DEEP IN THE MEADOWS, Kindle Edition Now Available

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Bianca “Bee” Thompson’s brother, Jimmy has been dead for ten months, yet she still feels his presence lingering. And one question haunts her: Was Jimmy’s death an accident?

Probing into the events on the night of Jimmy’s death, Bee hears strange voices. The voices lead her to a blood-splattered room, a terrifying threat, and a deadly trap. Is Bee on the trail of her brother’s murderer, or is she entangled in a totally different and much more diabolical plot?

Deep in the Meadows on Amazon

Zero in on Your Hero Publisher

It’s not easy. This is a step for the authors that have moved on from the idea of getting an agent. Because that’s not easy either. In fact, it’s even harder. Agents need to be so selective, one or two wrong moves, their career won’t be moving too good. So they have every right to be as selective as possible. That’s their job. Watch the market. See what is hot and what is not and study and read like crazy to find what they are looking for.

If an agent doesn’t want you, you then act as the agent for your own work. Hunt, dig deep. Keep looking. Keep your submissions active. If you hit a bust, move on. If you submitted to a bust and they offer and you have doubts, move on. Don’t ever feel bad for doing it either. You can still get good feedback this way and it will help in the honing process.

But if your work isn’t what they are looking for, you still need to look out for your work yourself. Don’t just give up because of whatever many rejections, whether it’s 2 or 202. Why would you give up on something so precious as your time and energy and love crafted in your own words? If you wrote it and finished it and polished it to your liking, give it a shot and query. Let it go through the query process for as long as you can take. And if you can’t take it anymore, don’t stop there. Continue on with your mission, setting your sights on publishers. So you’ve set your bar high and have to readjust it. Don't sweat it. But don’t let the bar drop down so low you have no idea what you’re getting into either. RESEARCH. And I don’t mean, just research. I mean hunt down and harpoon that sucker from a million miles away if you have to. There are publishers that are willing to put your book to justice if you only do your extensive research.

Okay, so you’re down and out and still want to give it a whirl. You type in the Google bar: Publishers. Buzz, wrong. Too many links come up, where do you start first? How many pages do I have to look at to get where I want to go? I’m getting nowhere with this! I'm getting a headache. Stop. Focus. And start honing it down again. If you don’t know your genre, back up and study that first. If you send your work to a place you're not sure of, test it. See if it works. If not, what's the worst that could happen? A rejection? Really no rejection is the worst. You want some kind of feedback and if all you get is "not for us" ok then, now you know. Move on. Read the guidelines for every potential publisher. If you don’t know, check out some of their books like they say to do. They are trying to help you too.

Make sure of what you are writing first and foremost. Is it mystery-suspense? Romantic suspense mystery sci-fi thriller? If it’s a mixed bag of things, focus on the strongest element. Is the book more suspenseful than it is romantic? Does it have paranormal elements? Again read the guidelines and study their books. They are there for a reason.

Find out what that publisher has to offer and what you want in a publisher and what you are willing to negate and what you really want to have for your book. The marketing of a book is an extremely important factor to have for a publisher. Look at who the distributor is, is it a familiar one? Or is it from some weird unknown place you’ve never heard of before? See what’s out there. How much comes up on these publishers? Are they in the library? Will your book be offered in print as well as e-book?

You as the author will need to put that agent hat on and weigh the pros and cons and do what’s right for you and your book.

There are more and more doors opening up for authors to submit directly to the bigger publishers. Scope out the places that are still willing to accept unagented submissions that still offer the things you want, like placement in an actual bookstore and an advance.

Please try to watch out for the small author-mill type publishers that are willing to offer you a contract in a short time and that you know it will only be online to order. If you see the publisher pumping out 10 to 15 books a month? And they’re a tiny publisher no one even heard of? That is a red flag right there. Good chances are, you will be poorly edited, get a slapped-together cover, and have low sales. And all you’ll have to show for it is a writing credit. Yay, I was published! Good. Now do you want to get published and paid?

Drop those publishers like a poor lover that doesn’t know what love is. Because I may be a stupid woman, but I know what love is. And that’s not it. They won't give a shit about your book and your platform. In fact they’ll shit on your platform and leave you with a bad rep. Agents might look at you and your tiny writing credentials and see low sales on Amazon. It’s not fun. So in other words, these small publishers could hurt you in the long run.

So, let’s recap. Don’t give up, first of all. Give yourself adequate time to query. Give yourself a number even if you want to. I am going to query, 50 agents or 100 agents or 500 agents, until I've had enough. Then I am going to move onto the publishers. Research. Sites like Preditors and Editors, AbsoluteWrite, Publisher’s Marketplace, Publisher’s Weekly, Writers Digest, Agentquery, Querytracker(net) are all good starts. Each and every one of these places have helped me really hone down my writing path. Be sure you know what you are writing. If your book is heavy Sci-Fi, you hit the sci-fi publishers first.

Another important note to remember: If you get feedback from an agent or publisher or the whole flock, right down to that mystery critiquer from your writing community, listen. It doesn’t mean you have to do what they tell you to do for the book. And if they tell you really negative things, toss it and move on. It’s useless information. Just take what really hits home and that you think will make your book better. Really important to remember: Do what you want to do, don’t do everything everyone will tell you either. Your book will be directionless because you let everyone else guide it away from your main idea. You can’t please everyone. But you do however want to please your targeted audience because you are zoning and honing in on their crowd, whether YA or MG or picture books. So why not zero in on that perfect fit of a hero publisher that will do your book right?

For more helpful resources, please visit:  Rachelle Burk's Resources for Children's Writers

Chocolate for Writers: An Extended List of Advance Paying YA Publishers Accepting Unagented Submissions

Although I can’t give out candy online today, it’s my treat to give you more publishing information as of 10-31-2013. And they are advance paying publishers too! No, it’s not a trick either. In addition to that, I’ve listed below some publishers (although they don’t pay advances) they are definitely worth looking into. Here is the breakdown.

Crossed Genres Publications: They are a small press publisher of speculative fiction. Pay 2,000 for advances

Darkfuse: They are an independent publisher of modern horror, suspense and thrillers. They take short stories, novellas and novels. Although it doesn’t state it, they will consider YA. Great cover designs. They offer hardcovers too.

Black Inc Books: UK Publisher. Although it doesn’t state in their guidelines, I’ve confirmed they do in fact accept YA. This one accepts the full manuscript too.

Black Balloon Publishing: An independent press with both print and digital distribution. They are on the quirky and offbeat side. Again, another one that doesn’t state YA in their guidelines but will consider them.

Lucky Marble Publishing: This is a new publisher so proceed with caution. They are geared towards Middle Grade and YA. They state in the FAQ link they pay a small advance.


Albert & Whitman: A long-time publisher will finally be accepting e-mail submissions January 2014.


Non-advance paying YA Publishers, but still worth checking out.


Astraea Press

Pink Fish Press

Jolly Fish Press

Unbridled Books

Verso Books (may pay advances)

Persea Books (may pay advances)


Well, that’s it! Be sure to check out each site and read the guidelines before submitting. For more extensive information on these publishers, be sure to check out Absolute Write and the P&E. Good luck and have fun! Happy Halloween!!!

When Going Postal is a Good Thing

With today’s day and age and the wonderful world of email, many authors negate or just plain forget about sending postal submissions. Many of these places are just as good, if not better to send your work to. It really doesn’t cost that much to send out via snail mail every now and then. And it’s really fun when you get something other than bills in your regular mailbox, especially if it’s a response from a publisher!


Even though using email is faster and more convenient, this doesn’t mean publishers accepting only postal submissions are in the stone-age and should be counted out. It is just their way of handling their flow of submissions. Plus it’s also considered a filtering mechanism. Most writers are less likely to send every single manuscript they have this way. And writers who do send via postal mail are often more cautious about what they send, making sure their manuscripts better fit the publisher’s guidelines. This also minimizes unwanted manuscripts.

I want to remind everyone that this list is geared towards children’s and young adult authors and are advance paying publishers, unless stated otherwise.

So here’s a list of publishers that accept postal submissions to get you started.

Peachtree Publishers: From picture book to YA submissions. Watch out for the special note on genres.

Dial Books for Young Readers: A YA imprint of Penguin. Responds only if interested.

Tor Books: Part of Macmillan. Chapter books, middle grade, YA. Genres: Science fiction and Fantasy

Holiday House: Early picture books to YA. Only responds if interested.

Seven Stories Press: New YA imprint Triangle Square. Political and social issues (fiction/non-fiction)

Big Mouth House: An imprint of Small Beer Press. Publishes for readers 10 and up. Also accepts short story collections.

Again, this is list is just to get you started, but there are plenty of other places out there to look into. Even though it might be a little more out of the way to send, it’s worth looking into. Remember to read all the guidelines and follow them closely. Good luck and have fun with it!

Pros and Cons to Agents and Publishers

There's more than one way to getting published. Agents are one avenue. But not the only avenue. With more and more smaller publishers getting bigger, and big publishers opening the doors to unagented submissions, or just plain self-publishing, it all just depends on what road you'd like to take. I just don't want writers to give up at that point after the agent search has ended. That's not the end of your book. And that shouldn't be the end of your dream either. There's more options out there. Doing as much research as possible for your book, is key.

UNLESS the agent is very reputable and has great contacts and is truly willing to help you get your book out there, I would suggest you tread carefully on who you sign with. You’re wasting your time if you go with a less-than-perfect agent. An agent that hasn’t gotten any solid sales from major publishers, or an agent that shops your book around to places you can submit to yourself? What’s the point?

There are many things an agent can help you with, such as editing, marketing, helping you get a better deal of course, but not all agents are created equal. It's best to do your research before you sign. And don't hesitate to ask questions too. You don't want a mediocre agent that only submits your book to a handful of places and then says to you, we’re going to scale down now and submit to smaller publishers. Why? When you know in your heart there’s several other places your agent can submit to? Clearly an agent like that doesn’t have enough contacts.

And for those authors that find themselves an offer from a publisher that think you need an agent for, not necessarily so on that either. You can just as easily have a literary lawyer look at it for a one time flat fee, rather than paying the agent 15% off the advance and 15% off of all your royalties on the book. If you do this the wrong way, you may get burned. Especially if your money streams out of the agency first. And to think when you got the deal in the first place? No, sorry. It just doesn’t make any sense.

Some authors are more successful self-publishing their books then the authors with agents AND publishers. Most of the time because the agent placed it with some small publisher. And believe me, there are agents out there that leech off authors like that. Continually placing their authors with these tiny publishers and never getting a better deal for them is darn right stealing from an author. If you want to get published the right way, you'll need to be aware of such things. The whole reason behind even getting an agent is so that agent can get you into places that you couldn’t normally get into yourself.

There’s good agents and there’s bad agents. Just as there’s good publishers and bad publishers. Could you see if you got a bad agent and a bad publisher? IF you’re not savvy enough to know what’s going on in the publishing industry, it could happen to you. The best thing to do for your book is research the shit out of who you are sending it to. With all those internet scammers out there, if you’re not fully aware of what’s going on, they could get to you. And believe me, having a bad agent is worse than not having an agent at all. And having a bad publisher is a complete disaster. Warning signs for that are things like poor communication, poor editing on other books of theirs. Not good with distribution. Poor marketing. I could go on and on.

I'm not suggesting all agents are bad, or all (not so well known) publishers are bad. I just want writers to know they have options. Actually quite a few. Even if you get rejected by what you think every agent and publisher out there, there's another around the corner. New publishers opening, old publishers expanding. Same goes for agents too. The Guide to Literary Agents is a good resource in finding new agents too.

Just know there are other options out there just waiting to be explored. Whatever you decide to do, rule number one: Never give up on your publishing dream. If you feel as though you need to trunk a novel, write a new one and begin the process again.

Unless you’re just writing for leisure purposes, don’t give up on your dream of getting published. Keep open to that possibility always and try to keep your submissions active for as long as possible. Keep at it. Just as a side note about vanity publishers, since I haven't covered them. Stay away. Any publisher asking or money from you is a crime. Don't equate it to self-publishing either. It's not the same thing, not in the least. With self-publishing, you have full control and places that give you much better royalty rates. Bottom line, keep options open. Do your homework and search, and research again. With determination and information, you can get there too!

Big Publishers Accepting Unagented YA Submissions

If the agent route isn’t working for you, and you’re a young adult writer looking for a place to submit then the list below is definitely worth checking out. All these publishers pay advances, unless stated otherwise. Even though this list is geared towards YA fiction writers, some of these places also take adult fiction as well as non-fiction, so again, it’s worth looking into. And all accept U.S. author submissions too.

Hachette Australia: Accepts email submissions on a regular basis. Will respond within three weeks if they are interested. I think that’s an excellent turn around.

Harper Collins Australia: Accepts submissions every Wednesday. Be sure to check their guidelines. Remember the time difference. So say for example, there’s a 15 hour time difference (if I did my math right) for U.S. authors, so if you submit at 9:30am (thinking it would be okay) it would be 12:30pm in Australia and you wouldn’t be able to submit. If you don’t see the “Wednesday Post” button to click on, that’s a clear indication you won’t be able to submit.

Allen and Unwin: Accepts submission every Friday during “The Friday Pitch.” Please make sure to read their guidelines. There’s a special form you need to fill out and copy paste it into your email submission.

Ben Bella: Accepting submissions on a regular basis. Openly states the advances are between 5K and 10K and may be higher if they really want the ms.

Beyond Words: They are in partnership with Atria an imprint of Simon & Schuster . They are into mind, body and spirit and will accept fiction also.

Witness Impulse: This is another imprint of Harper Collins, that even though I’m not sure if they take YA submissions, they are looking for mystery/suspense/thrillers. Even though they don’t pay advances, their royalty rates are high and they pay it monthly which is a perk.

So there it is. More places to submit to without having to have an agent for. BUT, if you do get an offer from one of these places, it would be wise to get a professional to look at your contract. Often times, you can submit to an agent, with your offer and they’d be willing to help, whether they want in on the deal or kindly help without getting involved. And yes, it does happen.

Good luck everyone! And whatever you do, never give up! I truly believe if you strive hard enough to do your research and continue to look (because new ones pop up all the time) you will find a home for your baby.

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