What are the percentages for first novel?

randywrite · Aug 15, 2010

Hello all you agents. I was just wondering what the percentage might be for a first novel to make it big.

For example, Nicholas Sparks, The Notebook.

1% 5% 10% dare I say 20%

Thanks for your time, Randy

Deleted member 42 · Aug 15, 2010

Percentages of what?

thothguard51 · Aug 15, 2010

Nicholas Sparks (author) - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
"True Believer The chemistry of Nicholas Sparks -- The Notebook and Nights in Rodanthe scribe has penned 14 bestsellers in 14 years". ...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicholas_Sparks_(author) - Cached - Similar

Without knowing what his first submission was, how can we say what the percentages are when using NS as an example...

Most first novels do not even get published. They get trunked...

Most authors don't find their voice or audience until about their 3rd book, from what I read...

Rare is the author who strikes it big on the first novel sale. So I would say the 1% or less is more likely the number, considering there were over 750,000 titles printed in 2009...

randywrite · Aug 15, 2010

I haven't submitted anything. I just asked a question.

Percentages of what?

It's in my op. Percentages that any first novel will be a huge success. Does that clarify it for you?

Giant Baby · Aug 15, 2010

randywrite said:
I haven't submitted anything. I just asked a question.
It's in my op. Percentages that any first novel will be a huge success. Does that clarify it for you?

You're leaving out several steps here. First is, percentage I can finish the manuscript. Next, is percentage I can acquire representation from an agent. Third, percentage my agent can sell the book to a publisher able to get it to that level. Lastly, percentage it can be a massive break out.

It can't be done (predicting the odds), and it's unhealthy thinking. If there was a formula for this, or a grid, we'd all be working on our sure bets. Write what you write best, make it the best you can, and then come back and we'll help you find your way to the next level.

Sorry. It's hard by default.

Ryan_Sullivan · Aug 15, 2010

There are rarely numbers for things like this. But, it's probably pretty small.

Deleted member 42 · Aug 15, 2010

randywrite said:
I haven't submitted anything. I just asked a question.
It's in my op. Percentages that any first novel will be a huge success. Does that clarify it for you?

No. Not really. That's not possible to calculate, frankly. There are far too many variables, and most of them are not trackable.

But it's not likely. Look at the numbers of books published in a year just in the U.S.

Look at how few are listed on, say, the NYT list.

For a quick idea, go to Amazon, and look at the top 100 books.

And look at the current number of new books Amazon is tracking.

Look at how many authors have a spouse who works.

Look at how many authors have another job until they have three or five or six books in print.

thothguard51 · Aug 15, 2010

Don't worry about percentage of first time break out success. That's a pipe dream. Worry more about writing the best book you can and then moving on to the next one and writing a better book, and then the next, and the next...

randywrite · Aug 16, 2010

Sorry, but this was really only meant to be a fun question. I know there's a million variables. I guess I should have qualified that in my OP.

I just thought, since I was in "Ask The Agent" part of the forum, I might get an agent's opinion on the question, and I just thought percentages would be an easy measuring tool.

Take any agent, for instance, say you're at a book conference, and you walk up to him or her and ask, "How many first novels that come across your desk, get published and even go on to be bestsellers?" That's a legit question, even if they laugh in your face.

But they might be kind enough to say, "Not very many, I'd say .001%"

This was not a question of whether it would be hard to have a first novel published, or that MY first novel would get published....it was just for fun. I wasn't worrying if my book would sell.

Thanks for the input though.

DeleyanLee · Aug 16, 2010

My first thought was--the first novel written or the first novel published? Not guaranteed to be the same thing at all. *shrug*

quicklime · Aug 16, 2010

randywrite said:
Hello all you agents. I was just wondering what the percentage might be for a first novel to make it big.

For example, Nicholas Sparks, The Notebook.

1% 5% 10% dare I say 20%

Thanks for your time, Randy

I get what you are saying, I think--what % first novels hit it big.

I doubt there are stats, I can discourage the hell out of you with some peripheral stats to give you an idea how bad it is

good agents: up to 6,000 submissions per year, they accept maybe three dozen, so that is less than 1%. Assume at least half of those are existing authors and most authors hit an acceptance on their third book, and you see where this is going.....

I intend to finish at least 5 books before I hit or quit, since I enjoy it I hope to go further but I also hope to beat the third book rule--hope for the best, plan for the worst.

randywrite · Aug 16, 2010

quicklime said:
I get what you are saying, I think--what % first novels hit it big.

I doubt there are stats, I can discourage the hell out of you with some peripheral stats to give you an idea how bad it is

good agents: up to 6,000 submissions per year, they accept maybe three dozen, so that is less than 1%. Assume at least half of those are existing authors and most authors hit an acceptance on their third book, and you see where this is going.....

I intend to finish at least 5 books before I hit or quit, since I enjoy it I hope to go further but I also hope to beat the third book rule--hope for the best, plan for the worst.

Nice post........hmm third one's the charm.

Jamesaritchie · Aug 16, 2010

randywrite said:
I haven't submitted anything. I just asked a question.
It's in my op. Percentages that any first novel will be a huge success. Does that clarify it for you?

First, percentages mean nothing. Write a great novel, and you'll have great success. Write a lousy novel, and you'll have no success.

But and however. It does depend on the kind of novel it is, the genre, the publishers, and other factors, but even if you mean first novels that manage to get published, you're still talking about, oh, maybe one in hundred that hit it big. If that. Not even close to this, if you mean big as in Harry Potter, Twilight, etc.

You always hear about the first novels that hit big, but who talks about the hundreds that flop, or sell just enough to make the publisher buy a second? Three out of four first novels don't even pay back the advance, let alone hit the bestselling list.

If you're talking about first novels as a whole, meaning odds of even selling your first, or your second, or your third, or your fifteenth, this, too, depends on many factors. It's easier to sell a category romance that a mystery, easier to sell a mystery than a fantasy, and easier to sell a fantasy than an SF novel, simply because the respective markets are larger, so more slots are open. But "easy" is always relative.

At a large publisher where I used to reaqd slush, the publisher bought about one out of every 2,200 queries/partials/full manuscripts that came in.

But, overall, there's roughly a one in one hundred chance of selling a novel somewhere, even if it's to a tiny publisher with no advance. Chances are selling it will not result in a huge success.

But if it were easy, anyone could do it, and what fun would that be? Again, though, percentages are meaningless. It comes down to how well you write, or, more exact, how well you tell a story, and how much readers love your characters, and the world they live in.

Writing is skill and talent based, not luck based.

Old Hack · Aug 17, 2010

Agents ask to see partials or fulls on less than 5% of the submissions that they receive.

They take on up to five new clients each year (although I know at least one agent who hasn't taken on a single new client in the last three years).

Of those new clients, perhaps half get published.

Those published books then have to fight it out with all the other books out there: the number of books published each year runs into hundreds of thousands.

There are only fifty-two weeks in a year, so only fifty-two opportunities for a book to be top of the best-seller lists. And the books which reach the top of those best-seller lists don't necessarily earn their writers a fortune: last year a writer whose name escapes me (she's on my blog somewhere but I can't find it right now) published her royalty figures for her NYT best-seller and I think she earned around $25k for it.

So, I can't offer you any percentages. But you can perhaps get an idea of how likely it is that a book will hit the big-time.

Barbara R. · Aug 17, 2010

One in a billion? As Old Hack explained, the odds each step along the way are enormous. As a former agent, I'd estimate that less than 1% of the work submitted to agents is potentially publishable (leaving aside self-publishing.) Then only a fraction of that work sells. Only a small percentage of published books are selected for review or given any support by the publisher. And of those that are reviewed and supported, only a tiny fraction become bestsellers.

So if you're thinking of getting into this business as a way to make big bucks, better invest your energy elsewhere.

quicklime · Aug 17, 2010

let's turn this around a bit:

Say an agent takes 0.25% of what they are offered. Not much, but from Barbara's post I'll guess that is somewhere in the ballpark.

ONCE AGENTED, assuming a solid agent, what are the odds of them selling the work? I know, still lots of variables, but perhaps we're getting a bit closer....and just selling, not of hitting bestseller list, getting Potter-bucks, etc., just of an agented book seeing print.

Thoughts?

If it's around 50%, then you have a (theoretical) 0.125% chance of selling--granted genre, quality of the work, etc. also means a great deal, and if you write another "The Firm" or "House of Sand and Fog" your odds are much higher than if you turn in another "Bridges of Madison County" because the quality of the work matters as well, but it gives some very rough ballpark.

Randy, I'm gonna say any way you slice it, the odds are piss-poor, but at the same time I"m enough of a numbers guy that I suspect we should be able to get some rough percentage, bearing in mind that the number means very little because this is such a case-specific matter.

I'm trying it in my spare time because I have spare time, I like to think I have a shot, and if it pans out then it could change my family's world. I can already hear the "you gotta do it for the love" and "if $$ is your measure of success you are destined to fail" crowd getting their motors started, and what they say isn't unreasonable, but I do not believe in absolutes. I'm not gonna crawl in a tub and start cutting and listening to crappy emo songs if I do not succeed, I'll take a stab and if things do not improve after say 5 novels, I just didn't make it yet and it's time to re-evaluate. If they do, even a couple sales at $10K each would be extra travel or college money.

The above being said, even if you write well, if you want extra walking around money, you would unquestionably be better off simply taking a second job bagging groceries part-time

Jamesaritchie · Aug 17, 2010

Old Hack said:
Agents ask to see partials or fulls on less than 5% of the submissions that they receive.

They take on up to five new clients each year (although I know at least one agent who hasn't taken on a single new client in the last three years).

Of those new clients, perhaps half get published.

Those published books then have to fight it out with all the other books out there: the number of books published each year runs into hundreds of thousands.

There are only fifty-two weeks in a year, so only fifty-two opportunities for a book to be top of the best-seller lists. And the books which reach the top of those best-seller lists don't necessarily earn their writers a fortune: last year a writer whose name escapes me (she's on my blog somewhere but I can't find it right now) published her royalty figures for her NYT best-seller and I think she earned around $25k for it.

So, I can't offer you any percentages. But you can perhaps get an idea of how likely it is that a book will hit the big-time.

Well, in fairness, that writer wasn't near the top of the list, her book was a probably not around for long paperback, and that 25K was early earnings. It was no indication at all of what a book at the top earns, or what a book in the top ten or fifteen earns, or even what that one might earn over time.

randywrite · Aug 17, 2010

quicklime said:
let's turn this around a bit:

Say an agent takes 0.25% of what they are offered. Not much, but from Barbara's post I'll guess that is somewhere in the ballpark.

ONCE AGENTED, assuming a solid agent, what are the odds of them selling the work? I know, still lots of variables, but perhaps we're getting a bit closer....and just selling, not of hitting bestseller list, getting Potter-buckes, etc., just of an agented book seeing print.

Thoughts?

If it's around 50%, then you have a (theoretical) 0.0125% chance of selling--granted genre, quality of the work, etc. also means a great deal, and if you write another "The Firm" or "House of Sand and Fog" your odds are much higher than if you turn in another "Bridges of Madison County" because the quality of the work matters as well, but it gives some very rough ballpark.

Randy, I'm gonna say any way you slice it, the odds are piss-poor, but at the same time I"m enough of a numbers guy that I suspect we should be able to get some rough percentage, bearing in mind that the number means very little because this is such a case-specific matter.

I'm trying it in my spare time because I have spare time, I like to think I have a shot, and if it pans out then it could change my family's world. I can already hear the "you gotta do it for the love" and "if $$ is your measure of success you are destined to fail" crowd getting their motors started, and what they say isn't unreasonable, but I do not believe in absolutes. I'm not gonna crawl in a tub and start cutting and listening to crappy emo songs if I do not succeed, I'll take a stab and if things do not improve after say 5 novels, I just didn't make it yet and it's time to re-evaluate. If they do, even a couple sales at $10K each would be extra travel or college money.

The above being said, even if you write well, if you want extra walking around money, you would unquestionably be better off simply taking a second job bagging groceries part-time

Thanks quicklime for putting a new spin on this thread. You have a positive way of looking at something bleak. I'll take that, and I'm gonna take my stab at it too.

Good stuff.

What are the percentages for first novel?

randywrite

MySky

Deleted member 42

thothguard51

A Gentleman of a refined age...

randywrite

MySky

Giant Baby

Oh, the humanity.

Ryan_Sullivan

Agented YA Writer

Deleted member 42

thothguard51

A Gentleman of a refined age...

randywrite

MySky

DeleyanLee

Writing Anarchist

quicklime

all out of fucks to give

randywrite

MySky

Jamesaritchie

Old Hack

Such a nasty woman

Barbara R.

Old Hand in the Biz

quicklime

all out of fucks to give

Jamesaritchie

randywrite

MySky