Finding good comps is harder than I expected. Comps (short for comparable titles) is an important step in the post-writing / marketing / selling phase. The phases I love…not one bit. If you’re going the traditional publish route comps serve as a quick pitch for potential agents / publishers and even bookstores to know where your book should live on the shelf. They help identify the market your book should be pushed toward and / or provide some insight into style, genre, feel, or general vibe of your story. I wrote an espionage / sci-fi / techno-thriller. This should be easy, right? It’s Tom Clancy meets Ready Player One, or maybe it’s War Games meets The Night Agent. Staying away from the big titles like the Harry Potters (and probably Ready Player One) is recommended. Going too old with something like War Games is fine, but pairing it with something contemporary helps. In the early stages of writing I had a few ideas for comps, but less so for the selling aspect and more as a guide for myself in how I wanted the story to feel. Although HOST isn’t heavy in sci-fi, I enjoyed Ready Player One and it’s flow and pacing. I get technical, but not at the level of a Tom Clancy or many other procedural thrillers. War Games, the film, was a major blueprint for how I wanted to the story to play out. I also wanted that ’70s and ’80s Robert Redford, Gene Hackman, espionage / spy thriller film feel like The Conversation or Sneakers. Of course, there’s the flip side of searching for comps. That moment you run into a book that is eerily like your own and you start doubting if your story should be told. Spoilers: it should. In the latest Writer Syndrome episode we dive into comps, how we used them and originality in writing.
Categories: Podcast
