How to publish a book with 30 of your best writer friends
By Kendall Powell
I’ve recently come to a disturbing realization: I am a collaborator at heart. That wouldn’t be such a problem, but I’m also a freelancer. Most days, I work very much alone. I’m a social mammal, too, which is why I founded an online community of freelance science writers, called SciLance, in 2005. On our private listserv we talked about craft, complained about sources, and shared our best ideas about everything from story structures and business strategies to buying boots and raising children. I guess I shouldn’t be surprised that we ended up pitching, writing, and publishing a science writing handbook together, too. Community is great. But collaboration?
In some ways, writing a book with 30 other writers was easy compared to sole authorship. Each of us had only a chapter or two to write. But in other ways, it was incredibly difficult. How do you make so many individual voices cohesive, and how do you weed out the inevitable overlaps or resolve differences of opinion? It quickly became a balancing act of delegating work and decisions, coordinating many moving parts, and layering on heavy doses of diplomacy to accommodate all the personalities and different work styles involved. More than once, I worried that this huge project might end up imploding the very community that made it possible.
So I’m thrilled to say that The Science Writers’ Handbook: Everything You Need to Know to Pitch, Publish, and Prosper in the Digital Age will be on bookshelves in late April — and that SciLance has survived to tell this tale. The book is a resource for any science writer or communicator who cares about the craft and commerce of our field. It covers the how-to basics, but goes beyond reporting and writing and pitching to include the personal and professional struggles we’ve all faced and the solutions we’ve found. Like my Denver-area hiking trails, this project was a steep, sometimes rocky, and ultimately satisfying climb. And while the idea of the book circulated for years, it was an Idea Grant from NASW that finally launched it on the path from wishful thinking to reality.
The Science Writers’ Handbook idea first sprung out of a SciLance email conversation in January 2008, when Anne Sasso wrote: “You know, guys … we should write a SciLance book. I bet we’ve got enough material in the archives to get a good start. … Can you tell that I’m procrastinating again?”
We recreated the hive mind process of the listserv, asking for insights, experiences, and feedback from one another. And it’s no surprise that Anne eventually became the project’s business manager and wrote the chapter on procrastination, “Just Write the Friggin’ Thing Already!”
The book concept sat around for more than a year until August 2009. Anne again raised the idea, and with the ScienceWriters meeting in Austin just a few short months away, the notion got rolling with scores of serious and silly contributions of possible chapter titles. Some of them made it into the final version in one form or another. Other suggestions hit the cutting-room floor, such as “I’m Thinking of Something Blue: How to Handle Editors Who Are Rather Unspecific,” and “Oops, I Did It Again: Why I Said I’d Never Write for Another Women’s Magazine.”
Tom Hayden drafted a short book proposal and outline. In Austin, a dozen of us, over coffee in a hotel suite, dedicated a morning to brainstorm the project’s goals. We would address the frustration we’ve all felt, such as when asking for advice on writing forums and getting 10 conflicting answers in response. And we’d share the humor in this life. We debated the format — personal essays, edited email threads, or some combination — but we agreed the book would include our voices and our collective wisdom.
Mark Schrope distilled the meeting by observing, “If we do it well, it will be something that reaches people at all phases, appealing to beginners all the way up to advanced writers.”
As always after ScienceWriters meetings, we left energized and renewed. And inevitably, that enthusiasm was overtaken by our individual workloads. The project went back into hibernation.
On Feb. 17, 2011, NASW announced the Idea Grant program and solicited proposals. That same day, Amanda Mascarelli posted the spark that would finally move the project from idealistic to realistic: “Hmmm … do you think the SciLance book could be a good candidate for this funding opportunity?!”
Tom’s response: “Holy crap, Amanda, that actually might be just the ticket.”
Momentum snowballed from there. Michelle Nijhuis took the lead on turning the earlier proposal into an Idea Grant proposal, with input from Cameron Walker, Tom, and me. We submitted our proposal in March and in July NASW awarded us a $43,000 grant; the larger of our requested budgets that would allow us freelancers to get a first draft done quickly.
It was a profound moment of what we call “the fear” — the realization that your audacity has paid off in an assignment, which you are now actually going to have to complete. In short order, a project team came together: Michelle Nijhuis and Tom Hayden agreed to act as co-editors for the book; Anne Sasso handled project finances and Alison Fromme took charge of administration; Sarah Webb and Emily Gertz spearheaded online marketing, and would eventually divide and conquer the website and social media presence for the book. As founder of SciLance, I continued to act as “collaborator-in-chief” of the book team as well as served as head diplomat.
By fall of 2011, all 26 chapters were assigned. Wanting each chapter to reflect multiple perspectives, each author surveyed the group in an intense email blizzard lasting several months.
From this process alone, I learned incredible new things about the writing habits of my colleagues, some of which I immediately put into practice in my own work. For example, Hillary Rosner offered this gem for writing first drafts: “I’m a big proponent of 'TK.' I use it for everything from explanations I can’t be bothered to write yet, to details I need to double-check, to quotes I need to find in my notes, to bits I see are missing … ”
The writing of the book came together astoundingly well, but we had yet to decide on a publishing strategy. At the end of 2011, Tom submitted a formal book proposal to a nonprofit press, a small publishing house that had already put out several science communication books. The feedback from reviewers was positive, and we were thrilled at the prospect of having a real publisher and a real book. But, as Alison Fromme recalls, “As is often the case, we challenged ourselves as a community.” If one publisher was interested, we asked each other, perhaps others would be, too? We decided the book needed an agent.
A huge advantage of writing a book as a group of 31 is that by tapping the list, we immediately had a handful of agent names to contact. In January 2012, we signed on with Andrew Paulson of Zachary Shuster Harmsworth. Before the end of February, he had interested enough publishers to hold an auction on our book proposal. Da Capo Press came in with both the best advance and the resources to help us reach a wider audience beyond science writing and academia.
The advance, along with the NASW grant, allowed us to pay our contributors, editors, and organizers more fairly. It also guaranteed our own dedicated marketing budget, key in today’s publishing environment. A large chunk would support a significant online presence for the book via a website, blog, and social media accounts.
By fall of 2012, Tom and Michelle submitted a final draft to Da Capo for copyediting. After an all-too-brief celebratory moment of high-five emails, the book team turned squarely toward the marketing push.
Looking back, I’m struck by how much we’ve been able to do and do well because there are 31 of us continuously pulling together and pitching in. For example, under Sarah Webb’s guidance, Monya Baker, Hannah Hoag, and Stephen Ornes have split up web editing duties so that we can manage three to five weekly blog posts to the book website, which we view as a tremendous resource for science writers in its own right.
Clearly, if revisions, proofs, and website launch were stacked on one author’s plate, it would be a full-time job with pretty lousy pay. Granted, some aspects, such as collecting information from all 31 contributors for the 17-page author questionnaire, were certainly much harder to do en masse. But the project has enriched our community in ways I could have never imagined. We are all smarter about contract negotiations, wiser about the realities of publishing a book-length project, closer for getting deeper glimpses into each other’s work habits and family lives, and better writers for the time we’ve spent thinking about how to improve our craft.
I feel a bit of maternal pride as this network created for online socializing has bloomed into a professional team of writers, working together to advance science writing as a field. Along the way, I’ve also felt the stars align as our many partners in this collaboration just seem to “get us.” Carl Zimmer’s blurb stands out as such:
Writing about science can be exalting, enlightening, and rewarding. It can also be maddening, baffling, and terrifying. The Science Writers’ Handbook is dense with sage advice on how to make your experience the former rather than the latter. These are lessons it takes years to learn on one’s own; this book feels like a wonderful cheat sheet for the profession.
We think he’s right — and we hope you will, too. I couldn’t be happier with the outcome if I’d done the book all myself. In fact, I know I wouldn’t be happier — my stress level would be through the roof, my income in the toilet, and the book’s substance and style diminished by a factor of 30. Collaboration has its own rewards. Nor does it have to end. Stop by the website and join the conversation with your own thoughts, tips, and tricks to enrich the science writer’s life.
Group lessons learned
If someone wants to give you $43,000 to be split among 31 writers, it’s best if you already have a legal entity set up for distributing payments and handling expenses. SciLance Writing Group, a four-member LLC, was born shortly after our grant award.
Get an agent. Ours was worth every bit of his standard 15 percent commission. The bidding auction he arranged included four academic presses and two trade publishers. He also helped us navigate and negotiate complex, sometimes bizarre, contract issues (see next item).
Modern publishing contracts include such exotic items as “theme-park rights,” should your book idea be transformed into a movie that inspires Disneyesque thrills. A peak at our “book’s rides” — from our fertile imaginations — will appear on the pitchpublishprosper.com blog (coming soon).
Writing your own contributor contracts — and asking your colleagues to sign them — reveals how challenging things can be from the other side of the editorial fence.
Sometimes you must break your own rules: When quoting friends and colleagues on their most vulnerable thoughts and feelings about their careers, it’s best to run copy back by your sources.
Hire a web designer who is as much a science geek and word-nerd as you are. We knew we had chosen wisely when Ron Doyle of Waterday Media included a swirl based on the Fibonacci sequence on our homepage.
Delegate tasks to those who have built-in skills and enthusiasm, especially for marketing that falls largely to authors these days and includes outreach via social media and conferences and other in-person events to promote the book to students, scientists, journalists, professors, and communicators. For example, Rob Frederick, a multitalented multimedia guru, produced our fantastic video trailers from footage shot at ScienceWriters2011 and 2012.
Set up as many separate email lists as it takes to keep organized.
Book project-related emails to date: 2,393 and counting.
Look inside the Science Writers’ Handbook
More than just a writing how-to-book, The Science Writers’ Handbook arms readers with the tools to make science writing a way of life.
Part I primes the reader with the essential skills for quality science writing, Part II contains real-life advice for maintaining a work-life balance, and Part III breaks down how to support oneself on an unpredictable freelancer’s income. In each chapter, a SciLance member uses his or her own experience to tackle a challenge the modern science writer faces. Bonus material accompanies many chapters.
PART I The Skilled Science Writer
What Makes a Science Writer? by Alison Fromme
Finding Ideas by Emily Sohn
Making the Pitch by Thomas Hayden
Bonus material: • Classic Mistakes We Can All Avoid by Monya Baker • Pitching Endurance by Douglas Fox • A Tale of Two Query Letters by Thomas HaydenGetting the Story, and Getting it Right by Andreas von Bubnoff
Bonus material: • Making a Reporting Plan • A Science Writer’s Emergency Question List • On and Off the Record • “So When Can I Read Your Draft?”By The Numbers: Essential Statistics for Science Writers by Stephen Ornes
Excavating the Evidence: Reporting for Narrative by Douglas Fox
Bonus material: • Who Pays for Travel?Sculpting the Story by Michelle Nijhuis
Bonus material: • Story AnatomyWorking with Editors — and their Edits by Monya Baker and Jessica Marshall
Going Long: How to Sell a Book by Emma Marris
Bonus material: • Sample Query Letter • The Six Steps to AuthorshipMultilancing by Robert Frederick
Just Write the Friggin’ Thing Already! by Anne Sasso
Bonus material: • Thirty Books in Thirty Days by Emily Sohn
PART II The Sane Science Writer
The Loneliness of the Science Writer by Stephen Ornes
Good Luck Placing This Elsewhere: How to Cope with Rejection by Hillary Rosner
Beyond Compare by Michelle Nijhuis
Bonus material: • Measuring Success in a World Without Performance Reviews by Alison FrommeAn Experimental Guide to Achieving Balance by Virginia Gewin
Bonus material: • How the &%@ Do I Take a Real Vacation? • Balance, Schmalance by Liza GrossCreating Creative Spaces by Hannah Hoag
Avoiding Domestic Disasters by Bryn Nelson
Children and Deadlines: A Messy Rodeo by Amanda Mascarelli
PART III The Solvent Science Writer
Minding the Business by Anne Sasso and Emily Gertz
Networking for the Nervous by Cameron Walker
Bonus material: • The Introvert’s Survival Guide for Conference Cocktail PartiesPaid to Grow by Robin Mejia
Contract Literacy by Mark Schrope
Bonus material: • Time and Money: Can I Afford This Project? by Stephen OrnesThe Ethical Science Writer by Brian Vastag
Bonus material: • The Journalism-Promotion Divide by Helen FieldsSocial Networks and the Reputation Economy by Emily Gertz
Bonus material: • Blogging: My Digital Calling Card by Sarah WebbThe Diversity of Science Writing by Sarah Webb
Sustainable Science Writing by Jill U. Adams
Other book contributors: Jenny Cutraro, Adam Hinterthuer, Susan Moran, and Gisela Telis.
Kendall Powell is a freelance science writer based near Denver, Colo.
