Shooting the Shit About Your Deepest and Darkest Book Money Questions PART TWO

Summary

Podcast Summary: “Shooting the Shit About Your Deepest and Darkest Book Money Questions PART TWO”

Podcast: The Shit No One Tells You About Writing
Hosts: Bianca Marais, Carly Watters, CeCe Lyra
Air Date: January 5, 2026
Episode Focus: Money & the Business Side of Writing – Advances, Royalties, Agent Finances, Publisher Decisions, Marketing Money, and more.

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Episode Overview

This lively and candid episode continues the hosts’ deep dive into the nitty-gritty of money in publishing, answering real listener questions about advances, royalties, agent compensation, multi-book deals, marketing budgets, celebrity endorsements, and industry trends. The hosts, two veteran literary agents (Carly Watters and CeCe Lyra), pull back the curtain on financial realities for authors, sharing personal anecdotes and industry wisdom with honesty and a sense of humor. Emerging writers get practical advice and a better understanding of where the money goes (or doesn’t).

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. How and When Does Money Flow After Signing a Publishing Deal?

(04:16–08:03)

• Misconceptions About Timing:
  • Many first-time authors believe money arrives quickly after a deal. In reality, delays are standard—advance payments are split into several installments (signing, delivery & acceptance of edits, publication, sometimes even later).
    • CeCe: “The biggest misconception might be how much time everything takes... You get paid the first installment after the contract is signed, but that can take a long time.” (04:41)
  • Sometimes advances are paid in “fourths” or even “fifths” (one payment a year after publication or after the trade paperback).
• Delivery & Acceptance:
  • Carly: “People really focus on that first word—delivery... but the second is acceptance. Acceptance means the publisher has accepted your manuscript after all edits—sometimes months after delivery.” (06:26)
  • Payment schedules vary widely and can cause significant financial uncertainty for authors.

2. Why Isn’t Advance Money Held in Escrow?

(08:03–08:45)

• CeCe’s Wish: Advance money is kept by publishers (who earn interest on it) rather than being put in escrow for authors’ benefit.
  • Quote: “I've always wished we could have an escrow situation like that—it's always bugged me. The money should be in escrow earning interest for the author.” (08:03)
• Reality: Not enough bargaining power on the author’s side; unlikely to happen.

3. Big Money Deals—The Taylor Jenkins Reid Question

(09:06–10:45)

• Ethics & Privacy: Carly declines to comment on the specifics of a famous author’s deal out of respect and professional confidentiality.
  • Quote: “I feel very protective of her. She is a famous person... out of respect I am not going to talk about her.” (09:33)

4. Are Two-Book Deals Better Than One-Book?

(10:45–15:26)

• It Depends:
  • CeCe: “A lot of writers hear ‘two-book deal’ and think that is superior...that’s not how it works necessarily.” (10:52)
  • Downsides include being locked in at a set price if you break out, or being required to deliver again to a publisher you may not want to stick with (e.g., if your editor leaves).
  • Sometimes publishers cancel the second book if the first underperforms—rare, but possible.
  • Some writers find the “guaranteed” contract comforting, especially after a stressful debut.
• Strategic Considerations:
  • Multi-book deals often make sense for series, but not always for standalones or uncertain publisher relationships.
• Joint vs. Separate Accounting:
  • Carly: “Joint accounting is when the entire advance is a bucket for all titles in the deal—you don’t get royalties until the whole amount is earned out... Separate accounting means each book is responsible for itself. Generally, separate accounting is better for most authors.” (14:18)

5. Agent Money: How Long Before an Agent Earns a Living?

(16:00–18:12)

• Agent Timeline:
  • Carly began agenting in 2010; didn’t sell her first book until 2011; initial years brought little or no income.
  • Growth can “double” fast if successful, but remains unpredictable due to publishing’s payment structures.
    • Carly: “I made $0 year one, maybe $0 year two... then $10K, then $20K, then $40K, then $70K, then $140K. It honestly doubled for a while.” (16:00)

6. Do Celebrities Get Paid to Endorse Books? The Anne Hathaway Example

(18:18–21:01)

• Behind the Scenes:
  • Anne Hathaway promoted a debut novel, but that’s because she’s starring in and producing the adaptation—not because the publisher paid her to endorse.
    • Carly: “It’s not that Penguin paid Anne to do it. Anne Hathaway wants this book to do really well because she’s producing the movie.” (18:32)
• Industry Takeaway:
  • Publishing decisions and publicity sometimes look mysterious/outlandish from the outside, but often make sense within a larger business ecosystem.

7. How Much Should Debut Authors Spend on PR/Marketing?

(23:06–27:16)

• Budget Realities:
  • PR campaigns for book launches can cost $10,000–$20,000 for a “really active campaign.”
  • Authors need to decide what’s effective—randomly spending a bit here and there usually won’t move the needle.
    • Carly: “If you want to hire PR, set aside a percentage of your advance... These campaigns are expensive. You only launch your debut once.” (23:18)
  • Talk with your agent/publisher about what they will or won't provide, and be strategic.
• Financial Privilege:
  • CeCe: “If you are able to think of the advance as money to reinvest in your business, that’s a good thing... but it absolutely gives a leg up to those with financial privilege. That is reality.” (26:01)

8. Is It Delusional to Believe Your Book Has Million-Dollar Potential?

(27:16–30:29)

• Faced With Statistics:
  • Most books/authors do not make millions—but every book could, theoretically.
    • CeCe: “If by ‘potential’ you mean it’s possible, then, no, you’re not delusional… If you mean ‘it for sure will happen,’ then probably, yes.” (27:40)
  • Fortune sometimes does favor the bold—some delusional people do succeed, and some fail spectacularly.

9. Do Advances Trend Based on Genre Popularity?

(30:29–34:23)

• Market Forces:
  • Advances are driven by competition, current trends, and genre popularity—but also publisher-specific factors.
    • Carly: “Generally what advances depend on most is competition. If there’s a lot of interest, that drives the advance up.” (30:44)
• Subjectivity:
  • Publisher’s perception of a book (lead title or not?) greatly influences the offer.
  • Wide disparities possible in auctions because of these subjective assessments.
    • CeCe: “Publishers love their backlist that they didn’t pay a lot for when the book does well.” (32:16)

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Money Flow Timing:
  • CeCe Lira (04:41): “The misconception is that once you accept an offer, you can count on money coming in. It takes a long time…”
• On Advance Installments Escrow:
  • CeCe Lira (08:03): “I always wish we could have an escrow situation. That money should be in escrow, earning interest for the author.”
• On Two-Book Deals:
  • CeCe Lira (10:52): “Two is not necessarily superior to one in this context. It is actually one of those situations where… it depends.”
  • Carly Watters (14:18): “Joint accounting—such a sexy topic. Joint accounting is when in a two-book deal... you don’t get royalties until you’ve earned out the entire lump sum.”
• On PR/Marketing Spend:
  • Carly Watters (23:18): “Have a real focus. Don’t just throw money around…these campaigns can be $10,000–$20,000...”
  • CeCe Lira (26:01): “Financial privilege often leads to more success. That is so unfair. And it’s also so reality. Not talking about it doesn’t help.”
• On Million-Dollar Books:
  • CeCe Lira (27:40): “Every book has million-dollar potential… If you’re thinking ‘I will for sure make a million dollars’, then most likely, yes, you are being delusional. But fortune favors the bold.”

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Important Timestamps

• [04:16] – Advances: installments, timing, misconceptions
• [06:26] – Delivery & acceptance: what they really mean for payments
• [08:03] – CeCe’s escrow rant
• [09:06] – Big deals (Taylor Jenkins Reid) & agent ethics
• [10:52] – The truth about 2-book deals
• [14:05] – Joint vs. separate accounting
• [16:00] – An agent’s first salary: how long it takes
• [18:32] – Celebrity endorsements and marketing investments
• [23:18] – Real numbers on PR/marketing budgets
• [26:01] – Privilege and success in publishing
• [27:40] – Is million-dollar book success reasonable?
• [30:44] – Do advances trend based on genre/popularity?
• [32:16] – How subjective publisher perceptions shape deals

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Episode Tone and Takeaways

The hosts remain honest, no-nonsense, and encouraging—but never sugarcoat tough financial realities. They blend practical advice with industry gossip and hard-learned lessons, all while keeping the tone light, funny, and accessible. The big message: Knowledge is power, publishing money is never simple or fair, but asking questions and arming yourself with information helps.

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Useful For:

• Writers (especially debuts) confused about advances, royalties, and publishing finances
• Anyone wondering about the business side of being a literary agent
• Writers considering how (and if) to invest in their own book marketing
• Creatives seeking transparency about publishing industry deals and pitfalls

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End of Summary

Transcript

[Bianca]

Hi there. We've got a lot we're really excited to tell you about, but I'm going to make this real quick so you can get to the episode. The Deep Dive is coming up at the end of January. The lineup of speakers is incredible and the range of topics is mind blowing. You do not want to miss out on the last Deep dive ever. Then the beta reader matchup is open once again, with the matchups going out early in February. Sign up to kick your creative year off with a bang. Lastly, there's an amazing writer's workbook available which will make the perfect gift for you or the writer in your life. Head to our website the Shit About Writing to find out more.

[Intro Announcer]

Welcome to another episode of Shooting the.

[Carly Waters]

Shit with Literary Agents Carly Waters and Cece Lira where we dissect publishing gossip, discuss book industry trends, and the overall state of the book business. If you've ever wanted to grab a coffee with two literary agents, grab your mug and pull up a chair. All right, welcome back to our part two of our Money episode. If I could sing, I would sing that like money, money, money, money. That type of song would be our little like theme song for this one. So this is part two. Who knows, maybe we'll have a part three someday. If you guys still have burning questions. But I hope this is a series of episodes that you guys can kind of come back to or bookmark or find a way to to save so that you have access to all this good information. Because this is one of those super curiosity inducing topics and we're going to kind of go through a new series of questions on things like advances and royalties and marketing and can writing be a job and business questions and all of that sort of stuff and how agenting works from a financial point of view. If you are listening to this and you haven't listened to part one of our Money series, you can go back two weeks and you'll see it as our Shooting the Shit bonus episode two weeks ago and you can refer back to it. You don't have to have listened to that episode to enjoy this episode. But if you want to listen to both, that is where we are answering all of your questions about money and Happy New Year, everybody. Speaking of of money and a happy New Year, I think yeah, we should. I don't have a coffee in front of me. I just have like my little Stanley mug to cheers everybody with. But Happy New Year.

[Cece Lira]

Happy New Year. The happiest of New Year's. May it be a wonderful year for everyone. Filled with Good health and good surprises.

[Carly Waters]

Absolutely. And as you guys know, these episodes come out on Mondays. And if you are a substack subscriber, you will be getting one of our Tuesday editions, which is one of our subscriber editions tomorrow. And just a couple things to look out for. Bianca thought it would be fun to share our baby pictures. Our co host baby pictures for you guys to think about or figure out who is who. So I'm looking forward to you guys, I don't know, just trying to figure out who is who. Cece, do you think they're gonna have trouble figuring it out?

[Cece Lira]

It's gonna be the easiest thing ever. Like, this is such. I'm sorry, but this silly idea, like, the sharing the baby picture is adorable, but, like, you're gonna know instantly who's who. No one's going to have even, like, even, like, a shred of doubt, okay? I promise. It is the most obvious thing in the world. Fine. Yes. Oh, my gosh. So hard. Like, like, no. Everyone's gonna know.

[Carly Waters]

Okay, well, if you want to see us cute, cute babies, you will see them in the subscriber issue tomorrow, so definitely check those out. Our newsletter crew also put together a compendium of all the Q and A's that we've done over the years, which our paid subscribers can now download and refer to at any time. This is, like, possibly hundreds of hours of content. I'm going to be honest with you guys, so definitely make sure you go check that out.

[Cece Lira]

I'm so excited for that one, because now whenever someone asks me a question, I can go, hi. Go look at our compendium of Q and A's. I'm going to say that we also have an excellent essay written by Mickey Yashinsky, author of Adventures of Max Spitzkopf, the Yiddish Sherlock Holme, about the art of eavesdropping. I'm a big eavesdropper. I have so much fun. Like, I love eating by myself in places because I'm always eavesdropping to people's conversations, and I look like I'm not. I look like I'm busy writing away, but I'm not. I'm listening it, so this sounds exciting to me. And then we have an essay by Taylor Huton, author of Axe and Grind, about tossing narrative curveballs. I don't know anything about tossing balls, but narrative curveball sounds interesting to me.

[Carly Waters]

There you go. So some fun things to check out in our substack tomorrow. Okay, well, let's jump back into our money questions now. We've tackled A number of questions already. So, again, refer back to those. But we're going to. I'm going to throw to cece with another question here, and I'm going to throw to her. For writers early in their careers, what is the biggest misconception about how money actually flows after signing a publishing deal?

[Cece Lira]

I think the biggest. Okay, the biggest. I think the biggest misconception might be how much time everything takes. So, for example, let's imagine that you get an offer, like, you got an agent. Yay, agent. Submitted your project.

[Bianca]

Yay.

[Cece Lira]

You got an offer. All the gays, you accept an offer. And then there's the contract negotiation. Let me tell you, that can take a long time. Sometimes it doesn't. Sometimes it's fast. Nothing in publishing is fast. But, yeah, you. You get paid. Like, the first installment of your advance typically gets paid after the contract is signed. Which brings me to probably the second biggest misconception I have had. Multiple people. And these, in fairness, there's like, publishing newbies, which is fine. We all were publishing newbies at one point or another. Be like, oh, my advance. So I get it in advance. Actually, these days, advances are broken up in installments, right? So, like, first installment, when you sign, second installment, when you deliver all the edits and changes, and that's accepted. And then third installment, when your book is published. But speaking of curveballs, from our newsletter, there are publishers. I'm not going to call out names. And who started this? Penguin Random House, who started paying in fourths? And sometimes you get an extra. Not an extra, but, like, sometimes this is split up into fourths. And then the fourth installment happens one year after publication or when the trade paperback comes out. And I've also heard of people. I've never actually experienced this myself, but I've heard of people trying to get away with fifths. Anyway, what I'm getting at is that the misconception is once you accept an offer, you can count on money coming in. And it takes a long time, you know? And once you start earning royalties, that takes a long time, too. Royalty season. It's not like you're making money every month unless you sign with an Amazon imprint, which I'm just getting confused now, so I'll stop talking.

[Carly Waters]

One thing I wanted to add about this. In terms of biggest misconceptions, one of the things I find, and CC's obviously all correct in everything she said, is the. The concept of delivery and acceptance. So cece touched on that second payment there, which. So the first is on signing. So that means that Means both parties signing, counter signature, getting processed through the system. The money being sent to the agency, agency sent so sends the money to the author. But the second payment is the delivery and acceptance payment. And so people really focus on that first word delivery. The author's like, hey, I handed in my manuscript, you know, where's my check? Delivery and acceptance. Acceptance means. And the definition of this also varies between publisher. But acceptance means that the publisher has accepted all of the edit. So you've gone back and forth through the full editorial process. Some publishers hold on to this money until the book is like fully transmitted. You know, the copy edits are done, then they send the money. I prefer obviously, you know, the DNA payment to come when the structural edits are done. I think that's fair. The author has done their part. The copy edits is the publisher's job. Obviously the author has to approve those. But I don't think acceptance should be on copy edits. I think it should be on the developmental edit. So anyway, but so authors will think, hey, you know, I've delivered my manuscript today. The day of recording is December 17th. You know, I'll get my money in a couple days. But then again, your editing process can take weeks, it can take months, right? You don't know how much this back and forth is going to take to get to that point, right? Manuscript and the publisher is trying to make you work for it, right? That's why they're holding onto this payment. They want to make sure that you're holding up your end of the bargain. So, yeah, so anyway, that, that delivery and acceptance piece I find a bit of a misconception because authors sometimes think I delivered versus is the book accepted?

[Cece Lira]

And we didn't get this question. But what you just said now reminded me of if I had a magic wand and I could wave the magic wand, what is something I would do? Like, I'm not saying this would be the top thing I would do, but something that's always bugged me is how publishers, they keep the advance money and they don't have to put it an escrow where it's earning interest for the author, right? Like they're just keeping the money and they're earning interest on it themselves. And that's always bothered me and I always wish we could have an escrow situation like that that would make me so happy. I know it's probably never going to happen because there is not enough bargaining power on the author side to make that happen again. Oligopsony. But it's always bugged Me, like, always bugged me. I'm like, that money should be an escrow. It should be earning interest for the author.

[Carly Waters]

Yeah, yeah, this is a very valid point. We should have a whole episode of what Cece and I think should be changed in publishing. We should write.

[Cece Lira]

That would be a very fun episode and it would bring me a lot of joy because we would get to like, live in our imagination land for a full hour and that would be wonderful.

[Carly Waters]

I'm writing that right down right now so that we don't forget. I'm writing that down as a future episode idea.

[Cece Lira]

Alrighty. Let me now pick a question for you. I'm not sure if you can answer this, so I'm reading from the question. I'm not sure if you can answer this because she was a previous client of yours, but can you discuss Taylor Jenkins Reid's 40 million five book deal with Simon and Schuster? What does this mean for publishing industry slash writers? How much would an agent make on a deal like this? Thank you. So Carly has graciously agreed to address this question.

[Carly Waters]

I totally understand why you were asking this question, of course. So I'm not going to like properly address this question, but I do want to talk about. Yes, she was my client for five years. We worked together over the course of five books. And, you know, we still have a working relationship. And one of the reasons that I don't talk about her, I just, I want to talk about maybe why I don't talk about her, because I get requests, I get media requests from very large publications asking me for quotes about her, about her early career. I actually decline them. And the reason is she is a famous person, you know, and I feel a great deal of like, protection and respect for her. And, you know, we don't work together actively on current and future projects, but we actually have a continuing working relationship because of the books that I sold for her and the sub rates that the agency continues to sell for her. So we do still have a working relationship. So I feel very protective of her. She is a famous person, so I am not going to talk about her out of respect for her. And yeah, you know, we, as I said, we still kind of work together in that capacity. So that's kind of why I don't talk about her. So I just kind of want to talk about why I don't. Why I don't talk about her. So hopefully that, that. I don't know if that answers anybody's questions, but.

[Cece Lira]

But yeah, I like that. Thank you for sharing that with us.

[Carly Waters]

All Right, let's move to a question for Cece. Do you think a two book deal is a good financial choice?

[Cece Lira]

Okay, this is where the publishing is institutionalized gambling bit comes in. Okay, I want to first start off by saying a lot of authors, a lot of writers hear two book deal and think that is superior to a one book deal because two is more than one. I have two cookies, not just one. That is not how it works necessarily. Two is not necessarily superior to one in this context. It is actually one of those situations where, I'm sorry, I feel like we can probably play a drinking game every time I say it depends. You guys drink. Okay, I'm going to drink water.

[Carly Waters]

It depends.

[Cece Lira]

It depends. Because it's important to note that if you do have a two book deal, just because you have that in your contract does not mean that the publisher is going to invest in the way that you would want them to in the second book. They, in certain cases, this is rare, but it happens even sometimes cancel the second book. You don't have to pay back the advance that was given, but they might even cancel it if the first book doesn't sell well, if it doesn't do well. It's. If an issue happens. Again, this is rare, but a lot of people think too, like, I kind of have like a guarantee. And that brings us to the question of do you want a guarantee? Yes. If you accept a two book deal, you are tied to that imprint for two books. But that means that a, you're already pricing your second book. So if your first book does incredibly well, you've already sold your second book for the amount that you've sold it for. Like, you can't leverage that. You can't be like, hey, excuse me.

[Intro Announcer]

We need more money.

[Cece Lira]

Now another piece of this is if you don't like the working relationship with the publisher for whatever reason, including what happens a lot the editor might have left, you no longer have the option of going to someone else for that second book. Right. Like, that's something that's also a really important piece. Another thing to consider is you might be someone who like enjoys the stability and the guarantee of a second book. I have heard not from a client, from an author who's a lovely, lovely author. She was saying, after my first book came out, I was so terrified because all of a sudden I started like, your book becomes a product. It was out in the world that if I didn't have the contractual obligation to deliver a second book by X date, I wouldn't have written. That's her take on it. So that was something that was very comforting for her. So anyway, my point is it really depends on the situation. There are situations where I look at a two book deal and I have said this to clients and I say, hey, I personally don't think a two book deal is right in this case for these reasons. These reasons being anything, anything that's super specific to my client. And sometimes I go, this actually makes a lot of sense, a two book deal with this publisher. And this is good. And it's always the client's decision. My job is never to decide, it is always to advise. But it is so case specific that it depends. How do you feel, Carly?

[Carly Waters]

Oh yeah, I'm the same. I mean often you'll see this more for series anyway, right, where it's like there's kind of a reason to continue this and if there's going to be a number of books in the series, then it makes sense to just do larger contracts. So you're not like re upping these contracts constantly. Like just from a logistical point of view, but from a strategic point of view. Everything Cece said was correct, right? You want to be able to leverage things when you can. And you never want to get yourself into a situation where you're like, oh, I wish that I had have leveraged this and so on and so forth. The other thing, I don't think that you'd mentioned this cc so I'll jump on. It is just like the joint accounting versus separate accounting.

[Cece Lira]

I knew you were going to talk about joint accounting. I was like, Carly's going to talk about joint accounting. 5, 4, 3, 2. And then Carly mentions joint accounting. Such a sexy topic. Such a sexy topic like joint accounting.

[Carly Waters]

Oh, can't help myself. Gets me fired up. So joint accounting is when in a two book deal or multi book deal that the bucket of the whole advance refers to all of the titles under that contract. And so you don't get royalties until you've earned out the entire lump sum. And it could take one book or two book or three books to kind of get through that. That lump sum separate accounting is when each book is accountable to itself. And so the advance, there's an advance, you know, for that one, an advance for the second book and the third book and so on and so forth so that it feels more equitable because you know, you want to make sure if book one does earn out, then it is only responsible for itself. So again, there's lots of different theories and strategies about it. Generally separate accounting makes more sense. For most authors. And I think most agents feel that way. And yeah, so anyway, that kind of comes into play. So some publishers might say, yeah, we'll give you a two book offer, but it's going to be joint accounting. And then it's like it's their way of kind of protecting themselves and hedging their own bets because they're accounting these two projects together and so they don't have to account them separately, which for them is kind of like mitigating some risk where, you know, it's really just something in my opinion that serves the publisher and not the author.

[Cece Lira]

And I agree with that assessment. It's just again, one more way in which the publisher is potentially getting like the better end of the deal. So, yeah, as agents we always, we typically, I should say we typically fight for there to be separate account. I am going to ask a question to Carly and this is going to be under the agent money bucket. Carly, how long after you became an agent did you see your first check from a client book? And how long until it turned into a good salary?

[Carly Waters]

This is a great question. So this requires me kind of mostly going back in my memory because I do have all of this kind of documented, but I didn't go through my old spreadsheets. But I will just again be very frank about my recollection of everything. So I became an agent in 2010. I didn't sign, I didn't sell a book until 2011. So that was a whole year of not selling anything. And then when I sold that, then again I sold one book and that advance was split up in three parts. And so, you know, again, took a while to obviously for all that to build up. So I, when I kind of recount this again, I don't have the paperwork up front, but when I recount these memories, I'm like, okay, I made like $0 year 1. I potentially made $0 a year too because like again, we have to negotiate the contract and then you get that advance. So we're talking like, you know, a small amount. And then I, the way that again, the way I recount it is like, okay, then I make 10,000. And then is when the extrapolation starts to happen. I make 10, that I made 20, then I made 40, then I made 70, and then I made 140. Do you know what I mean? Like, so that's when like the doubling starts to happen and I'm, it honestly doubled for a while. You know, it's that ability to like sell the books. And then I worked on a lot of books that earned royalties, which was a huge help. And so I wasn't just relying on, you know, advances. It was like, okay, when royalty season happened. And generally it's kind of spring and fall, but for each public publisher, it's slightly different. So then you start to get some cash flow start to happen that will, you know, fill in all of these. These gaps. And then you start to kind of be able to call it. Call it a salary or call it a career, you know, in a way that kind of made sense. But it was a lot of money management of, okay, this is when a lump sum is going to come in, and this has to last until then. And it's really hard in this business to. To kind of know when payments are ever going to come in because, as I say, with like, delivery and acceptance, I don't know when the book is going to be accepted or I don't know when this contract is going to be finished. And so you know, that learning how to cash flow that at a really early young age, because I've said this before, but I started agenting when I was like, 22. I think I had my own list by the time I was 22. So I've just done this from a very young age. And so, yeah, it taught me a lot of good money management skills.

[Cece Lira]

For sure. For sure. I love that. And I love that. Thank you for sharing. Do you want me to read the next one?

[Carly Waters]

Sure. Yeah. What do we got next?

[Cece Lira]

Okay, so I'm going to read one from Business Questions. How much do you think Penguin spent on getting Anne Hathaway to promote a debut novel, yesteryear? I'm not crazy for thinking this is crazy, right? Lol.

[Carly Waters]

Okay. I love this question because this speaks to so many things that I love to talk about. So I think this person saw Anne Hathaway, or, you know, maybe they follow her on social media and they see, oh, my gosh, a celebrity is promoting a book, a novel. What does that mean? What this person doesn't know is that Anne Hathaway is starring in this movie, right? And so as a publishing person, I know this. And so I think, okay, this book hasn't come out yet. What Anne Hathaway is doing as a producer, I believe she's a producer as well as a producer. She wants this book to do really well. Because if this book does really well, then it creates more of a mobilized grassroots fan base. And again, this book is set up to do quite well. But now we have this, like, grassroots fan base and oh, Anne Hathaway's talking about this and we, we build and build and build. And so this is also a way for Anne Hathaway to provide some insurance on the movie that she's making about this. So that's why you're seeing it's not that Penguin paid Anne to do it and actually wants this book to sell a lot of copies because if it does, then that helps her movie. So I just wanted to, I thought that was a great question because it just kind of speaks to the inner workings behind the scene about how all these things are connected.

[Cece Lira]

It's, it's skin in the game, right? Like it's skin in the game. That's why like I, again, this is a totally separate situation. But I still remember my mother in law whom I adore spending, I think it was Christmas with us here. And she was like, oh my gosh, did you see that? Obama is, is narrating a really cute documentary about the ocean. And isn't that so nice of him to do that? And I was like, mom, it was actually my husband, My husband was like, mom, of course it's nice of him to do it. He seems like a really nice guy. But like he's doing it because he has skin in the game. Like his production company is the one that produced the documentary. That's the reason. So I think it's really easy for our brains to be like, publishing paid this person X amount of money. And sometimes, yeah, I mean we've seen, we've seen some questionable marketing investments. But yeah, I actually remember this is so much fun. When I went, when was this? I'm pretty sure this was in my, when I, I don't remember, but I, I visited Jenny, Jenny Jackson, the editor of, of yesteryear, who's also an author, by the way. If you guys, guys haven't read her book, you should. She was telling me about yesteryear. She was telling me about like this book that she had upcoming. This was a long time ago. She was so excited about it. And I remember thinking like, oh my God, I really want to read this book because of the way that she was like so passionate about it. So, you know, remember that like there's always, there's always drivers of a book success that happen even before the Anne Hathaways of the world come into the equation.

[Carly Waters]

Definitely. All right. And with that we are going to take a break for our sponsors.

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[Carly Waters]

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[Carly Waters]

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[Carly Waters]

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[Cece Lira]

Okay, I want to ask Carly a business question from our listeners. How much should a debut author consider spending for marketing, PR support and help?

[Carly Waters]

Oh, this is a good question. So the way that I like to frame this is twofold. I usually say to a client or anybody asking, you know this advance money is your money. I'm not presuming to know your financial situation. You might need to take that Money and pay off debt. You might need to take that money and take a sabbatical from work. You know, they're. It's your. It's your funds, basically. But a lot of authors will say, again, what. What should I do? And so I will try to say, you know, is there a percentage that you think that you can set aside from this to help with these matters? And it could be, you know, a percentage of the entire advance. It could be a percentage of a certain section of the advance. Because the other thing is a lot of these marketing PR kind of companies, if you're going to hire them, they want to be hired about a year in advance of the book coming out. So you kind of got to think, okay, of this first chunk, the signing part of the money. Can I take some of that money? And so generally, these companies charge for a pretty active campaign, let's say kind of like four to six months. They're probably going to charge anywhere between kind of like 10 and $20,000, which is a quite a large amount of money. And especially for a lot of authors who maybe are debuts or they kind of. They don't know how this industry functions and what this money is supposed to be for. And, you know, how this kind of flows and works. It can obviously feel like a lot of money, because it is a lot of money. But you're hiring somebody to do a job, right? You're hiring somebody that's kind of the concept. And so some authors will think, oh, can I just take $500 here and throw it there? And I'm like, well, what are we doing with that $500 or thousand dollars? Right? Because there are, you know, a lot of people who advertise, like, I can do a blog tour for you or all these other things, and you really have to think about what's going to move the needle. So it's not so much a matter of, can I just take some money and do something with it? It's all about having a plan for that. So do you want to hire somebody to do a podcast tour for you? That's an active thing where it's like, oh, I want to do a podcast tour. These are the companies that can get me on podcasts. Or I want to do a speaking tour, right? It's like, I just think it's really important to have a real strong focus on what you want to do. Or this company has a great reputation for serious nonfiction, getting in more literary magazines. Okay? That's what I want. So to me, it's not so Much like I have some money, what do I do with it? It's what is my plan, what are some gaps, what are some opportunities, and what is the amount of money that stuff like that costs? And I'll be honest with you, it's quite a bit of money. So do without what you will. But remember, you only launch your debut once. So just have really active conversations with your agent and your publisher about what potentially some of those gaps might be and if you want to fill those or supplement those and work together as a team. Because that's the thing, you all want to be rowing in the same direction, especially if you're hiring a third party a hundred percent.

[Cece Lira]

I think that, I don't know, I kind of want to touch on this and it's not a, it's not a fun thing to say. For anyone who is able to think of the advance money as money that you will reinvest into the business you've created, that is a good thing. It doesn't mean any guarantees. It's really important to understand that. But that is a good thing. And if anyone's listening to this and thinking, cc, that sounds super unfair because that means that people with financial privilege have a leg up. That is exactly what it means. In this capitalist society, having that financial privilege can often give you a leg up. In many instances, everything from you have money to, I don't know, higher meal prep services so you can have more time to write to. This big thing like financial privilege affects every single aspect of being an author and oftentimes does lead to more success because you are able to buy back your time, because you're able to invest in, in pr, because you're able to invest in many, many ways. And that is so unfair. And it's also so reality. This is reality and not talking about it doesn't help. So if you are able to look at your advance as money that you are going to use to invest in your business, if you are able to do that, it's something that is advisable, I would say, in general.

[Carly Waters]

All right, next question. I want to throw to cece because it's kind of fun. We can both answer it. This person said, am I being delusional for so fully believing my story has million dollar potential? I'm a marketing strategist, so I look at everything as investment, performance, audience opportunity. But the negative stories on author monies are making me wonder if I'm being too optimistic in this world or scares chance.

[Cece Lira]

Are you being delusional? I think this depends on what you mean by million dollar potential? If you think about it, every book has million dollar potential. Like every book could earn the author a million dollars. Every book could earn a million dollars to the publisher. Every book could. Right. It just depends on whether readers will respond to that in that way. And that is not a meritocracy. So much of it is discoverability. So if you're thinking it has potential, no, you're not being delusional, because every book does, and your book is a book. If you're thinking I will for sure make a million dollars off this story really fast, then most likely, yes, you are being delusional. Although it's possible you're not, but most likely, yes, you are. I think that it's important to remember that in life, like, you would never, you would never go into a new job, right. Without first studying what salaries are paid. You want to be an accountant, you want to be, I don't know, archaeologist. Like, you would research. What do most people make? What is the average salary? Like what, what companies are hiring? What's the job market? Like, you would research all these things. And so a huge thing that authors need to do is kind of research, like, hey, are most authors able to work to make, to make a living off their books if they have one or two books? No, most authors are not. Some are, but most are not. And so if by that you mean, like, for sure, then yes, delusional. And if by that you mean it could happen, then no, not delusional. I will add though, like, I have seen delusional people skyrocket because fortune favors the bold. Let's just be honest. I have seen delusional people achieve so much success in their lives, and I have seen delusional people really crash and burn and not be successful at all. Because fortune favors the bold, but so does failure. Failure also favors the bold. It can go either way. I genuinely think that it depends on whether you're able to look at your own talent. You're able to understand how the marketplace works. You're able to understand the hard work that goes into it. It is not a stable career, I'm telling you right now. Stability. No, it's not. But it is a career with, with, with, with million potential, for sure.

[Carly Waters]

One thing I also want to talk about is this idea of like, million dollar potential. Because you could mean a million dollar. Like, I think this person's alluding to the idea of like, is this a million dollar deal? But they said million dollar potential. And so there are a lot of books that earn A million dollars in their lifetime. Because books can be around for a very long time. And if they're a steady seller that sell year on year and they to kind of like, you know, come up with different trends, it's something that's not necessarily topical, that's evergreen. There's a lot of books that earn a million dollars over the course of their lifetime or even authors that, you know, earned a million dollars over their lifetime. So I think this person means like a million dollar advance. But yeah, it's, it's totally possible to work on million dollar ideas. Both of us work on million dollar ideas all the time.

[Cece Lira]

Yeah, exactly. And, and that's what makes our job so exciting. I mean, it's part of what makes our job so exciting. Okay, question that I'm going to throw to Carly and we'll both talk about do advances trend based on genre popularity?

[Carly Waters]

All right, so these are kind of two separate things. Genre and popularity are obviously different, but I think what they're trying, this question is probably trying to get at is do advances trend? Right. Like what are the things that make advances trend? Or what are some more popular buckets than others and that sort of thing. So yes, advances do depend on genre and popularity and sometimes the combination of the two. Generally what advances depend on the most is competition. Right. And so I think the heart of it is competition because with an advanced situation for a debut, right. So if we're potentially going to sell something and there's a lot of interest for it, then that, you know, drives up the interest for it and kind of drives up the advance based on the market conditions. So yes, I would say advances trend based on genre and popularity. Another way to think of it is, you know, again, categories that are doing really well, publishers want to kind of continue to invest in those because that's a, you know, a diversification of their allotment of all the different imprints and they're going to focus on the things to reinvest in the imprints that are continuing to do well. So there's that like imprint investment advances do depend on so many things and also authors and where they're at in their career. Right. If somebody is kind of proving book on book that they are continuing to sell a lot of copies and kind of again, rise in that category, then yeah, that advance is going to trend up. So it makes a lot of sense, you know, and I think this person knows that, right. That if somebody is selling a lot of copies, they're going to get a higher advance. If a category is Moving a lot of copies, it's going to get a higher advance because that's where the market concentration is. Yeah.

[Cece Lira]

I also think it's important to note, because this is a really interesting discussion, that because of the subjective nature of publishing, and that includes how subjectively publishers can see the positioning of a book, advances can vary widely in an auction. Sometimes they don't. Sometimes you see that all the publishers see that book positioned in the same way. But, you know, we've all. All agents have been involved in auction situations where you get one offer for 300, another offer for 350, another offer for 370, and then one offer for $50,000, and you're like, this person's out to lunch, you know, And I've also seen situations where it's like everyone in the same level and then one person offering like, like hundreds of thousands more, you know, like, it. It does vary. And part of what, you know, the publisher's job at the end of the day. And, and this is not a secret. I'm not spilling industry secrets here. But it's to protect the publisher. Right. Like, editors are. Editors love authors, and I'm so grateful for editors, but editors are like one person within a big, big institutional machine. Their job is to offer as much money as they think they can offer to get you. They don't want to overpay you. That is not in their best interest. Why would it be? You know, like, if they can get a book for less money, that's a good thing for them. I still remember this was. Was this last year? No. No, it wasn't. So Simon and Schuster had, like, a virtual roundtable around my birthday. So it was in June, and it was via Zoom, and I had to catch up the recording because it actually happened. I'm pretty sure it was during the day of Bianca's launch, which is why I couldn't watch Live. Okay. But, you know, one of the things they talked about is how much they love their. Their backlist that they didn't pay a lot for, you know, and they talk about this openly, not in a mean way, but they talk about, hey, it's really great when we can buy a book for not very much money, and that book does really well and makes everyone money, us, the author, etc. So remember, when you. When you're looking at advances. And advances do vary, but one of the variables is actually how a publisher sees it. You know, like, how, like, do they see that as a lead title? Do they see this as a X or Y, a Z? Like that that also influences it a lot.

[Carly Waters]

All right, guys, well, we hope we kind of covered as many of the hot topics that you wanted to cover. Those were the buckets of questions that came in. That was what was asked. We really enjoyed this topic. So maybe we'll do a, I don't know, a part three in the future. But that that's kind of our wrap for today. So we're so excited to kick off 2026 with you guys and lots of more shooting the shit topics to come. I wrote down a number of ideas based on some of the spinoff conversations that we've had today. So thank you guys for tuning in. Thank you.

[Cece Lira]

Bye.

[Bianca]

Cece Lira is a literary agent at Wendy's Sherman Associates. If you'd like to query CC, please refer to the submission [e-mail]. carly Waters is a literary agent at P.S. literary Agency, but her work on this podcast is not affiliated with the agency and the views expressed by Carly on this podcast are solely that of her as a podcast co host and do not necessarily reflect the views, opinions, policies or position of PS Literary Agency. Hi there. We've got a lot we're really excited to tell you about, but I'm going to make this real quick so you can get to the episode. The Deep Dive is coming up at the end of January. The lineup of speakers is incredible and the range of topics is mind blowing. You do not want to miss out on the last Deep Dive ever. Then the Beta Reader Matchup is open once again, with the matchups going out early in February. Sign up to kick your creative year off with a bang. Lastly, there's an amazing writer's workbook available which will make the perfect gift for you or the writer in your life. Head to our website the Shit About Writing to find out more.