I need help getting an agent

Yeah, you have to finish the novel first and polish the hell out of it before you start looking for agents.

kitty_revived said:

To be fair this would be my second novel my first is already getting published (war of silence) I just want to get an agent and make sure I get a better deal this time around since my last publisher kinda screwed me over in the way they have been acting.

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You're looking for an agent to rep your new book - which means you have to write it first.

Say you sent out a query and the agent requested the manuscript, but there isn't one. Then what do you do? You'd have likely lost your chance with that agent.

If your first book had sold TONS, and you wanted an agent, maybe you could get interest, but your first isn't even out (that I can see).

It still needs to be finished, unfortunately. One unproven novel in the pipeline (not a slam - that's great news and I wish you best luck on it!) will not likely entice an agent to talk to you about an unfinished work.

How is your first getting published? If it sold to a reputable publisher, you probably can get an agent before finishing your second. If the first was self-published, it's meaningless.

I really don't mean this to be rude, but the punctuation in your posts is pretty bad. Is this simply because you don't check it in post, or because you don't know how to punctuate? If it's the latter, you're going to have trouble finding an agent, or a publisher until you learn how to punctuate.

Was that your War of Silence published on Lulu last year?

cornflake said:

Say you sent out a query and the agent requested the manuscript, but there isn't one. Then what do you do?

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Learn the magic art of writing publishable manuscripts in two weeks or less, of course! ^_^

Okay, in all seriousness, and speaking as someone who got a full request before I had the manuscript polished, while it is certainly feasible to scramble something together, it wasn't fun, I was very sleep-deprived and miserable, and because I had rushed, I worried that the agent was not seeing my best work. The manuscript was ultimately rejected, so take that for what it's worth.

Full requests can come in as little as a few hours. Most come within a week. If you're not ready to react to that, better to wait.

You're self-publishing. An agent is generally for trade publishing. If you want to go the traditional route, you will need to finish and polish that manuscript first. I highly recommend someone else to take a look at your work first, whether you submit to an agent or self-publish. I'm going to guess English is not your native language. If you are self-publishing, I recommend you hire an editor.

This:

Unimportant said:

A literary agent represents an author by submitting her book(s) to publishers, negotiating the contract(s), and managing royalty income/sales of rights.

Write the book. (Then revise it. Then edit it. Then polish it. Then get some beta readers to read it and make suggestions for improvement. Then revise it again. Then edit it again. Then polish it again.) Then write a query letter and send it out to agents.

Agents receive thousands of queries each year, so your book (and your query letter) has to be better than those thousands of others. Take the time to make it as good as you can.

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And this:

chompers said:

You're self-publishing. An agent is generally for trade publishing. If you want to go the traditional route, you will need to finish and polish that manuscript first. I highly recommend someone else to take a look at your work first, whether you submit to an agent or self-publish. I'm going to guess English is not your native language. If you are self-publishing, I recommend you hire an editor.

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I've noticed you have some grammar, punctuation, missing words, and awkward sentence issues. I read your excerpt in the YA forum and you had a couple of awkward sentences and...ornate writing (for lack of a better word). You replied to another poster that, that is the way you speak. Only problem is, writing is not always the same as speaking (though you can get away with some things when writing dialogue if it is true to a particular character or group of people (Ex. regional dialect/slang) or in special circumstances if it fits the overall narration.

Not trying to be discouraging, and if it feels that way I apologize, but your original post kind of set off my "newbie" radar (in terms of your knowledge about how the industry works with regards to the world of agenting). Since you are new here, I strongly suggest you take the time to explore AW, read the stickies, learn as much as you can, and participate in the appropriate Share Your Work thread. When you have 50 posts you can post a snip of your work (usually first chapter) and get some good and honest feedback. Though, you may want to make sure your skin is thick enough to take the criticism, as the honesty there can be a bit of a shock to your system at first .

I wish you the best of luck. Happy writing!

ETA: I would like to add that I am in no way an expert or all knowing about the industry as a whole, so if anything I have said is inaccurate please feel free, posters, to correct me. I am just relaying the knowledge I have acquired since joining AW several years ago. I am still learning EVERY. DAY.

About your earlier novel--it's good that you took Silence down from Lulu, but a large chunk of it can still be read on Google Books. Whether you end up going with traditional publishing or self-pubbing, you might want to see if you can get it taken down.

For one thing, it identifies Lulu as the publisher, and if it was never actually released you don't want people thinking it was, in case you do try to sell a version of it later down the road. And it needed lots of editing, so isn't the best thing to have out there representing you.

Here's a link with info about getting the work removed from Google Books.

In general, don't try to rush things! You've gotten a lot of good advice here on what you need to do before you'll be ready to start looking for an agent--take some time and digest it. Then finish that draft.

Best of luck with your journey.