Table of Contents

	Introduction: It Takes Less Than a Minute to Reject Your Book	p. xiii
	Editorial Reasons for Rejection	p. 1
	Your Writing Is Crap	p. 2
	You Lied to Me	p. 6
	You Insulted Me or My Company	p. 11
	We're Already Publishing a Similar Book	p. 16
	Your Target Audience Is Too Big	p. 20
	Your Target Audience Is Too Small	p. 25
	Your Target Audience Isn't My Target Audience	p. 31
	Your Book Is Too Extreme	p. 36
	Your Ideas Conflict with My Values and/or My Company's Values	p. 41
	Your Book Tries to Do Too Much	p. 46
	Your Word Count Is Too Long or Too Short	p. 50
	You Are Not Credible on the Topic You Want to Write About	p. 56
	You Didn't Do Your Homework	p. 60
	You Are Lazy	p. 65
	You Didn't Pass the ôFirst Line Testö	p. 70
	My Publishing List Is Packed for the Next Eighteen Months	p. 75
	Had a Fight with My Spouse and/or Children Just Before I Read Your Proposal	p. 79
	You Didn't Eschew Obfuscation	p. 83
	You Pitched Me Two Awful Ideas in a Row	p. 87
	Your Agent Pitched Me Two Awful Ideas in a Row	p. 92
	You Don't Have an Agent	p. 97
	You Didn't Give Me Enough Writing Samples	p. 102
	I've Rejected This Book Before	p. 107
	You Are Clueless about Copyright Law	p. 111
	Your Book Is Boring	p. 116
	You Took the D-Train	p. 120
	Your Project Is Unoriginal	p. 125
	Your Cover Letter Was Too Long	p. 129
	You Stink at Grammar and Spelling	p. 133
	You Didn't Give Me a Complete Proposal	p. 138
	Bottom Line-You Didn't Do Enough of My Job for Me	p. 142
	Marketing Reasons for Rejection	p. 147
	You Have No Idea What It Means to Market a Book	p. 148
	You Have No Legitimate Means for Promoting a Book	p. 152
	You Don't Understand the Difference between Features and Benefits	p. 157
	You Have No PR-Worthy Accomplishments	p. 161
	You Are Not Able to Run a Grassroots Publicity Campaign for Yourself	p. 165
	Amazon.com Reviewers Don't Like You	p. 170
	You Have No Internet Presence	p. 175
	Your Internet Presence Is Shoddy and Unprofessional	p. 179
	You Are Not Engaged/Poorly Engaged in Social Media	p. 183
	Your Title Stinks	p. 187
	Your Introduction Is Useless	p. 192
	You Look Unprofessional	p. 197
	You Are a Poor Verbal and/or Informal Communicator	p. 202
	You Demonstrate No Knowledge/Faulty Knowledge of Your Competition	p. 206
	There's Too Much Competition for Your Book	p. 211
	You Aren't Able to Significantly Differentiate Your Book from the Competition	p. 215
	You Can't Quickly Evoke the Right Emotions When Talking about Your Book	p. 220
	You Can't Provide Impactful Endorsements for Your Work	p. 224
	My Marketing Team Tried to Promote a Similar Book in the Past, and It Failed	p. 229
	My Marketing VP Is Unfairly Prejudiced Against You	p. 233
	My Marketing VP Doesn't Care about Your Topic-and Doesn't Think Anyone Else Will Either	p. 237
	Bottom Line-You Weren't Good to Mama	p. 241
	Sales Reasons for Rejection	p. 245
	You Are Not a Celebrity	p. 246
	There Is No ôBrandwagonö Trend You Can Latch Onto	p. 250
	You Have No Sales History to Speak Of	p. 256
	You Have a Sales History, and It Sucks	p. 260
	You Self-Published Yourself into Oblivion	p. 264
	Women Just Aren't That Into You	p. 269
	My Sales VP Thinks of You as an Unknown (the ôNo Froofiesö Rule)	p. 274
	My Sales VP Is Hostile toward Me or My Editorial VP, and Is Sabotaging Our Careers by Undervaluing Proposals We Bring to Publishing Board	p. 278
	My Sales VP Can't (or Won't) See the Future	p. 282
	You Are the Wrong Gender	p. 286
	You Have Unrealistic Expectations about Your Publishing Potential	p. 291
	You Don't Know Why People Buy Books	p. 296
	Other Books We've Done Similar to Yours Did Not Sell According to Expectations	p. 300
	Nothing Similar to Your Book Shows Up on Industry Bestseller Lists	p. 304
	You Can't Identify Specific Sales Channels That Your Book Will Sell Through	p. 308
	Your Book Costs Too Much to Make	p. 312
	You Want Too Much Money	p. 316
	Your Novel Is Not a ôRomanceö	p. 321
	My Sales Team Is Struggling to Sell Our Current Line of Books	p. 326
	There Is No Real Sequel Potential for Your Book	p. 330
	My Sales VP Asked a Spouse/Friend/Baby-sitter if They Would Buy Your Book, and the Response Was Unenthusiastic	p. 335
	My Sales Team Asked a Few Key Book Buyers if They Would Stock Your Book, and Their Response Was Unenthusiastic	p. 339
	Your Book Failed a Focus Group	p. 344
	Bottom Line-Not Enough Profit Potential	p. 348
	Afterword	p. 352
	Appendix: Recommended Resources for Writers	p. 355
	Acknowledgments	p. 359
	About the Author	p. 361