Hello! A few comic sites have recommended your guide, "pitching-your-comics-or-how-to-shove-a-watermelon-through-a-chain-link-fence." It seems that your squarespace site has expired, and there do not seem to be extant copies within easy googling range. Would you mind posting another copy of this somewhere if you have time? Thank you!
Hey, sorry I took so long to reply! I rarely check Tumblr anymore. But, since you asked, hereâs the post in question--hope it helps!
Nobody likes pitching. Itâs difficult, time-consuming, and nerve-racking. Youâre basically deciding to run nude down the middle your townâs busy street screaming âJUDGE ME!â so donât feel bad about being uncomfortable about the process. Everybody does.
That doesnât mean, though, that there isnât a right way to run nude and a wrong way. Because there very much is, and even the smallest details can put your pitch over the top or make it slide to the dreaded slush pile (which is the equivalent of someone wrapping it in a burlap sack and tossing it in the river). Pitching is your moment to sell your book. Itâs your time to be Don Draper and hit an editor so hard in the gut that they simply canât say no. Thatâs the impact you need to have, so they look at what youâre sellingâand pitching is selling, donât ever forget thatâand feel something deep in their core. That they have something special on their hands, something thatâs going to move others emotionally or intellectually, something that will take readers on a journey theyâve never gone on before. You have to win the room in the span of 500 words and a few pages of art. That, to say the least, is not easy.
Letâs start with the truth everyone should know:
Your bookâs merit isnât about how good it is; its merit is whether a publisher thinks they can sell it to a wide audience. To do this, you have to be a preacher wiping away sins and baptizing nonbelievers in the river at dawn. You have to convert people, make them believe in you and what youâre selling. Thatâs why, if there's one thing you take away from this post, let it be this:
Your pitch should bolster what makes your story unique, not what makes it good.
Itâs a tough pill to swallow, but the reality is a million âgoodâ pitches have been rejected, and a million more are soon to follow. Good doesn't sell.
You might look at this and think âyeah, but there's plenty of books that are just 'good' on the shelves. Good or even worse.â And you know what? You're right. But you're not competing to join the middle of the packâbeing unique is never common. Your sights need to be set on being equal to, if not better than, the best work being produced at any given time. You'll never tickle an editor's fancy by saying âthis book as probably as good as that one book that's indistinguishable from its peers and will likely be forgotten by the end of the year.â Granted, this puts a significant challenge in your path. This is an epic task, make no mistake about it. But if you want in, this is the height you need to be to enter.
Accept it, and start stretching your legs.
Let's think, for a moment, on this idea of being unique. Look at one of the best books that has been released in recent years: Scalped.
Baseline premise for Scalped is simple: a crime saga set on a Native American reservation. That alone piques my interest. I've never seen that kind of story before, and it sounds pretty amazing. If I was an editor, I'd definitely give this book a serious look (now, keep in mind, execution of said premise isn't what we're talking about hereâthis is all about getting your foot in the door).
Breaking Scalped down, what really makes it pop in the elevator pitch alone (âcrime saga set on a Native American reservationâ) is its ability to combine something fresh with something familiar. Crime saga? Check. I know all about that, and even if I'm not a fan of the crime genre, I know that if done right, it can be successful. There's an audience there. So I have that recognizable piece to hold on to. Now move on to the Native American reservationâthat's what hooks me. We don't get much in popular culture, hardly anything at all, on the Native American experience. And this isn't a dull PBS specialâthis is a crime saga.
Fresh and familiarâremember that.
I bring that up because I'd argue you need both, and you need them in harmony with each other. Too familiar and you're middle of the pack. Too fresh and you're likely stripping away too many narrative and genre conventions that help make your story resonate with people.
Stemming from that, here comes one of the hardest truths in all of this: At the end of the day, your book needs to be commercially viable. It needs to have an audience, it needs to sell and be profitable. As artists, we generally don't like to think in these terms. Art and commerce will always be at odds, and for good reasons. But while comics is very much an artistic endeavor, it's also enveloped in the entertainment industry. That means your book has to be viable enough to duke it out in the direct market. Whether you publish with Image, Z2, IDW, etc., you're duking it out with Batman for shelf space, attention, and sales. There's no art house cinema where you can find an audience and pack in showings for weeks on end. Every comic shop is a 74-screen multiplex where the big-budget blockbusters never stop coming. Your book, in some way, has to be ready to compete under this condition.
Getting back to the specifics of pitching, there are three important things to remember that will help raise your pitch above the rest.
1. Get to the point: This is the most important part of pitching and ties directly into everything Iâve said about selling your book on its uniqueness. This is where you have to really dig deep into the story and discover what makes your precious snowflake the most precious snowflake. That means youâre going to lose a lot. Say goodbye to the awesome plot twist in issue seven, the shocking character development in issue nine. Youâre shoving a watermelon through a chain link fence, and what makes it to the other side has to be the most essential, most compelling part. You need to convince people why this story is worth tellingâwhat makes it special. When Don Draper sells Kleenex, he talks about the mom caring for her sick kid, the emotional crutch and release this simple piece of tissue paper provides. He doesnât talk about the factory in Scranton where itâs made. You have roughly one page of text for your synopsis and a few pages of sequential art. This is your moment to make an editor feel somethingâthrilled, wowed, curious. Make every inch of your limited space count.
2. Tailor to the audience: This is sort of a no-brainer, but I know editors come across countless submissions that arenât a fit for their publisher. Look at a publisherâs line of books, see if your proposed title fits their lineup. Itâs important to know the industry, and this is a great way to increase your literacy; learn what publishers are doing and what its tastes are. This is will help you understand where you fit in and even customize your efforts towards a particular publisher. Â
3. Get known: This is another important part of the process, an intangible that can separate your pitch from the slush pile to the âIâll at least open the emailâ pile. Go to cons, talk to editors, let them know who you are and, most importantly, why youâre targeting them as a place youâd like to work with. You donât have to be direct on that final point but, like I said above, itâs better that you understand, and express, that you appreciate what the publisher is doing and want to be part of their line. Donât be the person that buckshots their work, sending anything anywhere. Take the time to learn, customize, and be on peopleâs radars. If thereâs a book you really like, tweet your compliments to the editor. Use social media to raise your visibility. But be appropriateâdonât friend Ross Richie on Facebook and message him a pitch. Thatâs a quick way to not be discredited before you even get started. Â
Eye of the tiger. If you want to get in the door, make it so the people holding it feel compelled to open it for you and usher you in.
To help out, hereâs the pitch Tim Daniel and I wrote for Burning Fields, our eight-issue series currently running with the mighty Boom! Studios (the final issue, he said with misty eyes, releases next week). Now, granted, Tim and I had the advantage of coming off the success of Curse, our previous Boom! series. But I still think the Burning Fields pitch is good. In the original email, we called it a âsupernatural war horrorâ story. That right there was a big part of selling itâfamiliar but unique.
