The Basics: The Essential (and Secret) Strategy to Land a Book Deal
If you walk into a bookstore with a problem you want solved, you are not looking for a blurry mix of someone’s life story, a few tips, and a sprinkle of inspiration. You’re looking for something clear: “self‑help,” “business,” “parenting,” “health.” If your book doesn’t fit cleanly on one of those shelves, it’s going to be very hard to sell — no matter how good your idea is.
That’s the central issue this episode tackles:
What category should your traditional nonfiction book be in — and why does that matter so much if you want a big book deal?
Stop Trying to Write a “Prescriptive Memoir”
It’s happened more than once: an author referral comes in, and buried in the email are two dreaded words—“prescriptive memoir.” Meghan’s response? A hard no.
Here’s why:
A prescriptive book is a how‑to: it exists to solve a reader’s problem with clear advice or a step‑by‑step approach.
A memoir is a true, story‑driven account of your life or someone else’s, told for insight, reflection, or emotional impact.
Trying to combine both into one category creates a book that is hard to shelve and hard to find. As a reader, you’re rarely walking into a store thinking, “I want a deep personal story and a practical manual in the same volume.” You want one or the other.
When you mash those together, you create a simple problem:
Where does the book go in the bookstore?
If no one — editor, sales rep, bookstore buyer, or reader — knows which shelf it belongs on, it becomes invisible. Category is about making it easy for the right reader to find your book.
Fiction vs. Nonfiction (Start With the Big Fork in the Road)
First, you have to answer the most basic question:
Do you write fiction (made‑up stories like novels, YA, children’s books)?
Or nonfiction (true or based in truth)?
This podcast is explicitly not about fiction. Meghan focuses on nonfiction, and more specifically on prescriptive nonfiction for entrepreneurs and experts.
Within nonfiction, there are four broad categories:
Lifestyle
Reference
Narrative
Prescriptive
While Meghan doesn’t work on the first three, understanding them helps you avoid mislabeling your project.
Understand the Nonfiction Landscape (So You Don’t Mis‑Categorize Your Book)
Lifestyle
Lifestyle books are often:
Cookbooks
Food and beverage books
Beautiful, often full‑color, “coffee table” style books
They’re the kind of book you might buy in a cute vacation shop along with a gorgeous dish towel — expensive, visually driven, and meant to be browsed as much as read.
Reference
Reference books are:
Straightforward, information‑heavy guides on niche topics
The type of book you dip into when you need an answer, not something you read cover to cover
Think: “how to do your laundry” from a fancy dry cleaner, or a guide to what your houseplants are trying to tell you when they turn brown. They exist to be referenced, not lived with as a narrative.
Narrative
Narrative nonfiction is:
Story‑based: memoirs, biographies, anthologies, history, pop culture, social issues
Anything that reads like a novel but is grounded in real life
Politics, current affairs, science, tech, sports, and true crime often live here. If it’s primarily a story, not a how‑to, it’s narrative.
Meghan doesn’t work on lifestyle, reference, or narrative. Her focus — and probably yours, if you’re an entrepreneur or expert who wants to solve a problem — is the fourth category.
Prescriptive Nonfiction – The Category Entrepreneurs Should Care About
Prescriptive nonfiction is:
Self‑help and how‑to: books that offer a solution or “prescription” for a reader’s problem.
If you want to write a book that:
Helps readers change their money habits
Grow or lead a business
Improve their relationships
Navigate parenting, health, or major life transitions
… then you’re almost certainly writing prescriptive nonfiction.
Within prescriptive, Meghan points to several sub‑categories:
Advice / Relationships / Self‑Help
Love, dating, marriage, friendship, family dynamics, personal development.Body, Mind, Spirit
Meditation, spirituality, “woo,” oracle decks, death and grief, mediums, psychics, paranormal topics.Business
Leadership, entrepreneurship, business growth and strategy, motivational business books, personal finance, economics.Diet
Classic diet books and weight‑loss programs.Health and Medicine
Health trends, medical developments, sexual health, and books that sit between prescriptive and narrative depending on approach.How‑To (Catch‑All)
Anything that teaches a specific skill or process and doesn’t neatly fit elsewhere.Parenting
Everything from pregnancy and early childhood to navigating adult children and aging parents.Religion and Spirituality
Faith‑based books, often for Christian markets, or spiritual works that aren’t categorized as “woo.”
These are the shelves your book will live on — literally in a store, and figuratively in the minds of agents, editors, and readers.
Why Category Is Not Just a Label (It’s Your Strategy)
Meghan lays out a chain reaction that shows why category is so important:
Knowing your category helps you target the right audience.
That directs you to the right editorial help — someone who actually works on your kind of book.
That helps you get literary agents who know the editors who buy your category.
That makes it more likely you’ll get a strong book deal with a team who understands your genre, your audience, and your competition.
That alignment shapes marketing and sales, both inside the publisher and in your own platform.
Sales teams then know which stores and buyers to pitch your book to.
Bookstores know where to shelve it.
Readers can find it easily.
And that’s what makes you a successful author.
Category is the first domino. Get it right, and everything downstream, from proposal to promotion, gets easier.
Questions This Episode Answers
“Can my book be both memoir and how‑to?”
“I have a big life story and a big message. How do I decide the category?”
“What if my topic could fit in more than one prescriptive sub‑category?”
“How does category affect my chances of a traditional deal?”
This episode is lesson 3 in Meghan’s “101 curriculum” for entrepreneurial authors. Earlier episodes cover stages and roles; upcoming ones introduce her proprietary framework for getting your book deal.
