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Seven
Essential Points on Literary Agents As an aspiring author, you may have heard, “If your
work is really good, you can get an agent. Getting the work into shape is the
hard part. If you get the work into shape, the right agent will follow.” Is it
really that simple? Well, yes and no. The
seven essential points below prepare you for what to expect when seeking an
agent, or literary representative. Point 1: Fiction or nonfiction? Differences in Approach As
a novelist, or fiction writer, you need to complete your whole book, format it
properly, and find an agent who specializes in selling novels. If you write
nonfiction (self-help, how-to, memoir), forget about writing the whole book,
unless you want to self-publish. Instead, write your book proposal. A
book proposal is like a business plan for your book. Its job is to convince the
publisher to part with money so you can get paid to write your book. In
either case, to minimize your chances of rejection, you’ll need to have your
proposal or manuscript polished before approaching an agent. Point 2: That someone calls herself an agent says nothing about what she can do for you. Some
things haven’t changed in the century since the first literary agent was born.
Today, anyone can still hang out a shingle and say she’s an agent—many
people do. Not all agents are effective, ethical, or even sell any books. Jill’s Guerilla Caveat Don’t
settle for just any agent. Agents vary tremendously in their effectiveness and
in what they sell well. Get your proposal (for nonfiction writers) or manuscript
(for novelists) into tip-top shape, then go for the agent who has a proven track
record selling work similar to your own. Point 3: Membership in the Association of Author’s Representatives (U.S.) indicates that the agent has agreed to abide by the A.A.R.’s code of ethics. This
professional guild for agents, http://www.aar-online.org,
requires, among other things, that an agent:
However,
not every legitimate U.S. agent belongs to the AAR. Many extremely successful
agents opt out of AAR membership. A comparable agency called the Association of
Author’s Agents, http://www.agentsassoc.co.uk,
operates in Britain. Point 4: Legitimate agents earn their living by selling to legitimate publishers the rights to publish authors’ books. In
return for writing your book and granting a legitimate publisher the rights to
print it, the publisher gives you, the author, a percentage of whatever the book
makes, otherwise known as a “royalty.” In return for brokering the deal and
acting as your advocate, you in turn give your agent a percentage (usually 15%)
of this royalty. This
is how legitimate agents make their money. They pick good literary prospects for
the publishers to consider, who rely on them to reduce the time and energy it
would otherwise take to wade through the enormous amount of submissions the
publishers receive. Publishers
know the legitimate agent’s living depends on being able to separate the wheat
from the chaff, so they tend to look more seriously at submissions from
reputable agents. To
reiterate, legitimate agents get paid through commissions on book rights only,
period. If an agent charges you any money, except a small fee for expenses (and
many people believe agents shouldn’t charge authors even for those; they
should simply be considered the cost of doing business), she has little
incentive to sell books. Successful
agents use a well-established network of relationships with editors in
legitimate publishing houses. They know the right editors to call for the
particular projects that come their way. They don’t have time to do anything
but sell book rights, because selling book rights is how they make their money. Aside
from selling the rights to publish your book in this country, many possibilities
exist for making money from your book both within and outside of the United
States. These include translating the book and selling it overseas, making an
audio recording of the book, or having the book used as the basis for a movie.
The legal permission to do these things are called foreign rights, subsidiary
rights and options, respectively. To
help you make the most money possible from your book, your agent should be able
to negotiate for the subsidiary and foreign rights to remain with you, and then
work either on her own or with someone else, to help you sell and make yet more
money on sales from those rights. Jill’s Guerilla Caveat Apart from
those agents who are simply mediocre, watch out for scammers—there are plenty!
Apart from trusting your gut, and not paying an agent, avoid any agent who: à
Insists
you hire a particular editorial or consulting service (this is different from
making a referral, or even better, two or three referrals and letting you
interview them and make up your own mind); à
Refers
you to a publisher who wants to charge you money; or à
Suggests
representing multiple works of yours simultaneously (unless they have a really
good reason for thinking this is a good idea—see Q&A below.) Agents
who profit from upfront fees for reading or handling manuscripts, who affiliate
themselves financially with editorial, coaching or publishing services, or who
claim to need your money for any other purpose probably aren’t selling the
rights to your book for a living. Why
should they, when aspiring writers who don’t know any better are kind enough
to bankroll their other enterprises? Point 5: At their best, agents advocate for author interests, and earn their commissions by: à
Using
their inside information, reputations and well-oiled relationships with editors
to approach just the right publishers for your book—especially the increasing
number of those publishers who won’t take unagented submissions; à
Applying
their contractual and negotiating expertise to garnering higher advances, more
rights and a lot of other stuff you might not be aware of; à
Helping
you refine both the form and content of your book so that it appeals to the
publishers they plan to approach; à
Intervening
on your behalf if you get into a disagreement with the publisher; and à
Assisting
you with making long-term decisions about sequels, options, subsidiary rights,
next steps and other aspects of your career. Point 6: Agents reject 99% of all material that comes their way. The
best and most reliable way to up your odds of getting published is to a)
research your market, b) know and communicate to the agent via a perfect query
letter how your work fits in with and stands out from others in its class, c)
deliver an original, well-written, impeccably formatted manuscript or proposal,
then d) choose an agent who is obviously interested in and has a record of
selling work like yours. Read that again. Point 7: Don’t initiate contact with a phone call—really. Approach an agent with a query letter instead. Unless
you are famous (and even then), approach an agent with a query letter. A query
letter introduces you and your book idea, and invites the agent to see your book
proposal or manuscript. Don’t
email unless the agent specifically states somewhere in print or on the Internet
that they welcome email queries. Also, don’t call with general questions about
their qualifications. Agents
who haven’t expressed interest in representing your work generally will not
consent to have you interview them unless you’re a journalist calling to give
them publicity. Once
an agent has expressed interest in your work, you can and should ask questions
of them, [covered in the book], then take up to a week (or longer, my mutual
agreement) to decide whether to accept their offer of representation. If
you’ve read this far, congratulations—you now have a solid introduction to
agents, a crucial piece of the mainstream publishing world. However, as you
might guess, finding exactly the right agent for your work, so you can beat
those 99% rejection odds, takes a bit more effort. Learn
more here: http://www.FindTheRightAgent.com. Jill
Nagle is a published author and the founder and principal of GetPublished, which
provides coaching, consulting, editing and other services for aspiring and
ready-for-next step authors. Find
us here: http://www.GetPublished.com. |
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