How possible is it to get a booke published if you're a young girl? I really want to be an author and I want to book published so bad! Thanks for your help!

Hi, mossface!

How old are you and what kind of things have you already written, please? It would be helpful to us here to know about those things in order to help you the best.

Thanks!

yea, I'm 12, I've written random stuff. My whole family thinks I'm good and think I should become an author! Why do you want to know?

One of my favorite statements about writing is contained in W. S. Merwin's poem "Berryman", in which the poet as a young man receives some good advice from an older and wiser poet:

"... as for publishing he advised me
To paper my wall with rejection slips...

I had hardly begun to read
I asked how can you ever be sure
That what you write is really
Any good at all and he said you can't

You can't you can never be sure
You die without knowing
Whether anything you wrote was any good
If you have to be sure don't write... "

Note that Merwin writes, "I had hardly begun to read", not "I had hardly begun to write". My advice to you is: read, read, read; read the great works of literature and learn from them; focus on your craft, and stop worrying about publishing. If you're good, you might be published some day. And even so, you might never be published. People write because their passion compels them to write, not because they really want to be published. If the passion isn't there, you won't succeed. Publishing is just a nice extra.

Finally, you need to know grammar, spelling, and proper punctuation like the back of your hand. You can then choose to subvert them, but only when you know how to use them properly. It's "I've", not "I've"; "you're", not "your"; "want to", not "want to"; "thanks", not "thanks"; and "know", not "kno". Discipline yourself to write correctly. IMspeak can lead to very bad habits that will creep into your serious writing.

You can try to get self-published through Lulu-but you would want your writing to be ran through spell check in Word. Perhaps you can get some of your stories published it kids/teen magazines?(ie;American Girl,etc)

You can get started with a portfolio at this age, but I high doubt that at this tender age you would get published by a big publishing company.

Good luck!

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Originally Posted by mossface

yea, im 12, ive written random stuff. my whole family thinks im good and think i should become an author! why do you wanna kno?

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Hi, mossface!

I wanted to know, because knowing the age and experience of the person asking the question can really make a difference in the way the answers are given.

Thanks!

Find out about publishers and email them. Ask if they can read it even if its only for constructive critism. I'm sure they'd be happy to. You may as well find as many as you can, no hurt in trying.

You'd be surprised how many newspapers and magazines will take a regular column from a young writer who can give an insight into how young girls think. If you do this, you'll get paid, and you'll get valuable experience. You'll also get a reputation as someone who can deliver what she promises, which makes a huge difference if you are pitching a book to a publisher.

For what it's worth, I just got an e-mail from a publisher (a real one, which pays money) asking me to consider writing some non-fiction for them. They get lots of people wanting to write fiction, but are in crying need of competent writers to do biographies and how-to books.