I am in the same position you might have been ten-ish years ago. I have several fantasy novels under my belt. I don’t feel like I’m good enough to be published yet, though that is the dream. Do you have a recommendation as to when I should start sending stuff out? After I finish college? When I’ve written a million words (I’m chugging along at around 550,000 at the moment)? After I’ve written a book that’s at least a “7” on the scale of awesome that runs from zero to Knife of Dreams ?
If you have finished several novels, then it’s time to go ahead and start sending things out. Many artists never quite feel that we’re ready–we feel that the next book will be better, and we should wait until that one is done.
My suggestion: Take your most recent book, sit on it for six months while you work on something else. Then either workshop the book you set aside (if you like to workshop) or do one last draft. Then start sending it out. The worst that will happen is it will get rejected. Keep sending it out until you have gone to all of the major publishers, then decide if you want to go to the small presses.)
(Note, this is advice to those who prefer to publish traditionally, which I still think is viable. However, self publishing is also quite viable these days. I’ll probably talk about that in another reply.) Also, keep in mind doing research about publishers, not just sending blindly. (I’ll probably talk about this elsewhere too.)
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