How many novels did you write before you got published?

[Spiny Norman]

Just out of curiosity, how many? Writing, I know, is a learning process. However, as someone both young and impetuous, the process of learning seems extremely agonizing, much like any process. I have one reader who thinks I'm being rejected because I haven't found my "voice" yet, and think that I'm being too influenced by genre fiction. I find that odd, but she insists that the characters in my novel come off wrong because I'm not writing like I want to, but am mimicking someone else.

So how many novels did you write before you hit your stride and go published? Or did you get published before you felt you found your voice?

[scarletpeaches]

Two trunk novels, a third which is currently on submission, and I have two other first drafts knocking about here somewhere.

So the third one was up to standard (I think). But I'm not published. Yet.

[Kristin Landon]

Two. But I wrote them each twice. :D

The first is currently trunked, the second is being published, the third is due at the publisher in July.

[infinitus_kaze]

My first novel was published, but I wouldn't call it a publish-worthy novel as I'm sure no real publisher would have taken it. I found out after I signed my contract that the publisher, PublishAmerica, was a fraud of a publisher claiming to be a traditional publisher when they really aren't. I was so eager to get my novel published that I signed with the first publisher who offered me a contract without doing any research into the publisher. I've always been the type of person who had to learn the hard way - through experience.

I'm currently rewriting the novel as an extended edition in order to make it something worth publishing. I know from my readers of the PA novel, about 30 or 40 in all, that this novel was good. They all told me that they enjoyed it and couldn't wait for the next book in the series, but the problem I'm faced with now is thus: I don't like the quality of the first novel and I'm not going to use PA for the rest of the series.

I'm hoping that I can use the extended edition of my novel, entitled The Gemstone Chronicles: Atlantis: The Sapphire City, to find a good agent and publisher. Then I want to finish the series under that publisher.

I'm also working on another novel entitled Bel Canto and a short story series entitled The Eden Tribes. I know that I'm dreaming when I say I want to get these stories published, but I believe that dreamers have a better chance at accomplishing their goals than realists because dreamers aren't afraid to keep trying. Realists, my sister in particular, tend to give up after a set number of rejections. I think that if you are going to be an artist (music, writing, art, theater, etc.) you have to be a dreamer or you won't ever truly succeed. Dreaming is what causes artists to strive for higher sights and put the extra strain in to grasp what is just beyond their reach.

[Andre_Laurent]

I'm not published. But I have two trunk jobs. The third one is ready to be submitted. And I'm working on the first drafts of number four and five.

[Melanie Nilles]

Looking back, I think I wrote three novels and one novella, but one of those novels was completely rewritten and did find a publisher. That one is the first of the four book series.

[Devil Ledbetter]

It makes me really sad to think my WIP could end up in a trunk. I better get to work on it.

[triceretops]

The first two non-fiction books I wrote were bought imediately. Alas, you're talking about novels...

Okay, 17 years ago I wrote ten novels. None of them got picked up, but I only submitted and got repped for three. Still no sale.

I just started writing two years ago and wrote five more. The second one got picked up by an agent, but I later sold the first one myself. So, in this new era, the first novel I wrote sold and will be out next month. I also sold the third one.

So technically, I guess I had to write four before the first sale, and that takes in a very long lag time of no writing at all.

Tri

[Shady Lane]

My third--and oddly, the only one I didn't actively try to publish--is the one that's coming out. I'm working on my fifth now. 1st, 2nd, and 4th I believe will stay locked away forever.

[CaroGirl]

I have one partial trunk novel that will never see the light of day. I have one finished novel that I'm working toward publishing and one wip. I also have more than a dozen short stories that continue to make the rounds. I'm currently unpublished.

[swvaughn]

Took me eight novels to get an agent.

At the moment, Novel #6 is out through a nice little e-pub (will be in print when I sell the requisite copies), and Novel #3 is on contract to said e-pub, but I have basically written it all over again. I still don't know why they agreed to take it...

1 and 2 are burn-in-the-fireplace novels (too embarassing for the trunk).

[Jamesaritchie]

Only one, but I'm not sure I ever worried about finding my "voice." Voice is a rather nebulous matter. Style is probably more important.

I think we're all influenced greatly by what we most enjoy reading, but I can't see a thing wrong with being influenced by genre fiction, as long as it's good genre fiction. This is like saying you shouldn't be influenced by the very writers who write and sell the most popular fiction.

[jpsorrow]

I had 3 novels under my belt before I made my first sale. However, I expect to have all 3 of them published eventually. Assuming the career continue, my current editor is interested in 2 of them (that would have been the next project after the Throne books, but we decided to go with another series before coming back to those other books). The third is a different genre, but my agent is planning on submitting it to other places at the moment. Hopefully it will find a home.

[Anonymisty]

Two. One's permanently in the trunk, but I'm playing with the other, to see if I can make it more marketable.

[maestrowork]

One and a half. The half was a "serial" that I kind of abandoned after about 12 or 13 "installments"... wait, come to think of it, that one was "published," too, albeit in a small, community newsletter. Never mind. :)

But it took me four years from concept to publication -- so it took time.

(I don't know if I would ever finish that "half"... it has a good story in it, but now I have better things to write about...)

[Susan Breen]

I wrote two novels before I wrote the one that is to be published. The first one took me seven years to write, the second one took three years, and the one that is to be published took four months. So at this rate, I should be able to write my next novel in about two weeks. But the thing is that when I was writing my most recent novel, (The Fiction Class) I could feel all that I had learned with the first two novels working with me. In fact, I took one of the characters from the second novel (who I'd always been sort of in love with) and plunked him into the third novel. So in my mind, all of my characters are a community, and hopefully they will all get their chance to shine.

[Pisarz]

I'm not published, but I've gotten a healthy handful of requests for material (some still pending) for my first novel. I'm not too optimistic, though, and I think this will end up being a trunk novel. So count me in for "at least one."

[ORION]

LOTTERY was my third novel. I had started another novel as number three and dropped it to start LOTTERY (it has since been completed and very well may be published next).
My first novel did get requests for fulls and partials (so did my second) but I abandoned querying both when I started submitting LOTTERY.
I think even if the first novel is a great premise after writing two or three others you get a far better idea of plot arc and pacing. You also find your true POV. I started with third person and ended up re writing everything first person. This is my true voice. I agree that after three novels you do hit your stride and find your voice. It also helps to attend retreats and conferences.
And WRITE.
And PERSEVERE.

[Robyn]

My first novel is the one that got me published. My second and third are coming out this year. I've been lucky though and blessed. Now if i could just land an agent I'd be happy. currently I'm sitting with a partial request for my 4th novel.

[johnzakour]

I've pretty much published everything I've ever written just not in the order it was written. :)

[blacbird]

Too few, evidently.

caw

[rugcat]

The first thing I ever wrote was a non fiction memoir about police work which never found a home. My next three were novels, two thrillers and an urban fantasy, all published.

[Shadow_Ferret]

How many novels did you write before you got published?
All of them.

[CheshireCat]

I sold the first novel I ever wrote -- sans agent. (You could do that twenty years ago.) With only a couple of exceptions, I've sold every novel I've written since.

[Gillhoughly]

What CheshireCat said goes for me, too.

I made sure that first book was beta-read out the whazoo, took feedback seriously, kept tweaking whenever it came back, and never gave up.

It helped to write well, of course! http://www.absolutewrite.com/forums/images/icons/icon12.gif

[Sean D. Schaffer]

Snipped...

So how many novels did you write before you hit your stride and go published? Or did you get published before you felt you found your voice?


I found my voice a long time ago. However, aside from a book done through a less-than-legitimate house, I have never been published.

Up to this point I've written, I would say, about 8 to 10 novels and/or novellae.

Of course, then there are the countless manuscripts I have not finished in the last 25 years, but that seems to be another story (no pun intended)...

[Scrawler]

How many novels did you write before you got published?
You mean write on paper, or write in my head?

[Uncarved]

Is it just me that wanted to answer this as "All of them?"...

I have three mostly done novels. I've only published nonfiction though. I think its because I don't let Anyone read the fiction, lol..

[Argo]

I'm unpublished. But I haven't really tried.

I've also written five over the course of 7 years (my last one I banged out in 5 weeks for a total of 350 pages. Crazy. Also done during Lent so that probably had something to do with it). My first one I'm still working on; it's the problem child of the nucleus. Two of them weren't meant for publication but one is now up to snuff. And then the remaining three are "in the can" and ready for an agent. Unfortunately, I have to get the first one published, which is by far the White Whale to my Ahab.

But each one is a learning experience. You find your voice through actually typing/scribbling. Don't feel discouraged by it. Take it as a golden ticket to improve in this wonderland. And don't write for publication (i.e. the paying public); write for that inner voice (God, the Muse, the genius, the daemon, etc.). People who write to appease the mob are hacks. People who write to appease their convictions are artists. Be an artist (duh).

So write, write, write and don't get bummed about how many manuscripts have those two three-letter words and a period on the last page, or on the shelf. Take it as a prime opportunity to hone your craft forever more.