William Peter Blatty Quotes

I don't sign contracts for my books.

I left my job as a feature writer on a newspaper to write a book, then sent it off to a number of agents thinking they would all reject me. Within a week, most had come back to say they loved what they had read, which then led to a bidding war for my first two novels.

I don't have a publisher yet, so I'm not in the process of that next stage and I don't know what that's going to look like. So I feel like I finished stage one [with my book].

In the summer of '80, Silhouette bought my first book.

I have represented people in book deals.

I got a couple of different contacts from publishing companies saying they'd be interested in a book about my work: not a kiss-and-tell book, which I specifically put in the contract. Just a book about my work and what I did.

It used to be a lot easier to get a book deal.

Many writers will get a contract by selling chapters and outlines or something like that. I wrote the entire novel, and when it was all finished, I would give it to my agent and say, 'Well, here's a novel; sell it if you can.' And they would do that, and it was good because I never had anyone looking over my shoulder.

When I sold my first book, 'A Conspiracy of Tall Men,' it was part of a two-book deal. It wasn't hugely lucrative, but it was enough money for me to quit the paralegal job I had in San Francisco.

I sell my first book to Random House, a memoir of my years as a war photographer, for twice my NBC salary.

With 'California,' editors were reading it, and fast, and others were emailing my agent to request it. Ultimately, there were a few editors interested in the book, and it sold at auction about two weeks after the submission process started. I couldn't believe it!

I had the easiest publishing experience in the entire world. I sent out fifteen courier letters to agents, got five no replies, nine rejections and one I want to see it. A month later I had an agent. Another month later I had a three book deal with Little Brown.

I think that a really good agent should be able to get the right publisher, which the agent has already figured out, get as much money as she can from that publisher, and make a deal, rather than have the amount of money determine the sale. That's what the best agents do.

That wasn't a bad price for a first book. My agent upped it as much as possible. I was 27 and had nothing behind me. I was working like a fool to earn a living and pay for my apartment.

I sat down to try to write 'Edinburgh,' an autobiographical novel, and that took five years to write and two years to sell.

No author is a man of genius to his publisher.

Never before had I been offered a contract and advance before a word had been written... I went home and began writing 'Julie of the Wolves.'

It's very hard to get one publisher to accept an author going over to the other author's company to collaborate.

If a traditional publisher offered me a quarter of a million dollars for a novel, I'd consider it. But anything less than that, I'm sure I can do better on my own.

The trick was really finding the appropriate publisher for each of the projects I'd devised.

I got a book deal without even turning in one shred of a writing sample.

I think you have to have a publishing house that offers you some support.

Exclusive will not be published in book format.

I can ask for a £25,000 advance, but then you spend a year writing the book, and £25,000 is a loan against sales, and you can easily spend five years earning out. So that's £25,000 for six years.

But here's the thing: what you do as a screenwriter is you sell your copyright. As a novelist, as a poet, as a playwright, you maintain your copyright.