Rachelle Gardner

One of the questions writers ask me is “How do you know in the first couple of pages whether you’re interested in a writer?” Sometimes I stumble when trying to answer because there’s no pat answer. It’s a combination of strong writing, a topic or setting that interests me, a character (or two) that I…

(And Other Annoying Devices) When I was an editor, I found myself the heartless eliminator of exclamation points!!! Seriously, I developed a hatred for them! People tend to WAY overuse them! Not to mention italics and bold, and that oh-so-effective use of ALL CAPS!!!!!!! Here’s a hint to avoid coming across as amateur: Use the…

As you all know, yesterday Thomas Nelson announced they are launching a new imprint, WestBow Press, which will operate as a subsidy publisher. Lots of people are talking about it and I thought I’d weigh in with a few thoughts. *Please note, this is preliminary since I’ve only had a few hours to think about…

A couple of quick notes:(1) I’m all caught up on responding to queries, so if you sent one prior to October 10th and haven’t heard from me, you may resubmit if you like. I am NOT caught up on reading requested partials and fulls.(2) Shark Tank is on tonight! Set your DVR or write yourself…

Over the weekend I asked my Twitter followers to send me questions. Here are some of them, with my brief answers. Kennectto asked:Do publishers sometimes accept queries and/or manuscript ideas from writers without agents? Some publishers accept unagented queries and proposals, but most of the majors don’t unless an editor met the writer at a…

Many of you have been on this pursuit-of-publishing journey for awhile now. Whether you’re just starting to write, or you’re already contracted, or you’re somewhere in between, I’ll bet there are things that have surprised you along the way. I’ve been in publishing for so long, I’m not surprised by much of anything anymore. So…

My name is Rachelle Gardner and I’m an agent with WordServe Literary Group based in Denver, Colorado. Click on this link to visit our website; or to meet the other members of the WordServe team, see this post. I love books, authors, publishing, and talking incessantly about them. My passion is partnering with authors to…

I was completely impressed with how many of you chimed in on Friday’s post on You: The Marketing Machine. You eloquently expressed your enthusiasm, your dread, and/or your ambivalence about the need to market your own book. One of the themes that cropped up frequently was the romantic fantasy of the writer as a loner,…

A couple weeks ago I was having dinner with a group of novelists (who also happened to be my clients). We were talking about the terrible waiting that’s always involved in publishing. At every step of the journey, whether you’re agented or not, published or not, there seems to be a huge need for patience.…

On Friday, in his This Week in Publishing post, Nathan Bransford gave a nod to my post last week on proactive vs. reactive protagonists. (Thanks, Nathan.) One of the commenters on Nathan’s blog said: Whenever I read something like: “you have to have a proactive protagonist,” I immediately want to go out and write a…

First off, if you don’t read anything else this weekend, read this article from the Washington Post. It doesn’t say much that we haven’t already discussed on this and other publishing blogs. But I think (for many of you) it will confirm what you’ve already heard: Yes, it’s a whole new world for authors, and…

This week I’ve been writing on topics that were brought to the forefront of my mind when I was at the ACFW conference and spoke with dozens of writers about their books. Today I want to talk about your protagonist, or MC (main character). I’ll make this brief: Your MC must be proactive and make…

One thing I’ve noticed lately in fiction pitches – verbal pitches or queries – is that some writers want to tell all about the theme or the emotional journey of the story, but they have a hard time conveying the actual story. Every novel has a theme. There’s a character arc, in which a character…

Over the weekend when I was at the conference, my ten-year-old had a gymnastics meet which I was bummed to miss, but Brian texted me her scores on each event, and he took video so I could see her performances. (I put one on YouTube.) Now, if you watch my daughter doing gymnastics, you might…