I’ve been thinking recently about how we as publishers work with our authors, and why so much of our industry can still feel so opaque. We rely on our writers, and we value them very highly (we would not have a business without them!) but it seems that many authors out there (and of course, not everyone) feel as though publishing lacks a certain transparency. As both an editor and an author, I am exposed to a lot of conversations about this, and one thing that I find worrying is how so many authors say they are reluctant to ask their publishing teams questions. 

The sorts of questions that come up are: How many books have I sold? How many were you hoping for? What is the retail landscape like? How will a marketing budget be spent? What can I do to help my book reach readers? Some of these are business sensitive (e.g. budgets, and they are also changeable) so it doesn’t make sense for those to be shared, and I’m not suggesting that publishers divulge all our financial information to authors. And, of course, a good agent can absolutely help relay this information, and provide authors with more context. 

I do think, though, that we need to get into the habit of explaining these things to writers, collaborating to a greater extent – because we all have the same goal, which is to get books into readers hands – and, crucially, building strong, trusting relationships that will enable authors to ask the questions they need to (without feeling that they will somehow transgress some invisible publishing rule).

If there is information we cannot share, we need to say so, and I imagine that in most cases, this will be enough – I’m fairly sure everyone involved understands the sensitivity of financial information that might affect others, and I sometimes worry that we are "babying" our authors to the extent that, when a book doesn’t connect with as many readers as possible, the author is left wondering what they did wrong, and why nobody told them earlier.

I’ve had messages from writers saying they have no idea how many books they have sold, that they aren’t sure whether they should email their editor, that they don’t know whether they can query editorial notes, that they don’t understand what retailers want or why their books are never stocked, that they don’t know why editors don’t respond to their submissions, and more.

Of course, there are tons of amazing, dedicated, hard-working people in this industry, but perhaps sometimes we don’t understand quite how much authors internalise silence or "failure" and the extent to which some (probably newer) writers feel in the dark, despite our best intentions for them to feel otherwise. Literary agents play a huge part in this and are wonderful at being there for their authors, but there are some things only those internal to the publishing house can relay and those are the things I mean here.

I’ve had messages from writers saying they have no idea how many books they have sold, that they aren’t sure whether they should email their editor, that they don’t know whether they can query editorial notes

Most of the time, when a book doesn’t reach as many readers as we might have hoped, it is not something an author has done wrong. Usually, it is down to factors such as market fatigue, the competitive nature of a genre, and perhaps a title or cover that didn’t connect as well as it could have. There are wider factors, too – the cost-of-living crisis, a squeeze in retail shelf space – and usually, it is not at all to do with the book being "bad" or an author not having "worked hard enough". That is why I think it is so important that as an industry, we share what we can, and that we are prepared to let authors in on some of the "secrets" that involve the books they themselves have written.

We are all on the same side, and (in my experience!) we are all pretty decent people, so sharing data should be something we do naturally. Of course, for this to happen we also need to receive kindness and respect from authors when things don’t go to plan, it needs to work both ways, but I think personally that if we could all trust one another a little more, we’d get better results. As publishers, we study our readers analytically, but authors bring their own knowledge too. It’s a cliché to say so, but two heads are often better than one. Knowledge is power. Sharing is caring. I’m supposed to be a writer, so I’ll stop talking in platitudes, but I think you get the idea.

To try to help with this, I recently began a free Substack called The Honest Editor, with the straightforward aim of sharing a behind-the-scenes look at the industry. So far, this has covered acquisitions, cover art, submissions and the editorial process, and it’s lovely that lots of people have signed up and said kind things. But I’ve also been saddened to learn of how many people feel that this transparency does not already exist – or not enough, anyway.

I hope together we can all take steps towards making it all feel clearer, more accessible and less like a magician’s cave – and I think this will not only help with making authors feel at ease, but help us to attract and retain staff, too (many people outside the industry still find it impenetrable, and for us to really diversify our talent, this has to change).

Sign up to The Honest Editor.