Tag Archives: Publishing

Comic Book Publishing

On my last post I made note that I don’t actually know anything about the world of Comic Book publication. So I went ahead and looked into how it works. For self-publishing, I think it’s pretty standard, you write the thing and then publish. You need to market it and do all the things, find an audience and market the comic to that audience. But for traditional publishing you write a pitch or synopsis and send that in along with some sample art. Which I was wrong about not doing your own art. Apparently that is more just in Kid lit.

photograph of a purple background
Photo by Artem Podrez on Pexels.com

This article has some really great tips about how to publish comic books/graphic novels: https://www.woodmanmaynard.com/blog/2025/9/29/5-tips-for-breaking-into-graphic-novel-publishing.

A couple of the important tips from the article are:

  • Look at comics that are similar to your own. Target those publishers.
  • Only submit to agents and publishers that already like and publish the type of work that you do.
    • That tip above applies across the board to any kind of written work.
  • Publishing timelines run long, so start working on your next project before you get published.
    • This last tip also applies to any kind of publishing with written work, unless you are self-publishing because you know your own timelines and can start working on your next project whenever you want.

So to sum it up, for publishing, you don’t need to have written the whole comic. You need a synopsis and some of the art. You need to target agents and publishers who are looking for work that you are writing and then you can start the process before you’ve finished your story.

Next in the write what you love series, we will talk about game narrative.

Historical Fiction: What are the Publishing Requirements?

Historical fiction has special rules. Because of this, you’ll need to ask yourself a couple questions when you first decide to write in this genre. The first question would be if you are writing far enough in the past to be considered historical. The answer to that question, which I found here; is you need to be writing at least 50 years in the past.

Photo by Digital Buggu

The second question, which is a bit more complicated, is does your work fit in another genre? Sometimes you are telling a story that’s really literary fiction, just set in the past, or maybe it’s really women’s literature, again just set in the past. If the thing that the story is about is how the people in that time lived and worked, and of course there is a story there–then it’s historical fiction. But, if the story is really about how the words cascade like a waterfall down the page, how they live and breathe for themselves; then it’s probably literary. Or if it’s about a woman who would not give up no matter the odds, then it may be a women’s literature piece. Or, if it’s really more about the romance than anything, well… I mean, I think you get it. You probably get it.

Another thing about the historical novel, is the readers are very picky about the details. So, you have to do your research and get it right. Whatever timeframe you are writing in, it has to be accurate. It’s very easy now to read something that you think may not be exactly correctly and then check it, so you, as a writer in the genre, has to be better at checking everything than your readers could ever dream of being.

Photo by Marco Cassé

Let’s talk word count. For Historical fiction, the length is a bit longer, they come in around 100,000 to 150,000. Take that however it makes you feel.

Thanks for reading about historical fiction requirements. If you are looking for information on a different genre, check out literary, kid lit and Religious publishing requirements. There will be more information to come on the other genres shortly. Thanks!