Your best bet of getting published in a magazine? “Start with little, tiny pieces—pieces that are 200 words, 150 words, 400 words,” says Sosienski. “Then, once [the editors] trust you, they’ll give you bigger and [longer] pieces.”

Test out book ideas with articles.
Chambers recommends writing articles about the topic you’re hoping to turn into a book for a few publications first—even if the pay for the article is low or nonexistent.

“The piece that I turned in to the company that published my [memoir] about my mom, Mama's Girl, was a story that I wrote for a paper that they were giving out on the streets of New York for free,” says Chambers, who adds that having these published articles “shows a publisher that you can take something from beginning to end. Which is really what it’s all about.”