After I created the outline for my book, the next step was to writing the proposal. I have scouted out some publishers to query. The one I’m most interested in wants not just a query letter but an entire proposal package.
So far, I have written about a third of the proposal, including the overview, and an analysis of the competition and the market. I did a little research to come up with relevant statistics for my target market, and incorporated the numbers into my rationale for the book.
In the course of writing this, I’ve had to re-do my outline twice. I took out an entire chapter, after I realized that one of the books already in the market has discussed the topic in its own chapter. I also made the introduction into its own chapter, just to make a nice round of 10 chapters for the book.
Of course, a proposed outline isn’t set in stone. I have no doubt that some things I will include now might have to be removed, and I might also have to add some topics that I can’t foresee for now.
My goal is to finish the first complete draft of the proposal by next week, and send it out maybe a week after that. I don’t want this idea to sit for long. I think the book is timely, and stands a good chance of getting noticed (I’m optimistic, can’t you tell?).
