Agent Query

We are two authors who have a book idea based on two well-known premises — the “Everyone Knows Theory” and “Everyone Believes Assumption”:

Everyone knows that publicity
is more frugal than advertising.

Creative authors believe their works are difficult —
if not impossible — to promote.

We two authors want to address these two premises:

We have backgrounds in computers and publicity and also have written books in the genres most think can't be promoted well. Between us that includes a novel, a book of short stories, a memoir, and several chapbooks of poetry.

We know that promoting theses types or writing is possible and we know — firsthand — how to do it. We want to share that knowledge with other writers who not only need to know how to promote but need to understand that their “impossible to promote” genres can indeed be destined for success with.

Our book The 12-Step Program for Marketing Your Fiction (Frugally) will help authors understand that they can promote their fiction and will tell these authors exactly how to do it.

Throughout our book we will be giving specific promotion examples for:

novels
short stories
children’s books
memoirs (not strictly fiction yet also a hard-to-market genre)
screenplays
graphic novels

Because between us we have business, journalism, retailing, publicity and publishing backgrounds, we also have ideas for promoting that won't feel reheated and warmed over from other books on promotion for writers.

And we need a good agent to help us bring our book to a publisher who will make the book cook and then help us bring it to a boil.

We are Phyllis Zimbler Miller and Carolyn Howard-Johnson. And here are only a few of our credits:

Phyllis is a novelist with years of entrepreneurship and computer background to call upon. She currently heads a company that builds call-to-action websites for book authors and she’s just been chosen as the San Francisco Examiner’s LA Internet Business Examiner to write four posts a week on this subject. She is also very active in social media platforms and has several of her own blogs.

Carolyn has been an instructor for UCLA Extension's world-renown Writers' Program for the past six years and she presents at conferences throughout the USA as varied as Dayton University’s Erma Bombeck's Writers' Conference, the Sinclair Lewis Writers’ Conference and San Diego State’s Writers Conference on everything from marketing one’s book to writing better dialogue. Carolyn is also the author of the multi award-winning HowToDoItFrugally series of books for writers and has a strong following for her practical books among authors as well as in writing communities and the media.

We have prepared a detailed proposal including a sample chapter on blogging, which is already receiving positive feedback as a free download available at FictionMarketing.com, a website already in place to promote Marketing Your Fiction. And at this site you may find more of our credits.

We believe we can have this book ready for you in a year, and if you email us we will send you the private link to the download of the proposal. Or we will be happy to mail the proposal to you in hard copy.

We look forward to hearing from you soon.

Sincerely,

Carolyn Howard-Johnson Phyllis Zimbler Miller
hojonews@aol.com pzmiller@millermosaicllc.com

Writers’ Digest 100 Best Websites
California Legislature’s Woman of the Year in Arts and Entertainment
Winner USA Book News Best Books of 2004 and 2007
Winner Book Publicists of Southern California’s Irwin Award
Winner Glendale, CA’s Ethics Award for Promoting Tolerance
Honored for “literary Activism” by The Pasadena Weekly
Military Society of America’s Award for Excellence in Poetry
Pasadena Star News Women Who Make Things Happen
Reader Views Literary Award
New Generation Indie Award in Marketing
Multi-Award Winning Blogger
Semi-finalist in Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award