Hello

I'm thinking ahead here as I still have a long way to go before I have anything ready to submit to agents, but I wanted to ask people's advice on how much biographical information to include in my covering letter.

The bare facts are as follows:

- read English at university
- qualified as a lawyer and worked in the City for 7 years
- my only published writing is various technical articles in the legal press, but I've always written for pleasure
- now on maternity leave

I'm not sure what, if any, of that would be of interest to anyone. Is it still worth including a biography or should I leave it out?

Thanks in advance for any advice.

Speaking for myself, i don't include a biography, i slip any relevant information into the covering letter. But this is probably only because i haven't many writing feathers in my cap.

I would include any experience which shows you are qualified to write about your story - eg mine is set in a school and i help out in a school once a week.

Casey

Casey is absolutely write. Biographical information is just there to give the agent or publisher a clearer idea of who you are as a person, but they don't want your CV. Talk about your interests, sure, but I always tend to keep my bio brief and let the story speak for itself. I give my age, and the fact I have travelled fairly widely, in order to show that these experiences have inspired me to write. I also like to say that I intend to write for as long as I live, because it shows willing, doesn't it?

JB

I agree with JB - Keep the biography thing to a minimum and let your work do the talking for you. If they like your work, they'll want to find out more about you.

Having said that, though, I did include info that I thought might get my work read more quickly, such as a comptition I was once shirtlisted for (Vogue Young Writers - hellish experience) and the fact that I'd done an MA in Creative Writing (though there are now squillions of these babies). I also, in my later submissions, named agents who had requested the full MS, cos I wanted them to feel they were battling for me and had to read it right this minute. It worked in a couple of cases. I got instant rejections.

Sarah

Yes, I think general bio info can be pretty minimal - certainly doesn't need a separate CV until you've got lots of publishing credits. I'd include any degrees - especially any CW ones, obviously and anything else interesting: living abroad a lot, like JB, or any jobs you've had that had fed into the writing, like Casey. The bare facts of what jobs you've had are worth mentioning anyway, but you don't need the gory details of your life as a commodities trader, say, unless your novel's set in that world. It would be worth mentioning your technical writing, as it does show that you can produce professional prose to a deadline.

Don't put in anything about previous efforts at selling your work, however much we know that encouraging rejections are a mark of stepping up the ladder towards success. To them it smells of failure: if someone else rejected it, it chalks up a big minus straight away. If someone else has got the full MS at the moment, it's different, because it's only fair and professional to be honest about the situation before this agent starts reading and thinking about it.

Emma

Oh. I wasn't thinking about being fair and profesional. I was just thinking about me.

I know what you mean but the two overlap. It's worth not getting a reputation for being unprofessional...

Emma

I would hate to get a reputation for being unprofessional. A guy I knew - and never liked - when I lived in Brighton got a reputation for being difficult to work with. I can imagine why, as he is enormously arrogant. He did have some success with his first book deal (comic book, not novel - he claims there is no difference between colouring in pictures and writing novels, I disagree, but don't understand . . .), but his agent and publisher have since dropped him. Still, he seems to do alright. He's a shameless self-promoter, which might have something to do with it.

Anyway, this reputation thing confuses me as well. I think I probably already have a repuation for being unprofessional. Do you just have to be polite and sensible all the time? I know it sounds stupid, but actually, I find that very hard.

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Oooh! Actually, one positive thing I did in an attempt to get more professional was become teetotal. I know that sounds extreme, but I really can pack away the booze, and I have a terrible habit of getting on the phone/email when pissed. Althoguh I am almost never rude, I can make a terrible fool of myself, and didn't want to risk leaving a message on Virago's answerphone slurring, 'Take me on, take me on. I'm an angry young feminist.'

I guess that would be uprofessional.

Emma, what's the truth about the mythical Launch Party? Do these things actually exist?

Launch parties don't exist if your publisher can possibly help it, these days. They cost a fortune, and don't anywhere near pay themselves back in book sales, except if the author's already so famous that they can get tons of media coverage out of it. Basically, your publisher is paying for a party for you, and with margins as tight as they are on most books, that's quite a lot to ask of them.

One option is to have it in a bookshop, which seems to me an excellent compromise. Failing that, they'll often offer to pay for the wine if you want to give a party yourself. Which does assume your house is big enough, of course...

Emma

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I think the key to behaving professionally is to understand how the whole book trade thing looks from the other side, which is where books like Betsey Lerner's come in, and blogs like Miss Snark's. So often what has aspiring authors frothing at the mouth is actually the understandable outcome of the nature of the trade, and the individual idiosyncracies, not a wicked conspiracy to do you down.

And as far as polite goes, I think it's do-as-you-would-be-done-by, isn't it? Why wouldn't you?

Fundamentally, the book trade can't function without authors as a class, but none of us, individually, is irreplaceable, and that's worth remembering. Publishing a novel by an unknown is a very, very expensive gamble on you and your writing. It's worth showing you're willing to do your bit: to turn up to trade dos, talk nicely and un-condescendingly to booksellers, say the right things about your work, not say the wrong things (worth finding out from your editor what that would be) not get drunk or get off with the wrong people...

Besides being bad manners, it's silly to do as your acquaintance did. Even if someone as badly behaved as that gets a contract in the first place, s/he's that much less likely to get another. Time is money, and authors who take up a lot of time in the handling without earning the money to match it, don't show up well on the profit-and-loss accounts.

Emma

Knownowt - great name, are you from the North East?

For my twopenneth, I'd keep you bio on a separate sheet to your cover letter. Don't include photos. I did - on the advice of a publisher - I made up a whole fucking montage.

I still cringe when I think about that.

Colin M

I'm quite relieved about that launch party thing. I'm leaping ahead of myself, but I fear all that side of things.

When I said I find it hard to be polite, I really mean I find it hard to be serious all the time. I wouldn't snog the wrong people or get wankered, but it's very possible that I would say the wrong things about my work. Like, for instance, 'Why are you wasting your money on this when you could buy a pint and a packet of fags?'
My agent says I have to toughen up, but that's easy for her - I think she is actually just a cast iron structure come to life.

Emma, I think you've hit on a crucial point when you say it's worth remembering that no one is irreplaceable. A lot of successful people seem to forget that, and I guess that's what breeds arrogance/shite bahaviour.

Colin, I wouldn't worry that you made a montage. Sometimes I think we are far more unforgiving of our mistakes than other people are. And anyway, you were only doing as a publisher said, and bollocks to it, they took you on, so they probaby don't care.

Sarah

I'd say give them what they ask for in their submissions guidelines. If they ask for a CV - which some do - then give them one, but keep it brief and focus on the bits that are germain to your writing.

No, you got me wrong. The publisher was a friend who runs a small, independent press. It was his advice. The agents all rejected me - although it did keep a couple of avenues open for future submissions.

But, having said that, if you have a personal website, especially if it's got an easy to type domain name, you can always include that. And it works, because one agent who called me said she'd been there and had a look through.

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I mean, as a way of having personal pics, more detailed bio information etc.

Didn't you used to have a blog or website, Colin? I was thinking you could post up that montage for us, you know, just to give you some critical feedback

Casey

God no! It was just a sheet of about seven or eight images from family albums, but thinking back, cheesey as a cheese sandwich made with cheese flavoured bread and sprinkled with parmesan.