Written by Viktoria Filipova
If you’ve found your way to the Triggerhub’s website, the chances are you have a manuscript you’d like to share with the world. How you have found us – be it through social media, recommendations, or simply by Googling – is a minor detail. What really brought you here is what you have written. So, how do we decide whether or not you’d be a fit for our list?
Cherish Editions’ dedicated team works hard every single year to publish the best of the best in the industry and maintain our excellent reputation as a specialist publisher, together with our parent company, Trigger Publishing. For this reason, we are selective about what we take on; you might see us describe our books as “selected” and “handpicked” quite often.
Whilst at this point you may be torn between clicking ‘submit’ or burning your pages like Kafka did (or doing the modern equivalent – shutting your computer down!), the team at Cherish Editions wants to help you feel confident about pressing that button. Here are the three main qualities that we look for as we consider books for publication, so that you can ensure your work is ready to be submitted:
- Relevance
We are a specialist publisher of mental health books, as well as anything to do with personal development, growth and mental wellbeing. We know that it is both hard and easy to feel relevant when writing about mental health, because each person perceives their struggles differently. You, as a writer, need to ask yourself how you can make your story relevant to a wide audience. If you can accomplish this, and your manuscript touches on some of our specialist areas, then we will be happy to read it!
- Written Quality
We ensure that everything we publish is up to the highest standard in terms of both written quality and its message. However, you may wish to consult with someone who knows writing but doesn’t know your story (a writing group or community, perhaps). They can objectively check whether your message comes through in the way you want it to. We will offer that kind of constructive criticism to you as well.
You must find the perfect balance between your creative spirit/desire to tell your story, and your practical side, which ensures the book is finished to a high standard. This is the kind of writing we are looking for – and, with a quality manuscript, we can help you polish it further. Even if we don’t feel that it’s publishable in its raw state, if we think it has potential, we’ll be likely to sign it.
- Author Following
Most of our authors are mental health advocates and that’s one of the reasons we are highly motivated to sign them. It’s important to us that you have started to build your own network of followers before you submit your manuscript, as this means you will already have the foundation to build an even larger audience, rather than having to start from scratch. For us, it is always great to partner with people who already act to spread awareness or have inspired a movement or change even before they come to us for publication. This way, we know that they will be able to help us in our mission to highlight the importance of mental health acceptance and inspire others who need reassurance on their own journeys. That’s not to say that if you don’t have a large following, you shouldn’t get in touch – if the desire to promote your book, and our charity, is there, we can help you with the hard work!
Share your Story with Cherish Editions!
Self-publishing may challenge your confidence, but it will also inspire you to conquer your self-doubt. Remember: there’s no such thing as a textbook that can cover all experiences relating to mental health, nor is there a single story that can share the ultimate secret to everybody’s recovery. The topic of mental health is inexhaustible and what’s important is not that you share as much as you can, but that your book can touch everybody who reads it, and inspire them to keep going.
In the end, if you think that you meet our criteria and have something in mind: be it fiction, poetry, a gift book, a picture book, self-help and/or an idea for a memoir… or even better – if you have it down on paper already – we are ready to cherish it and publish it for the world to see.
