I Absolutely LOVE My Agent, But...

Well, for me personally, if I didn't trust my agent, that would not sit well with me. Are you 100% certain she didn't read the manuscript which she told you she read, or are some assumptions coming into play here?

Consider that you might be misinterpreting some of her actions and assuming the worst, especially if your communication is not frequent. Also consider that it takes a good deal of time to go through a manuscript thoroughly, which may be why she could only use the word "try." And finally, consider that perhaps this agent's speed might simply not be a good match for yours. It might be worth an open-minded phone call to air all this out and assess whether you can agree on a process that will make you both happy given your different working styles.

And also, I'm curious, what do you love about her?

Easter is next week so it wouldn't hurt to wait and see if she does indeed read your book and offer feedback.

But, if I were in your shoes, I would be spending that week preparing for the possible outcomes and and defining what I want. (Suppose she reads it, but doesn't have notes ready immediately. Is that acceptable? What sort of reasonable time frame do you want to be working in? What if she doesn't read it and there are more promises of soon? Do you wait until the other book comes back from submission or tell her things are over, you want the book pulled and you need the complete submissions list. And so on.)

If it were me I would also be looking at any agents I'd queried before to see if there were any that were interested, but not interested enough, in the first book who might be a good choice to query with the second or third books. Start putting together a query letter on whichever book you think is strongest. Essentially formulate a plan for what to do next if things don't work out with the current agent. (Which it sort of seems like they might not.)

This way you have something to do rather than sit around wondering what went wrong (nothing went wrong, btw, but even good agents and authors don't always work out for each other) and you can take concrete steps towards finding a new agent sooner rather than later.

((HUGS)) and best of luck.

Ah, sorry, I misread the post above where you said "she said she'd read," as past tense, not future.

There's a saying that "No agent is better than a bad agent." A bad agent will keep leading you on, promising you that she'll get to your manuscript, and years later you still have nothing. I say get out while the getting is good and start submitting to other agents. It will be hard, but you found one agent, you can find another one.

popgun62 said:

There's a saying that "No agent is better than a bad agent." A bad agent will keep leading you on, promising you that she'll get to your manuscript, and years later you still have nothing. I say get out while the getting is good and start submitting to other agents. It will be hard, but you found one agent, you can find another one.

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Except that without an agent, you're dead in the water. In all likelihood, your book WILL NOT be looked at by publishers without an agent, so you're back to querying again, and as much as we like to think otherwise, querying is a crapshoot. Maybe you catch the right agent on the right day with the right hook, and then maybe your book clicks with them at the right time in their list. And then maybe they are more communicative than the agent you have. Or maybe not.

OP, I think you're expecting too much from her. As much as we hope our agents are cheerleaders and wise sages for our careers, in reality we enter a relationship with them based on one book. She took you on based on one book, and now you're frustrated because she's not helping you with books that are not the one book she agreed to rep. I don't think that's fair. If you want editorial help, hire an editor or turn it over to your beta-ing pals and let her do the job she agreed to do -- don't give up on her because she's not doing things other than that fast enough for your liking.

Her job is to broker a deal between you and publishers for the one book she loved enough to want to rep? That's it.

If you think she's not doing a good job of presenting the first one, then maybe a change is in order. But it seems to me your frustration isn't that she's not doing enough for book, it's that she's not helping book two. If that's the case, I'd be surprised if any agent out there would be much different.

Whiporee: If an agent says "I'll read this in X amount of time," and then doesn't, that's a problem. It's not a question of wanting editorial help the agent isn't giving, it's a question of the agent saying she'll read and give feedback and then not doing it.

It's perfectly okay for an agent to draw the line with one book and focus only on that one thing that caught their interest in the first place. But that's not what seems to have happened here. It's also okay for agents to only rep the book as it's presented to them, but again this particular agent seems to be one who approaches manuscripts with an editorial eye.

Expecting an agent to do what he or she has said they would is hardly unfair or unreasonable.

I think your agent is a hobbyist who loves the idea of being an agent but doesn't really have the time or the drive to make it her priority. If being an agent was truly a part time occupation for her, she would have time carved aside in her schedule for working on her agent duties - not just attempts to fit it in during her holidays. (Obviously I'm drawing my assumptions purely from the comments you've made on this thread, I don't actually know this person).

Your agent should be excited about and actively championing your work. You employ this person to be your go-between with publishers. They represent you. If you're happy with a casual hobbyist approach to the sale of your work then it's all good. But if you're not happy with that approach it might be time to look elsewhere.

Old Hack said:

I am not convinced that an agent can be effective as an agent when working full-time at something else. How can your agent speak to editors, to publishers, go to meetings, chase up foreign rights co-agents and so on?

I'm also concerned that your agent is taking far too long to get back to you. The time-frames you describe are not acceptable.

I'm not happy with this agent, whoever she is: but if I knew who she was I might be able to give you more specific advice. Feel free to PM me the name of the agent, in confidence of course. I'll let you know if I've heard anything significant.

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At least half of the best agents I know work full-time at something else. There is nothing whatsoever uncommon about this. That makes even less sense than saying that writers can't be any good unless they write full-time.

I don't know how much time you think it takes each day to handle all an agent does, but unless the agent has far too many clients, it doesn't take so much time she can't hold another job. If it did, you could say so long to a lot of great agents.

Expecting an agent to do what he or she has said they would is hardly unfair or unreasonable.

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Of course not. But I'd bet that the problem is that the AIQ has read at least some of the other two books -- remember that the OP said she'd told her to read the second after starting the first or something like that -- and doesn't like them. And now the AIQ is trying to avoid the conversation, so she says she hasn't read them.

This wouldn't be an issue because I'm sure agents tell clients they don't like their stuff all the time. I have one friend (really, my only semi-famous author friend) who tells me she dislikes her agent (she actually told me she doesn't know a writer who likes/relies on their agent), that her agent has never told her she liked a thing she's written. However, her agent sells her stuff and has allowed her a career, so it's a beneficial relationship. But the OP is looking toward there agent for direction on her MSes, waiting for plot feedback that's not coming, and that frankly, the agent isn't in the right position to provide. Editing and brokering are completely different skills, aren't they? Granted, the agent shouldn't have told her she'd provide that, but at the time, the agent might not have realized the extent of the obligation she was making. The OP is looking to the AIQ to provide guidance, when all the AIQ is trying to do is sell the book.

My agent took me on for my career, not just for the book I sent her originally.

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They all say that. Mine said that. Our contract says she represents everything I write. But the reality is that the agent has no way of knowing what you'll do next -- all she has to go on is the MS in front of her. That's her priority. It's not helping you craft and weave the next masterpiece -- it's selling the book she has available to sell. Expecting more than that is putting unrealistic expectations on anyone.

If you're happy with a casual hobbyist approach to the sale of your work then it's all good.

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What does this mean? All an agent can do at submission is convince people to read your stuff. That's it. They can't hard sell you to publishers or editors -- all they can do is get people who make those decisions to read what you've written. You want someone who believes in it, sure, but it sounds like the AIQ has gotten it read, just hasn't gotten it bought. If the agent has gotten it read and it hasn't sold, then the fault lies with the writer, not the agent.

I'm not saying this agent doesn't suck. She might. She might be a poser and a wannabe. I don't know. But I think that getting an agent -- someone who can present your finished works to publishers with a modicum of credibility -- is not an easy task, and one might be careful about abandoning the relationship for things that have little do with the actual purpose of the relationship.

And my agent was an editor before moving to the agent side of things. He's been keen to rep three different novels (two written after he signed me for the first) in three different genres. And he's interested in a fourth (currently in progress), but didn't have any qualms about telling me one project I'd mentioned was less likely to be something he was interested in selling at this point.

I dunno about every author/agent relationship out there, but what you're describing, whiporee, is not a working relationship I would want to stay in.

credibility -- is not an easy task, and one might be careful about abandoning the relationship for things that have little do with the actual purpose of the relationship.

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Struggling with quotation from this mini iPad, but as far as I know the purpose of the author-agent relationship is to sell the damn books. The agent cannot sell the books if she hasn't even looked at them. I have also never heard of an agent who only wants an author to rep one book. I think industry standard is along career lines.

whiporee said:

Of course not. But I'd bet that the problem is that the AIQ has read at least some of the other two books -- remember that the OP said she'd told her to read the second after starting the first or something like that -- and doesn't like them. And now the AIQ is trying to avoid the conversation, so she says she hasn't read them.

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If that's the case, I think that's a pretty crappy thing to do. :-/ That means that the agent doesn't mind stringing her client along just for the sake of avoiding an awkward conversation. If she doesn't like the book, then she should be honest and tell the client why (market reasons/just not something she reps/maybe a genre she's not familiar in etc) instead of saying she'll get to reading it soon, promise.

My old agents were at least honest with me about not wanting to rep my subsequent book because they thought it was too quiet for the market. That honesty helped me make my decision whether I wanted to stay with them or go on a search for a new agent. Without it, I'd still be languishing in their client folder, wondering what's going on with my MS.

Editing and brokering are completely different skills, aren't they? Granted, the agent shouldn't have told her she'd provide that, but at the time, the agent might not have realized the extent of the obligation she was making. The OP is looking to the AIQ to provide guidance, when all the AIQ is trying to do is sell the book.

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Ehh, it depends on how editorial the agent is. Again, I feel like honesty is key here. She could say something like: "I don't think I can work with you on this project at the moment because it just has too many issues I don't know how to fix. Maybe you could consider editorial feedback elsewhere?"

I'm not saying this agent doesn't suck. She might. She might be a poser and a wannabe. I don't know. But I think that getting an agent -- someone who can present your finished works to publishers with a modicum of credibility -- is not an easy task, and one might be careful about abandoning the relationship for things that have little do with the actual purpose of the relationship.

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I agree that getting an agent is frikkin' hard.

OP, before jumping ship, I asked myself: If I end up not getting another agent for Book 3, will I live to regret it? Which is worse, not having an agent at all, or having an agent who isn't interested in a book which I really believe in?

I answered those questions for myself, which made it clear what I had to do. Do think about the worst case scenarios. You COULD very well end up with no agent at all. Unless you are supremely lucky and your work is super in demand, you will probably go through months and months of rejections in the query trenches. Will you be kicking yourself continuously, wishing that you never left your agent? Or will you be glad that you're moving forward on your own?

Be completely sure that you'll be okay with your decision, no matter the outcome, before making it.

nm

I thought whiporee's advice, while not agreeable to most on this thread, came from a place of helpful intention. I can't say the same for all the snark that's been directed back toward him. Everyone here is just trying to help, and when you ask on a public forum for advice, you have to expect that some of it won't fit your situation, but we're trying our best to help the OP.

whiporee said:

Except that without an agent, you're dead in the water. In all likelihood, your book WILL NOT be looked at by publishers without an agent, so you're back to querying again, and as much as we like to think otherwise, querying is a crapshoot.

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A poor agent won't get your book in front of the right publishers, won't pitch your book well or appropriately, and if she gets you a contract it will almost certainly be a poor one. So yes, writers are better off unagented than going with an agent like that.

And querying isn't the crapshoot you say it is. Really. I've read enough slush to know that.

whiporee said:

I'm sure agents tell clients they don't like their stuff all the time.

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They do! But it's usually countered with, "and this is how you make it publishable."

I have one friend (really, my only semi-famous author friend) who tells me she dislikes her agent (she actually told me she doesn't know a writer who likes/relies on their agent), that her agent has never told her she liked a thing she's written. However, her agent sells her stuff and has allowed her a career, so it's a beneficial relationship.

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I can't think of any writers I know who don't like their agent. I can't think of any good agents I know who don't like the authors they represent. In many cases (and funnily enough, it tends to be the better agents who fall into this group) authors become good friends with their agents, and are very fond of them.

They all say that. Mine said that. Our contract says she represents everything I write. But the reality is that the agent has no way of knowing what you'll do next -- all she has to go on is the MS in front of her.

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The agents I know talk with their author-clients and work out what their next moves will be. As an editor, I've been involved in quite a few discussions with authors and their agents where we've talked about their future projects, where they want to go, and how best to get them there. This doesn't usually happen for big-selling, major authors: it's almost always for midlisters, or debut authors.

Publishers and agents want authors to be successful, and if they're not happy they can't be. We work towards that, as much as we can.

What does this mean? All an agent can do at submission is convince people to read your stuff. That's it. They can't hard sell you to publishers or editors -- all they can do is get people who make those decisions to read what you've written. You want someone who believes in it, sure, but it sounds like the AIQ has gotten it read, just hasn't gotten it bought. If the agent has gotten it read and it hasn't sold, then the fault lies with the writer, not the agent.

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Agents do hard-sell to some extent. And if a book hasn't sold then the fault doesn't necessarily lie with its author: it could be that the agent hasn't submitted it to the right people or places, or that the agent hasn't submitted it well, or that the agent has a bad reputation in publishing and the editors don't want to work with her.

I'm not saying this agent doesn't suck. She might. She might be a poser and a wannabe. I don't know. But I think that getting an agent -- someone who can present your finished works to publishers with a modicum of credibility -- is not an easy task, and one might be careful about abandoning the relationship for things that have little do with the actual purpose of the relationship.

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I agree that the agent might be fab. We just don't know. However, I do think that it sounds as though this agent isn't an effective agent for Luzoni, and in that case I'm not convinced that this is therefore a relationship worth continuing.

Luzoni said:

The issue here has always been time. I don't think I'm being the least bit unreasonable to feel that almost a full year, with most of it being waiting on her to read or partially read, the MS, is too long.

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That's the crux of the matter, I think. And I agree with you that she's taken far too long.

amergina said:

My agent sold book 2 in a 2 book deal. Before I finished revising book 1.

And got me another contract on spec.

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This is pretty standard for an established writer with a good agent. It's nice, isn't it?

http://absolutewrite.com//www.pinterest.com/pin/create/extension/

Jamesaritchie said:

At least half of the best agents I know work full-time at something else. There is nothing whatsoever uncommon about this.

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None of the really good agents I know work at anything other than agenting.

It might help if you'd name the agents you know who work full-time at something other than agenting.

That makes even less sense than saying that writers can't be any good unless they write full-time.

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Cut the snark, James.

unless the agent has far too many clients, it doesn't take so much time she can't hold another job.

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You say an agent who works full-time at agenting has far too many clients, therefore a good agent works only part-time as an agent, and probably has a second job.

What about an agent who has quite a few author-clients, works full-time as an agent and represents all her author-clients effectively? Is that a bad agent? Or how about an agent who has relatively few author-clients, but makes a high number of foreign and subsidiary rights sales for all of them: again, is that a bad agent?

I might be wrong, but my understanding was that a large part of an agent's role was making connections with publishers, developing and nurturing those relationships. I also believe the role of the agent is to do what they can to ensure the product they are selling (in this case a novel obviously) is as polished and marketable as it can be. That might be achieved through providing editorial advice to their client, or it might be a suggestion that the client engage the services of an editor. I would also think the agent would provide feedback from unsuccessful submissions so that any major concerns could be addressed before sending future submissions. Of course it's likely the agent would have had to put in their time developing and nurturing those publisher contacts to enable them to freely seek this type of feedback.

I don't agree that an agent must work full-time to be good at their job. I'm sure there are great agents that work part-time for a variety of reasons. But I also don't agree that it is the type of job that can be worked on a casual basis on nights/weekends/holidays/whenIgetasparemoment etc.

Surely writers expect more from their agents than simply an admin assistant to google publisher details and send off emails with the hope they'll get lucky and maybe make some pocket money from a sale.

Luzoni said:

So...here's the part I see in big glaring red letters: She's going to TRY to get through my novel over Easter. Back around Thanksgiving she told me she'd read my other book over Christmas. She didn't. Also missing from this email is any kind of promise that I may expect a more rapid response going ahead.

So my gut says I need to get out. She isn't promising to change, just dangling hope in front of me. Would you guys agree?

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It's not ideal that she has another job. It means she doesn't have much time for you, and she's unable to make a living (yet) as an agent. It could also indicate less than full commitment. On the other hand, she gets your work and her notes help you improve it. Also on that hand: giving up an agent once you've finally landed on is a very hard thing to do.

You've had good advice and done the right thing by emailing her about your concerns. If this relationship ends, you want to be sure it wasn't for lack of communication. Now she's saying she'll read over Easter. That's just a week away, if my calendar has it right. Why not wait till the holiday's over and see if she keeps her word? Either way it will clarify the situation.

BTW--you should ask to see rejection letters, always. It's useful information for you, since editors usually feel obliged to give some reason for their rejection (which agents don't when writers query.) Second--it keeps your agent honest. It's too easy to say, "yeah, I sent it here, there, and that other place" while the book is gathering dust on the shelf. I knew one agent who held onto a book she'd accepted for a whole year, never made a single submission. What a waste of time.

Good luck!