Author Submissions
Harpeth Road is looking for authors who are leaders and share our innovative and forward-thinking mindset. We want authors who are eager to learn, willing to roll up their sleeves, implement the most current approaches to marketing, and work with us as a team to build their author platforms and produce excellent writing.
Established authors, we’ll give you the latest in best practice to take your brand to the next level. New authors, we’ll prepare you for what it takes to be a bestseller and to get your books in front of readers. We offer lessons with up-to-the-minute research on topics such as your author brand, professional headshots, bio, editing, and social media to name a few. We’ll teach you everything you need to know, every step of the way. Ready? The journey starts right here.
What are we looking for?
Harpeth Road is a publisher of women’s fiction, contemporary romance, historical romance, and southern fiction. Our books all contain a love story, a strong conflict between the main characters, and an emotionally satisfying ending. We’re specifically looking for novels with light sensuality.
The main characters in our books are either strong characters or they find their strength along the way. These characters all have an arc—a learning curve—as they move through the pages, and there is a central conflict keeping our couples apart that, preferably, spans both internal and external conflicts.
Our settings are captivating, interesting locations that make the reader want to dive in and stay a while. They can be small-town and rural to lavish and upscale.
Our Overarching Goal:
Even though we’re small, we want to compete in quality with the best. With strong author education and top-notch editing, we will strive to take you and your story as far as it can go.
Pitches:
Pitches should be for finished manuscripts, ranging between 65,000 and 90,000 words in length. (If you’re a little under or over, we’ll still take a look.) We’re looking for authors who are willing to work hand-in-hand with us to create their platforms and produce jaw-dropping stories.
What will you get as a Harpeth Road author?
Every HR author will receive a production schedule that details every step of the process up to publication so you know in advance what will happen.
After the first novel, each author we take on will receive one-on-one synopsis/manuscript feedback conversations for new novels, to get your stories just right before you jump onto the page.
Authors will receive top-notch editing with industry superstars. We provide a developmental/structural edit, a line edit, a copyedit, and a proofread before the book goes to market.
All HR authors will have exclusive access to our Author Portal, where you will have everything you need for the entire publishing process at your fingertips.
All HR authors will receive lessons on best practices so you can do what it takes to make your book a success. We’ll teach you about subjects such as headshots and bios, how to maintain the best author websites, social media etiquette and which platforms to use, and how to maximize sites such as Author Central and Goodreads, to name a few.
We provide all our authors with marketing ideas, info about blog tours and launch schedule so that they can sit back, pop the bubbly, and enjoy their publication day without a worry.
The guidelines at Harpeth Road are simple: Send us a great story. If we love it, we’ll let you know.
(We focus all our attention on our prospective authors and, therefore, cannot always respond personally to every query at this time. If we feel your story could fit our list, we’ll be in touch.)