Tracy’s new e-book, PubSpeak: A Writer’s Dictionary of Publishing Terms is now on sale through the following retailers: Smashwords, Barnes and Noble, Amazon, and Amazon UK. Tracy writes:
Hello readers and writers of Glass Cases!
I’m very excited to be here today and host a contest for my new ebook, Pub Speak: A Writer’s Dictionary of Publishing Terms. When I wrote the book, I was envisioning an author who may have received their first contract using it to look up terms, or perhaps someone who wanted to get into the industry reading it to get a jump on the numerous other graduates competing for the same internships. I think there is a lexicon in publishing, and like many businesses, those that speak the language tend to do better than those that don’t!
Today though, we build a new lexicon – one of wit, and snark, and hopefully, pants-peeing.
It’s a Pub Speak Definition Contest and the winner will receive an electronic copy of the book, as well as my eternal admiration and probably some embarrassing congratulatory tweets. (You know you want it.)
I’ve listed six terms out of the 400 plus in the book. Choose one term – or all six – and come up with a definition in the comments section. Keep the comments limited to one definition only, but feel free to comment again choosing a different word. Only use each term once – no multiple definitions please from the same commenter, please.
Example: So if one of the terms was “advance,” your definition could be, “Advance: A figment of the writer’s imagination” or, as a second comment, “Advance: Half what you made that year at McDonalds.”
Here are the terms, good luck!
1) cheap edition
2) offer
3) work
4) novelette
5) shelf life
6) advance
Sarah and I will pick the winner and announce on Monday.
Sarah LaPolla 
Advance: Something so small even the IRS wonders why you claim it as income.
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Offer: Any personal reply from an editor or agent.
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Cheap edition: The handwritten, spiral notebook edition that one sells out of the back of his/her trunk.
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Advance: the dream of success a writer has at even the faintest nibble of interest from anyone in the publishing business.
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Shelf life: the length of time a shelf will remain standing once you start piling books on it.
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Novelette: A cute, small novel that will be dwarfed on shelves by bigger, more serious grown up novels.
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What fun! Thanks ladies.
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Advance: A pitch made by a drunk author, at a conference, that goes a little too far.
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Shelf Life: The length of time brick and mortar book stores will continue to exist, before e-publishing takes over the world, and burns all paper books like in a Bradbury novel.
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Novelette: The novella's red-headed step-child.
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Work: Something I pretend to do while I actually read publishing blogs.
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Offer: A hitman character in a mob crime novel.
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Cheap Edition: A novel written by software after I gave it a one sentence pitch.
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Novelette: the thing you self-publish so that you can be published while still not blowing your chances of debuting with an agent.
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novelette: a published work by any woman who is called “the female version” of a prominent male author
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Advance: A monetary reward for all those social gatherings you ignored in pursuit of your novel.
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Shelf Life: How long a book can be sold before it starts to stink up the place.
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Novelette: A baby novel who one day hopes to grow up to be just like their Mommy and Daddy.
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Offer: A validation of “they like me, they really like me!”
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Cheap Edition: A book that is destined for the discount rack before it even hits the shelves.
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