What it's like to be 'On Sub'

Find what it's like to be on sub, the emotional roller coaster and useful resources

Oct 12, 2024

Hello and Welcome to the Writer Story

We have officially reached 200 subs on this little substack which I started on a crazy whim. Yay!! You all are absolutely amazing!

Next week, I have an amazing author interview that I’m really excited about. She had one of the buzziest books releasing this fall, that is also part of the Publisher’s Marketplace Buzz Books. So stay tuned for that next week and make sure to subscribe if you haven’t yet.

Today we are talking about Life On Sub.

For people who don’t know what ‘On Sub’ means— It is a trad pub term when your agent shops around your manuscript to editors at publishing houses.

I know a lot of people here are pre-querying or querying stage, so I am hoping this will give you a picture of what lies ahead in the trad pub journey.

So, you have got an agent, and you have put your head together to edit your book to its best possible state.

Now is the time to prepare for going On Sub. Your agent gathers list of editors, you both discuss on the sub strategy and your agent sends out your book. Then you can yell out on all your social media that you’re officially ‘On Sub’. Note - If you have questions on sub strategy, read this post by the wonderful Author/Agent

Jenna Satterthwaite

Okay, so now that you’re On Sub, what’s its like.

Great question!!

It feels like you oscillate between two ends of the the spectrum.

First, you are building dream castles of getting your book deal, finding your perfect editor, publishing your book, going on tours, all full shebang.

Second, you anxiety-biting your already bloody nails, imagining your book lying on the editors slush email folder, kicked down to the interns who trash your manuscript after reading the first page, and the editors eventually ghost your agent as your book crashes and burns along with your self-confidence.

Well… yeah.. that pretty much summarises what being On Sub feels like.

But let’s keep the emotions aside and be pragmatic about it. Because I’m sure you must have heard it that you need to treat your author career like a business.

While editors have your book in their inboxes, what should you be doing?

Everyone says, write something else, which is absolutely sound advice. But know that you don’t have to. You can if you want, but if you want to take a break that’s fine too.

Here are some other things you can do.

You can take a vacation, because trust me you need it after going through the writing and editing and querying and more editing. You earned it.
You can binge watch TV or movie and get up to speed with whatever is in your To Watch List .. (exactly what I’m doing now. Bingeing the last season of Ted Lasso.)
Read through your ever increasing TBR. (Reading The Bandit Queens by Parini Shroff, and Happily Never After by Lynn Painter)
You can find a new hobby to dive into. Could be anything— baking, painting, graphics, chocheting, have a baby(seriously you’ll forget all about sub if you do)
You can learn something new, like take classes — dance, improv, yoga, water aerobics, rowing, tennis, coding, whatever interests you.

Basically do all you can to forget about being On Sub. You did all you want and now you just need to forget about it. If it sells, that’s all well and good. If it doesn’t (sorry to say but it’s always a chance), it’s not the end of the world.

I have been On Sub for two weeks now, and I have successfully been able to forget all about sub. The first week and a half were brutal really, nail biting brutal. Crazed Email refreshing brutal. But now I have settled down with my emotions and I feel so much better about it now.

During this process, make sure you and your agent are on the same page, supporting each other and working towards the same goal and communicating effectively. Having the support of people On Sub is super helpful too.

Here are a few resources for people On Sub.

Another thing about being On Sub is dealing with rejections. When editors read your book, most of them will reject. Could be absolutely any reason — not connecting, their list full, similar books already on list, scheduling conflict, market slowing in the genre or any million other reasons.

Understand that rejections don’t say anything about your quality of writing. If you were able to go past the initial querying hurdle and secure an agent (a reputed agent, or a new agent from a strong agency, who knows what they are talking about. Be warned there are lot of schmagents too who will only waste your time) your writing is definitely publishable. But whether this is the book that will get past the trad pub hurdle, well only time will tell.

Here’s some pep talk about handling rejections.

If you have any other questions, put down in the comments, and I’ll try my best to share whatever info I know.

The Writer Story

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