What does it mean to write a literary fiction novel? It’s tricky, because it’s not really its own genre, but people associate it with “good” or “real” writing. But here’s the problem: they don’t sell that well, which means agents and publishers aren’t really looking for them.

The difference between commercial and literary fiction (some might assume) is the quality of writing. So if you’re a great writer, you might think you simply must aim for a work of literary brilliance to be recognized and validated. But this meme also hits the mark: literary fiction, are stories where not much happens, to characters you don’t really care about.

They’re nuanced and poised and masterful, but subtle. Most readers will get bored, and critiques will hone their knives to tear your writing apart looking for flaws. As I told a friend at a bar in Lisbon a few years ago, you’re intentionally trying to write something much harder for a much smaller, and very picky, audience.

You might say, “So what! I’m not in it for the money!” But that implies that neither are your agents or publishers, which of course isn’t true: they shop for projects that will make money and your advance is a bet on future earnings. You may not care, but if your book doesn’t earn out its advance (and somewhere around 70% never do) your book might be a critical success even if nobody else will ever publish you again.

And even if it is a smashing, literary success, there’s a great chance you’ll be secretly losing money and quietly working part-time jobs to make up for losses in income. If you want a very successful, literary novel to be published, it’s going to depend on two things:

1. Your platform. This includes your peers and followers, and you should work to establish and grow both. If you’re not a people-person, or you haven’t already done something notable and recognizable (writing a book isn’t news; you have to actually do something) things may be hard to get off the ground.

2. Your writing. It *is* the case that literary fiction can be grandly successful even if the plot meanders and the characters are weak, because it’s mostly about the writing quality. That languorous feel of exotic texture, of humming life behind clever phrases. Good agents will appreciate that. But the truth is, out of every 100 literary fiction manuscripts, most of them are un-entertaining stories and there’s a thin line between flowery prose and vain, puffed-up amateurish writing.

Many, many authors who think they are writing “literary fiction” are secretly writing “bad books” with no commercial appeal, flat characters and uninspired plot events, and even if you polish them up and even if they include some really great writing, great writing alone is not enough to sell books.

Self-editing your literary fiction

What can you do about it? First, don’t assume because your book is literary fiction, that means it doesn’t have a genre or an audience; or that it doesn’t have to follow any rules; or that plotting is for formulaic BS. Tons of writing programs will critique your work and focus hard on the minutiae, but I would encourage you to look into book plotting and structure outlines.

They may feel simplistic to you, but the point is to make sure that things are actually happening. You always want to inspire towards better writing, but in *most* cases flowery prose is actually a sign of weak writing: of covering up or distracting from the fact that nothing interesting is happening. It would be so much easier to focus on improving your story itself and ask hard questions.

Don’t use outliers as excuses

The first response I usually get from “literary” authors is that so-and-so wrote the kind of book they’re trying to write and it was successful, so they will be too. Firstly, if they truly are 1 in a million, they’ve already basically done the thing. They were successful because they were first, in a way you won’t be.

But also, publishing has changed a ton even in the last few years, so if you’re using an example of someone who built their career ten or twenty or a hundred years ago, just no that the publishing opportunities they were offered literally don’t exist any more.

I’m not saying don’t write what you want to write. I am saying, it’s ridiculous to position literary fiction as the opposite of commercial fiction, and then at the same time turn your nose at popular, commercial, entertaining books and think that yours will be better even though (or because!) most readers actively enjoy it less.

This is the black-hole of hopeful artists, who assume their book will earn worldwide fame somehow EVEN IF it doesn’t sell and readers don’t like it. This maybe kind of used to be the case, if you have enough big influencers telling people your book is amazing. But in publishing, the influencer game has significantly died off. Readers buy books directly on Amazon, after reading reviews on Goodreads or hearing about it in the office.

Rather than hoping for a mountain of support, and that you’ll be discovered by a publishing team that will handle the marketing push and somehow make everything happen, you need to figure out RIGHT NOW why your book matters, who is going to read it, and why they’ll enjoy it.

You’ll need to be able to point to similar books. You’ll need a vague idea of the genre and audience. You’ll have to have an astute understanding of what that audience likes or dislikes, so that you can speak with authority not just on why you like your book; but why other people do also.

And you’ll need to start getting some beta readers early. This is tricky, because most helpful people in your life don’t read the kind of book you’re writing and wouldn’t give you objective feedback anyway. And a writing class or swapping reviews with a peer may attract want-to-be writers who will be unfairly harsh.

Remember it’s not really about the writing, it’s about the experience. Readers will either get sucked in and keep reading, or they’ll quit (people doing you a favor may persist even when it’s not enjoyable).

I’m personally a fan of self-publishing because you can do things that way you want to, but also get feedback faster. I prefer to help people launch books quickly to start getting feedback, than spend years working up to a perfect launch only to discover nobody really enjoys the story.

Some literary fiction writing tips

You can start by understanding and avoiding the egregious, common writing mistakes most authors make, and begin with the basic acceptance that great stories are about impossible quests that force a many character to grow. So if nothing else, you need a sympathetic character wrestling with a desperate challenge that is too great for them, and forced them to acknowledge or face their deeply-hidden trauma or insecurity; and that their emotions will slowly be stirred and then shaken through adversity until they lose control in a powerful way.

All the individual scenes should be leading up to that journey, but even if they’re minor, they need to be ripe with subtle conflicts and tensions; bold and interesting characters; and fresh and inspired scene descriptions.

I think I’ve written a literary novel. What now?

You most likely have a very clean, very well-written book, that just doesn’t really have a reason for existing. How will people pitch it or talk about it; why is it relevant; why is it necessary; how does it shine a light on real-life personal or societal issues that people have deep emotions about but aren’t being exposed? Is it just a personal biography about some interesting events in your life? How can it be more?

You’ll probably need to clean up a great deal of telling versus showing, by asking “what does this look like” or “who is saying this” to make sure you’re staying in an active scene with unresolved conflict (or it won’t have any tension). And you’ll probably want to stagger twists and reveals to make sure there’s a satisfying payout at the end that makes all the content seem worthwhile and necessary.

Since the market for this “genre” is so competitive, your book needs to be so much more than “clean” – but you’ve only got a few pages to lure in prospective readers, so choosing where to start and having a story with intrigue is important.

If you’d like some quick feedback on the first 5000 words, feel free to check out our Sudden Death/first chapter critique service.