How to Get Your First (Great) Book Deal:
Fiction/Nonfiction
Dates: Sunday, January 26
Time: 10 am - 3 pm (with one-hour lunch break)
Instructor: Laura Mazer
Ages: Adult
Genre: Publishing
Price: $150 WAIT LIST ONLY
Do you have a great idea for a book but don’t know how to go about writing and selling it? Or have you written a book but are stalled trying to get the attention of agents and publishers? Whether you’re just starting to develop your project or have already written a complete manuscript, this workshop will give you all the tools you need to get your book polished, sold, published, and on the shelves in bookstores.
We’ll cover the roles of agents, editors, and publishers; the function of book proposals; the secrets to crafting a strong query letter; and the smartest strategies to shepherd a project from “spark of an idea” to “magnum opus.” Ideal for authors of adult fiction and nonfiction.
Laura Mazer is the executive editor of Hachette Book Group’s Seal Press and Basic Books, where she acquires adult nonfiction, such as the New York Times bestseller So You Want to Talk About Race by Ijeoma Oluo and The Women Who Made New York by Julie Scelfo. Before joining Seal, Laura was the managing editor of Counterpoint and executive editor of the imprint Soft Skull Press, where she acquired literary fiction and creative nonfiction. In the 1990s, she was the managing editor of Creators Syndicate, the international agency that represents some of the most widely published opinion writers around the globe, including Arianna Huffington and Hillary Clinton. She lives in Oakland.