pitch decks for novels

a new trend?

On October 23, Publishers Marketplace reported on a new trend: some querying novelists are posting short, visual pitch decks for agents to discover on X. Shardai Smith, a horror novelist who also works in book marketing, started the trend in March. Here’s another example.

Although this trend seems to be catching on with genre novelists who can quickly pitch their projects using tropes (“cozy fantasy”, “grumpy x sunshine”), it caught my attention because I did something similar six months ago, to sell my sixth book.

I am cursed (and blessed) with being ahead of my time.

If you’ve been reading my newsletter for more than five minutes, you know that I’m obsessed with figuring out actual tactics authors can use to stand out in a crowded marketplace. And I mean stand out at every stage of the process: from getting discovered by an agent, to getting acquired by an editor, to getting chosen by readers across the country.

After my first submission round for my gothic TikTok novel was unsuccessful, I paused to revise the entire novel. To increase my chances of selling the book, I also hired a gen Z graphic designer to make a pitch deck for my novel, applying everything I’ve learned over the past ten years about what makes a successful non-fiction book proposal.

I naively thought my TikTok novel would be an easy sell, but going through the submission process made me realize how few book editors know anything about TikTok culture. They just aren’t on the app—their marketing staff is. To me, this is like thinking TV is a passing fad in 1952. I had to find a way to hold their hand through the portal, and also demonstrate my unique strengths in positioning and marketing the book.

After the paywall, I’ll show you pages from the actual pitch deck I created earlier this year.