The Manuscript Works Newsletter

Essential knowledge on scholarly book publishing that every author should have

What are the odds your book proposal will get rejected?

Hello reader,

Before I get into today’s newsletter discussion about proposal rejection rates, I wanted to quickly share that my annual 5-day challenge, Find the Perfect-Fit Publisher for Your Scholarly Book, starts on Monday. It's free to sign up, and anyone who is thinking of publishing a scholarly book in the future is welcome to join.

You can go ahead and sign up now or you can finish reading today’s newsletter first, which will tell you more about why it’s so important to get the fit right when approaching publishers.

A big part of my job is answering questions from prospective authors about the scholarly book publishing process. When I do institutional workshops or host Q&As for writers going through my programs, it’s not too dissimilar to playing in a game of Jeopardy! I never know in advance exactly what the questions will be, but I have to be prepared to answer almost everything that comes my way.

Some author questions come up over and over. Want to know what happens if you miss a publishing deadline? Are you weighing the pros and cons of an advance contract? Trying to figure out which chapters you should submit as your writing sample and how long they should be?

I’ve got answers to those questions at my fingertips (follow the links above to be taken to my FAQ archive, or check out my whole archive directory to see if another question that’s on your mind has been addressed).

But once in a while I get a question I can’t answer, and often it’s because there truly is no answer or at least not a satisfying one. Here’s one that comes up from time to time (and that I was asked by an author via email a few weeks ago):

What is the rejection rate for scholarly book proposals?

The answer is: I don’t know and neither does anyone else. There are a few reasons why.

The first comes down to semantics. When talking about “rejection” we might be talking about immediate rejections, the kind that happen when an acquiring editor quickly sees that the project is not a fit for their press and would not be worth expending any labor to consider further. We might be talking about a rejection after peer review. In this case, the editor will see a potential fit between the book proposed and their press, and thus invest some labor and resources in soliciting peer reviewers to comment on the merit of the project. But then the peer reviewers may advise against publication, or other stakeholders at the press may decide the book isn’t worth pursuing for some reason. Then there are the proposals that are “accepted” but the book never materializes because the writer doesn’t submit a full manuscript or the full manuscript is rejected by the press’s editorial board. We would be talking about different sets of numbers depending on which kinds of rejections we want to include.

The second reason I can’t provide a rejection rate for book proposals is that the data is mostly not collected, and if it is collected by specific editors or presses, they aren’t publicizing it. (If you are an editor or other publishing professional reading this who does track acceptance rates and wants to share, please let me know!)

Part of the reason this data would likely not be made public is that it requires so much context to be usefully interpreted that it’s probably not helpful to share. Again, I go back to the different kinds of rejections I enumerated above. For example, I’d guess that high-profile university presses receive a very large volume of proposals that are really not at all aligned with what that press publishes. Imagine a random person wants to write their life story but doesn’t know much about publishing so they send a proposal for a personal memoir off to 100 presses. They’ve heard of Harvard and Oxford so they send their proposal to Harvard UP and Oxford UP, even though these presses don't typically publish personal memoir. This probably happens at smaller, less well-known presses too. These kinds of random submissions take up room editors’ inboxes, and they will most likely be rejected, but they aren’t really meaningful when considering how competitive it is to publish at a particular press.

It’s also important to understand that publishers have specialties. They may be rejecting well-conceived proposals from serious scholars because those scholars haven’t done their homework to make sure the audience their book is written for aligns with the audiences the press is able to reach.

That alignment between project, audience, and press is the biggest factor that will lead to an editor wanting to find out more about your book or not. If you put some effort into getting the alignment right before you contact editors, chances are you will make it past the inbox at least. Your book still might not be offered a contract (for a variety of reasons) but your book proposal will at least get some sincere consideration.

This is what I would tell someone who wanted to know about acceptance and rejection rates of book proposals. Your book is not necessarily more likely to get rejected by a press with a low acceptance rate, so that’s not what I would be thinking about when embarking upon the submission process.

Your best path to “beating the odds” is to pick the right presses for your subject matter, approach, and intended readership. And of course, to put in the work to write a book proposal that makes the strongest case possible for your book to be published by that press. I can tell you that the success rate for my clients who have taken these steps before submitting their proposals is near 100%.

Want a little guidance on how to pick the right presses and increase your chances of acceptance? Next week I’m again hosting my annual 5-day challenge, Find the Perfect-Fit Publisher for Your Scholarly Book. It’s completely free to participate, and you’ll leave with a short list of the most promising presses for your book project.

You’ll also get clarity on your personal and professional goals, which will help you determine what’s important to you when picking a publisher. My mission at Manuscript Works is to help scholarly reclaim a sense of agency in the book publishing process, and it starts with deciding who you want to partner with, rather than assuming you’ll have to take any publisher who’ll have you.

If this sounds good to you, you can sign up for the challenge here! Tell your friends! I’ll see you next week!

Also coming up at Manuscript Works

Free resources

Worksheets for The Book Proposal Book ​Get worksheets and a checklist to support you as you use The Book Proposal Book →​

How to Publish a Book from Your Dissertation ​Get a webinar recording and revision checklist for your book manuscript in progress →​

How to Work with a Developmental Editor ​Get a webinar recording and custom referrals to editors in my network →​

More support

Manuscript Works Author Support is a private hub for ongoing support in your scholarly book publishing journey. Inside this community you'll get honest advice about publishers, peer review, offers and contracts, as well as join live Q&A sessions with Laura Portwood-Stacer and your fellow Manuscript Works authors. This community is open to alums of the Manuscript Works Book Proposal Accelerator and Book Proposal Shortcut for Busy Scholars. Find out more →

If you have a friend, colleague, or student who might enjoy the Manuscript Works Newsletter, could you forward it to them and let them know that they can subscribe at newsletter.manuscriptworks.com? They'll get a discount code for The Book Proposal Book as a thank-you for signing up. Thanks for reading and sharing!

See you next week,

Laura Portwood-Stacer ​Manuscript Works​

113 Cherry St #92768, Seattle, WA 98104-2205
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