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If you’ve always wanted to write a book . . . don’t! Write a non-fiction book proposal instead.
Your clients ask you the same questions over and over. Chances are, other clients in other towns are asking other vets the very same questions. Wouldn’t it be convenient if you could just recommend a book to them to answer all of the concerns you don’t have time to cover in the exam room?
But a book? Ugh! It sounds like an endless process requiring the alcohol and therapy necessary to soothe the typical writer’s torment. Fret not. Non-fiction books are sold on their proposals, and a complete proposal requires only about fifty pages of marketing and author information, along with an outline, a list of chapters and maybe two complete sample chapters.
The best book I’ve found to give you a good idea of how to write a successful book proposal is Jeff Herman’s How to Write the Successful Non-Fiction Book Proposal. This book contains an overview of the basic elements of a book proposal, but most valuable, it includes ten examples of book proposals that sold, complete with comments of why the proposal won the admiration of editors. It’s easy and fun to read, and you will mostly likely find a proposal that is in your book’s vein. Using that example as a template makes it so much easier to get your own thoughts down on paper.
Of course, having written numerous successful book proposals that sold to old-guard publishing houses, I can create a solid book proposal for you or revise what you have in a way that makes it a winner to agents and editors.
Writing a book can bring more than credibility, notoriety and an enhanced reputation. The experts with whom I work typically go from verbally paralyzed initially to pretty glib and fear-free once the project nears completion.
For my first book, my expert said “here’s chapter one,” and promptly handed over one piece of paper with five sentences on it. The paper trembled and my expert’s eyes were wide with fear. By the time we’d sold the book and were completing the last chapter, she remarked that her last chapter (a big ten full pages!) didn’t need much editing, that she’d taken care of most of it herself. Not only had she completed a book, she’d freed up her writing muscle, a skill she’d use through the rest of her career.
