Hello, board, it is me again, your least favorite bird. I have another memoir question.
I was on a panel today about memoirs, and the speakers were literary agents. And they said you write a book proposal for your memoir, like you would any other sort of nonfiction book, that doing queries was a little more "old fashioned." On further discussion, what I gathered is that if your memoir is more "literary," then it should be a query and finished, like a novel. But if it's more "high concept" (the examples given were "ebola doctor" and "female paparazzi")(yes I know there is a specific term for that but shhh) you can do the proposal and then the publisher commissions the book from you.
So I was both surprised and intrigued to hear this. See, what the memoir about is still happening, I have not reached "the end." But I know WHAT the ending is (it's figuring out X, via Y) it's not a vague "and then I learned the power of friendship" type thing. But to do Y, it's going to take a lot of time and effort. And, namely, money. You know how insurance is. So being able to pay for that, and to have the financial cushion to take time off of work if shit gets too stressful. Which it's absolutely going to be, as you can imagine.
{I know I'm being non-specific about what this is, but that's because this forum is visible to everyone, and I don't want random people [such as coworkers] learning about this. I do have the first scene in SYW, which you might have already read, so you should understand why I feel that way.}
My plan WAS to work on this memoir, but not as my primary thing, as I slowly deal with the medical gatekeeping/insurance process, and trying to even find the right professional. And if that's not possible or is out of my means (which is very likely), I'd just DIY it. Which you CAN do, but...well, it's not really recommended. Shit can go bad, which is why you want someone helping you with it. Ending up hospitalized and finding out how to hide that from work sure would make an interesting story! But I would rather not have to live that, if possible.
So my question is ??? fold:
I was on a panel today about memoirs, and the speakers were literary agents. And they said you write a book proposal for your memoir, like you would any other sort of nonfiction book, that doing queries was a little more "old fashioned." On further discussion, what I gathered is that if your memoir is more "literary," then it should be a query and finished, like a novel. But if it's more "high concept" (the examples given were "ebola doctor" and "female paparazzi")(yes I know there is a specific term for that but shhh) you can do the proposal and then the publisher commissions the book from you.
So I was both surprised and intrigued to hear this. See, what the memoir about is still happening, I have not reached "the end." But I know WHAT the ending is (it's figuring out X, via Y) it's not a vague "and then I learned the power of friendship" type thing. But to do Y, it's going to take a lot of time and effort. And, namely, money. You know how insurance is. So being able to pay for that, and to have the financial cushion to take time off of work if shit gets too stressful. Which it's absolutely going to be, as you can imagine.
{I know I'm being non-specific about what this is, but that's because this forum is visible to everyone, and I don't want random people [such as coworkers] learning about this. I do have the first scene in SYW, which you might have already read, so you should understand why I feel that way.}
My plan WAS to work on this memoir, but not as my primary thing, as I slowly deal with the medical gatekeeping/insurance process, and trying to even find the right professional. And if that's not possible or is out of my means (which is very likely), I'd just DIY it. Which you CAN do, but...well, it's not really recommended. Shit can go bad, which is why you want someone helping you with it. Ending up hospitalized and finding out how to hide that from work sure would make an interesting story! But I would rather not have to live that, if possible.
So my question is ??? fold:
- Is doing a book proposal for memoirs really a thing?
- Is it worth doing in my situation? Is my "concept"/"hook" compelling enough (and then my voice/style is also good enough) to make this worthwhile? I do have SOME industry contacts but...this would be published with a pen name. I can't leverage any of my networks/socials for the book, and I know that is part of the package for nonfic proposals.
- But also I have all of those diversity/under-represented voices things, but idk if that'll make up for the no following thing
- If an agent says no to a proposal, does that mean I blew my chance with them and can't submit a query/finished MS later?
- Is there anything else I'm not thinking about
