Things not to bother about in a heatwave

Folks, The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland – a country name so inept, you’d imagine is was a splinter republic of some collapsed empire rather than a country whose Parliament has been running continuously for 800 years and more – has just has had its Hottest Ever Day.

And since this week has been hot, and last week you all liked being told that you didn’t have to bother with social media, I thought I’d make you a list of some other things you don’t have to bother with … along with some suggestions for things you should bother with and a few more things you might want to consider.

THINGS YOU DON’T HAVE TO BOTHER ABOUT

1. Split infinitives.

Sentences with a split infinitive mostly sound better unsplit. But who really cares?

2. Social media

Unless you enjoy it.

3. SEO for your author website

There’s a lot of best-practice stuff out there for Search Engine Optimisation. If you have a big, complex site like Jericho Writers, then SEO needs to be your God. For an ordinary author website, you can just forget it.

4. A whole ton of other author website stuff

Look, best practice involves lots of things, to do with your hosting and your CMS and your mailing list integrations and all that. If you want to get serious about mailing list and writing plenty and building a market and driving sales yourself, then you need to get into all that. But honestly? At least 98% of authors don’t want to be bothered with that, including the majority of big selling names. And you don’t need to decide now. If your career does start to lift off, you can always pay attention to all that website / mailing list stuff then. Unless you’re planning to self-publish (in which cas, get everything in place for book #1), you can always just defer the issue

4. Sentences that end with prepositions

Again, sentences mostly sound better if you don’t have a slightly dull little word hanging around at the end, but that’s only a mostly. Some sentences work better with a preposition at the end. Do what you think’s right

5. Securing puffs or blurbs from famous authors

Not really your job. Not something you need to do. Not something you need to worry about. I mean, yes, if you happen to know Someone Famous, then use that connection, but don’t stress.

6. Hiring a PR company

It won’t work, so don’t bother.

7. Chasing the agent who seemed so excited but now doesn’t even reply

Look, agents shouldn’t do this. There’s no excuse. But agents, even those at good agencies, do behave like this. Just let them go. Send one or two chasing emails, then leave it. There are hundreds of other agents out there, so don’t stress about one fruit-loop.

8. Copyediting and proofreading your manuscript to eliminate any tiny error

Again, if you’re self-publishing, then you do need to do this. If you are a non-native speaker, or are dyslexic, or have some other reason to suspect the basic cleanliness of your text, then again you may want to consider professional copy editing (such as we offer). But most writers don’t need to worry. Just pay good, close, intelligent attention to your text as you sweep through it multiple times as part of your editing process. That, really, should be enough. No sane agent will reject a manuscript because there are some typos and the like. 

9. Writing every day

I spoke to my head of marketing (who has a book out, did you know?) and asked her what her biggest “don’t worry about it” topic was. She told me that the idea you have to write something every day was, ahem, one she did not endorse. (I can’t tell you exactly what she said, because I’m afraid her language was a bit too flavoursome for a public email.)

I agree with Sophie. Writing daily works for some people and not for others. Don’t stress about it, if you’re in the latter camp.

10. Perfectly adapting your cover letter to individual agents

Look, the standard advice is that writers should pore over agents’ tastes and craft their covering letter to appeal directly to the specific agent addressed.

But why? That just puts a ton of work on the writer, in exchange for minimal benefit for the agent. And agents are professional, right? They know that you’ll be sending your work to multiple agents.

So personally, I think you should choose your agents with some thought – don’t send a thriller to someone who only handles cookbooks – but beyond a point, don’t stress

THINGS YOU DO HAVE TO BOTHER ABOUT

1. Writing a book

Obviously

2. Editing the book

Ditto

3. Dealing with the necessary palaver of your publishing journey as effectively as possible

Ditto

4. Writing the next book

Ditto

5. And also

There is no “and also.” Write. Edit. Publish. Repeat.

THINGS YOU MIGHT WANT TO BOTHER ABOUT

Look, there are lots of ways that companies like ours ask you to spend money. And for some people, at some stages in their journey, spending money might be a sensible part of the answer – that’s why we exist, obviously.

From top to bottom, some of the options you could think about if you wanted to are:

1. Our Ultimate Novel Writing Course

Ridiculously good. Also very expensive. This will appeal to people who want a writing course that will do more for your actual book than an MFA / MA type writing course. (How come? We’re more serious about plot. We’re more serious about 1-2-1 mentoring. We’re more serious about genre fiction. We’re more serious about routes to publication.) But it’s a commitment – financial and emotional. More here. If you do want to apply, remember that there’s an early bird discount for applications received before close of play on Monday.

2. Our York Festival of Writing

This is just a ridiculously good weekend that somehow – always – amounts to more than the sum of its parts. It’s partly the synchronicity of everything – the deluge of thoughts and voices that fly at you all weekend – and partly the power of a community of people who share the same passion. I love this damn event, and always will. More here. 

3. Manuscript assessment

This is the rock at the heart of everything. A good manuscript assessment from a good editor remains THE best way to improve your work. If Jericho Writers could only offer one service, that’s still the one I’d probably pick. More.

4. Membership

Cheap as chips. Utterly brilliant. And getting better. More info. We’ve got more plans that I really can’t wait to tell you about, except those scary people in marketing keep telling me not yet. 

And more, of course. There’s tons more that we can do for you. But whether to bother about all these good things? That’s your call. It depends on who you are and what your journey is. I’d never say, for example, that any serious writer HAS TO buy a manuscript assessment at some point, because that just isn’t true.

And if in doubt, just call or email our Writers Support team. We employ zero salespeople. We never have and never will. We just employ people who are there to support writers. Hence their deeply unimaginative department name.

Meantime, I am going to go and add to the long list of things I have no intention of bothering with while the sun shine.