This is an #MSWL post, although I am not affiliated with the lovely people at Manuscript Wish List.
Below is a list of book ideas I’ve had percolating in my mind for a while—none of which I have the desire or qualifications to write myself, but all of which could be amazing (and commercially successful!) in the hands of the right author.
Who is “the right author,” you ask? For the nonfiction ideas, it’s someone with standout professional qualifications relevant to the subject, preexisting access to a large book-buying audience, and decent writing chops. For fiction, it’s going to be someone with an otherworldly voice and storytelling talent, ideally (although not necessarily) coupled with some kind of platform.
(See my prior post on the meaning of author platform here.)
Why am I tossing out potentially valuable book ideas like this / giving away the popsicles for free?
First: they’re not actually free. If you’re not a paid subscriber, you’re about to hit a paywall. MUAHAHAHAHAHA.
Second: book ideas in themselves are not that valuable. This is something you might not know as an author but learn pretty quickly as an agent. All kinds of people have all kinds of great book ideas all the time; whether publishers perceive them as valuable is all about the who, when, and how of their execution.
Also: most ideas aren’t at all original. No matter how esoterically genius or urgent your own ideas might feel, other people have had them before or are simultaneously having them now. That’s just the way of the zeitgeist, baby, and it’s why ideas in themselves are not copyrightable. The execution is the art. The execution is the property. The execution is everything.
Third: I genuinely want to buy and read these books.
Fourth: I want to be your muse, so I can go on a podcast and say this:
And finally: I would love to rep all of these books, provided the stars align.
This is where things are going to become a little awkward.
As you know, the cardinal boundary of this newsletter is that subscribing to it has no bearing on your chances of securing literary representation at Neon. We care so much about this boundary that if you do choose to query us, we require that you don’t mention your subscription status in your letter.
However. In order to tell me you’re seriously interested in writing one of these books—or miraculously already underway writing—you’re clearly going to have to acknowledge this newsletter. So I’m going to have to chip off a tiiiiiiny little piece of our sacred boundary this week.
The following rules still apply:
Please only email me about this if you’re a qualified author seriously interested in one of the specific ideas I’m about to mention. If you have another idea—even a sort-of-overlapping-one—please submit it through our standard submissions process.
Do not try to pull some lame “I love that idea from the post, but what about THIS one” in a direct email to me. I will delete.
No one—including me, since I’m making the choice to share—has the right to call dibs on these ideas. You are welcome to run with them to a different agent if I pass on representation. You are welcome to run with them to someone else if you work with another agent already. You are welcome to run with them unagented. Entirely up to you.
If you’re successful in selling this without me, though, Mama wants some credit.
If I am able to determine that you for sure got the idea for your book from this post AND did not give me the chance to represent it AND are now trying to play like you never had a muse named Anna and came up with that highly specific plant metaphor book concept all by yourself, I am going to razz you so hard on social media. So hard!!!
OK, here are my ideas: