{"id":1945,"date":"2013-06-12T17:07:07","date_gmt":"2013-06-12T21:07:07","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/heather-maclean.com\/?page_id=1945"},"modified":"2016-03-21T16:01:55","modified_gmt":"2016-03-21T16:01:55","slug":"how-to-write-a-non-fiction-book-proposalsample-chapters","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"http:\/\/www.heather-maclean.com\/heathermacleancooks\/how-to-write-a-non-fiction-book-proposalsample-chapters\/","title":{"rendered":"How To Write a Non-Fiction Book Proposal<\/u><\/font><\/a>
Sample Chapters"},"content":{"rendered":"

Ideally, you want to include 3 sample chapters: the first 2, and a random, later chapter like Chapter 7 or something. This is where you will set the tone, writing style, and voice of your book. The sample chapters you send should represent the very best your book will offer!<\/p>\n

No one expects you to be a designer or professional photographer, but any extra flavor you add to your sample chapters will help the reader understand your vision. If you’re writing a non-fiction book, you are declaring yourself an expert on that topic. Prove it with well-researched and interesting additions.
\n\"Memo\"<\/a>
\nFor the Mad Men<\/em> Cookbook, my idea was to have secretary Joan Harris collect favorite recipes from the office staff. Since they’re busy ad men, I tied it into a fictional ad campaign pitch. To begin the sample chapters, I included a memo from Bert Cooper to the staff. I created fake letterhead, and typed the message in a mid-century font and layout. I then printed it, hole punched it, added a coffee mug stain, and scribbled secretarial writing on it. I scanned that in, shrunk it, and added a photo of a 1960s pen and the cover of “The Art of War” (Bert’s favorite book) from that era. In a single page, I set up the conceit of the cookbook, showed I was intimately familiar with the characters and the time period, and gave a glimpse into the fun layout I had envisioned.<\/p>\n

Don’t go crazy with the layout throughout however. Publishers read a lot and they need to be able to read the bulk of your book unimpeded. When I want to show a side bar break-out box, I simply put it in a light gray rectangle. I know the book designer will use different colors and fonts, but I’m just trying to visually break it up.<\/p>\n

If you add photographs — either your own or stock photography — make sure you are inserting them correctly into your document. A single graphic grabbed off the Internet and pasted into Word can make your proposal staggeringly big. No one wants to open a document that’s 4 MB when it should be only 200 kb. Worse, a company’s email servers might reject it for having too large an attachment. If you don’t know how to check the size of your document or import compressed images, find a 12 year-old and pay them $5 to help you.<\/p>\n

Of course, make sure your sample chapters are correctly formatted and without a single error. Before you send your proposal to anyone, run it by a couple of different sets of eyes, including a Beta Reader<\/a>. <\/p>\n

That’s it! You’re done! Now go find yourself an agent.<\/p>\n

>> GO TO: How to Get An Agent<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Ideally, you want to include 3 sample chapters: the first 2, and a random, later chapter like Chapter 7 or something. This is where you will set the tone, writing style, and voice of your book. The sample chapters you… Continue Reading →<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"parent":0,"menu_order":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","template":"","meta":{"footnotes":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.heather-maclean.com\/heathermacleancooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1945"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.heather-maclean.com\/heathermacleancooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.heather-maclean.com\/heathermacleancooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/page"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.heather-maclean.com\/heathermacleancooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.heather-maclean.com\/heathermacleancooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1945"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"http:\/\/www.heather-maclean.com\/heathermacleancooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1945\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3261,"href":"http:\/\/www.heather-maclean.com\/heathermacleancooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/pages\/1945\/revisions\/3261"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.heather-maclean.com\/heathermacleancooks\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1945"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}