Nonfiction Book Proposals Anybody can Write (Revised and Updated) | 
| Author: Elizabeth Lyon
Publisher: Perigee Trade
Category: Book
List Price: $14.95
Buy New: $8.44
You Save: $6.51 (44%)
New (33) Used (15) from $7.95
Avg. Customer Rating:  28 reviews
Sales Rank: 15131
Media: Paperback
Edition: Rev Upd
Number Of Items: 1
Pages: 320
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.7
Dimensions (in): 8.3 x 5.5 x 0.9
ISBN: 039952827X
Dewey Decimal Number: 808.02
EAN: 9780399528279
ASIN: 039952827X
Publication Date: December 3, 2002
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Shipping: International shipping available
Condition: Brand new item. Over 3.5 million customers served. Order now. Selling online since 1995. Order with confidence. Code: B20080704211911T
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| Editorial Reviews:
Amazon.com
I know: we all want to write a Great Novel. But in the meantime, don't you have a few terrific ideas for a nonfiction book, too? The subtitle of this book is "How to Get a Contract and an Advance Before Writing Your Book." Doesn't THAT sound better than competing with John Grisham and Tom Clancy? Eighty-five percent of all new titles are nonfiction. So dust off those memoirs, dig up those recipes of Aunt Edna's. Lyon takes you step by step through the process of how to discover and pitch your nonfiction book idea to the best market.
Book Description
Many writers, and aspiring writers, don't realize the opportunities that exist in the nonfiction book market. This book shows them how to take advantage, with topics including subject matter research, creating marketing plans, and writing a strong "About the Author" section. Also features two dozen actual proposals.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 23 more reviews...
 Good book for the money June 25, 2008
I purchased this book hoping for information for my book proposal. I was not disappointed. This book has valuable information and I am happy with my purchases.
Good For a Clear Understanding of Your Book Proposal September 11, 2007
1 out of 1 found this review helpful
If you have started to look for a literary agent, buy this book first. If your proposal has been rejected by agents, buy this book. I thought I had read good proposal books until I read this one. Follow it step by step, chapter by chapter, and your book proposal will look quite differently than what you wrote before. After reading this book, I re-wrote my entire proposal, because the suggestions in this book gave me a better understanding of what I wanted to write, and how to convey my vision of my book to outside parties. If you are having problems outlining your book, defining your chapters, writing a query letter that will impress an agent in the first two sentences, buy this book. How To Pick The Best Tenant Jump Start Your Book Sales: A Money-Making Guide for Authors, Independent Publishers and Small Presses
Hope my proposal doesn't fall apart like the spine of this book May 8, 2007
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
Whether the glue is poor quality or another problem with the paperback spine, I really wish this much read book had held together better. From one to a few pages, to chuncks of pages, have separated.
That said, the book is completely informative, with numerous examples and step by step directions. Explanations help shape the user's thinking about how to develop their book proposal. I wish the writer covered the proposal in order, but I understand her reasoning for covering sections out of order.
The book doesn't give much help about how new writers can pad their "About Author" and beef up their personal selling points when they have never been published.
Overall, the book is packed with useful info.
Non Fiction Proposals anybody can write March 9, 2007
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
I have bought other books on this subject and this is the most useful and most logically organized.
A Great Resource for Writers - Aspiring and Otherwise June 8, 2006
19 out of 19 found this review helpful
The position of an aspiring writer, trying to break into the published market, is not an enviable one. Here's a fairly common scenario: writer spends a year or two writing his book. He pours his heart and mind into the manuscript, and once it's done, he starts sending it out to publishing houses. Responses aren't immediately forthcoming; it's a big manuscript, so it tends to sit at the bottom of busy publishers' to-do lists. Finally, if he's lucky, he gets a response - someone actually wants to publish his book. Only they want a lot of it changed, to make it more marketable.
It doesn't have to be this way; there's a better process to follow. You start with a query letter; a short letter of a few pages outlining the idea for your book. Since it's short, publishers are likely to read it much sooner. You get replies sooner, too; to the people who are interested, you send a full-blown book proposal - explaining in detail what you want to write, who will buy it, outlining the book, and providing a sample chapter or two (preparing this proposal is much, much easier than actually writing a whole book).
If a publisher likes the idea, you can be extended an offer, including a cash advance for the book. If something needs to be changed about the concept, it can be done before you've actually written the whole thing. Basically, this process means much less work, and getting paid for your work quite a bit sooner.
In "Nonfiction Book Proposals Anybody Can Write", Elizabeth Lyon explains in detail how to go about putting together a book proposal that a publisher will read and like, so that you will be offered an advance to write your book. If you want to make your living as a writer of books, you absolutely must have Lyon's book on your reference shelf.
My first book was self-published - that's a route that you can take to completely circumvent the approach to publishers; you can learn more about that in Dan Poynter's "Self-Publishing Manual". My next book is more suited to go through a publisher, and Lyon's book is definitely going to be one of the tools that I use to get the project going. Highly, highly recommended.
Danny Iny
Author of "Ordinary Miracles - Harness the power of writing and get your point across!" (ISBN 1-4116-7252-6)
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