it for many months, I never finished it—partially because I got bogged down in the mushy middle—but more so I think because I never had a strong stake in the story. It was an interesting idea, but there wasn’t anything uniquely me in it. And at the time, I don’t think I had the emotional maturity to be introspective enough to make that kind of investment.
More than a decade later, I was at a digital marketing conference and one of the inspirational speakers was sportscast and broadcaster Robin Roberts. She was great and her main point was to encourage people to use their personal struggles for good. She said, “Make your mess your message.”
My Mess Has Become My Writing Momentum
It’s taken me a while to act on that, but that’s what I’m trying to do now with my novels. The dystopian sci-fi trilogy I’m working on is inspired by my daughter, Samantha, who would be 18 years old if she were alive today. We lost her in the third trimester when my wife suffered a splenic artery aneurysm, which means the artery to her spleen exploded.
When that happens, it’s fatal to the baby 90% of the time and fatal to the mother 70% of time. My wife got very lucky. Our daughter didn’t.
My sci-fi trilogy is about a family decades in the future that suffers a similar loss, but the daughter that is thought to be lost isn’t dead. While separated from her parents, she lives and becomes—after many struggles—a badass. She’s the heroine of my story and, together with her partner, she saves the world from a horrible fate.
The other novel ideas I’m developing have equally personal cores that drive those stories and drive me to finish them, too. Thanks for joining me on this journey.
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Fight Write by Carla Hoch is fantastic for any author who wants to write a believable fight scene, whether it’s with guns, blades, or fists—especially if, like me, you’ve never been in the military or mastered a martial art. But, honestly, even if you have, you’ll find this book valuable.
First and foremost, it’s a great reference guide, detailing different fighting styles, attacks, melee weapons, guns, and more. But as much focus as there is on creating a credible fight, Carla also focuses on the build up to the fight and the aftermath. Those have to be credible, too. So, there are discussions of intimidation and posturing, as well as post-fight injuries. She also has a number of interviews sprinkled throughout that bring more visceral first-hand accounts of fight-related experiences.
I give it 5 stars, and 12 dog-ears.
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