Agents:
Finding Mr./Ms. Right
By Laura
Resnick aka Laura Leone
What makes
an agent good, or at least good for you?
There's no
simple answer. To be honest, after more than a dozen years
in the business, I'm still pondering this one, and still
learning.
In general,
a good agent, as we've discussed in previous articles,
is an expert about the business of selling and negotiating
books. Publishing is such a large and complex business
in this day and age that most individual agents specialize;
often even entire agencies specialize, to one degree or
another. For example, as an sf/f writer, there are many
agencies to which I can't take my career, no matter how
much I might respect the agency, because they know nothing
about the sf/f market and have no contacts in it. Similarly,
if you're a romance writer, there are agencies which would
be a poor choice for you, even if they'd be willing to
take you on, because they handle little or no romance
and know nothing about the romance market.
Consequently,
the first thing you need to consider when looking for
an agent is: Who handles the kind of fiction you write?
Resources such as the Romance Writers of America or the
Science Fiction/Fantasy Writers of America are good places
to start whittling down the vast sea of literary agents
to a list of those who specifically handle the kind of
fiction you write. Moreover, the more specifically you
can narrow your list of names, the better. For example,
if you write historical romances set in the Regency period,
it would probably be a good idea to look for an agent
who already handles a few clients who write historical
romances set in the Regency period.
There are a
number of ways to do this. Sometimes agents simply say
what they represent when you read interviews with them
in publishing trade journals or see them giving talks
at conferences. Some online or printed resources list
agents' clients, or at least the recently published novels
which the agency has sold. Some writers mention their
agents in the "author acknowledgments" sections of their
novels. Others mention their agents on their web sites.
Finally, whenever you read an author whose work you love
and which you feel is in some way similar to yours, make
it a point to find out who represented it. If necessary,
contact either the author or the publisher and ask.
If you're an
aspiring writer, also keep an eye on who's representing
aspiring writers in your genre or subgenre and (this is
important!) selling them. You don't want the agent who
has a list of 75% unpublished clients; you want the agent
who has a few unpublished clients she's excited about
and has made a number of first and second sales for her
other clients. In most circumstances, this sort of agent
is likely to be your best bet as an aspiring writer.
I would, however,
like to mention that even high-profile, well-established,
and extremely successful literary agents do still take
on aspiring writers. However, they take them on very selectively.
For example, Perry Knowlton, when he was the head of the
Curtis Brown Agency, took on an aspiring writer who'd
just completed her first novel; the author was Diana Gabaldon
and the book was Outlander. It landed an impressive sale
for a first novel, and Gabaldon made the New York Times
list by her third novel. My agent, Russell Galen, a well-established
sf/f agent, pulled aspiring novelist Terry Goodkind out
of a slushpile and sold his first-ever novel, Wizard's
First Rule, in a multi-book hardcover deal. Goodkind made
the NYT list with his fourth book.
So prominent
agents do indeed take on totally unknown writers; but,
as you can see in these two examples, they usually only
take on those writers whose submissions show immediate
and huge commercial promise. An aspiring writer with a
clearly midlist book is much less likely to get this kind
of attention, particularly if it's someone whose craftsmanship
needs some experience and honing to become very commercial.
However, this
doesn't mean that a green writer with midlist material
should settle for a bad agent. (NEVER settle for a bad
agent!) It just means that the good agents most likely
to be interested in you are those who, like you, are also
in the early stages of building their careers, their reputations,
and their skills. What you're looking for, therefore,
is someone with talent, potential, and drive who has not
yet achieved the sort of stature which you yourself have
also not yet achieved. There are numerous instances of
writers who signed with such agents at the start of their
careers and remained with them while both author and agent
climbed to heights of success over the years.
Yes, ideally,
the author-agent relationship should last years. In truth,
though, many of them don't. It's a highly individual relationship
which doesn't always work out. Your mutual needs many
change. Your mutual goals may change. Your mutual preconceptions
might be mistaken, or your mutual expectations might end
in disappointment. In one survey I saw among longtime
career novelists, the average writer had gone through
three agents. In another survey, it was six. I myself
am on my third agent. Although I know a few people who,
years later, are still on their first, this is an ideal
which you shouldn't be upset about not achieving if the
day comes when you or your agent are ready to end your
association.
I've heard
many people argue about whether or not an agent ought
to be in New York. There's no "right" answer to that,
and I frankly wouldn't let it bother me nearly as much
as a more important question: How did my agent learn to
be an agent? An established agent in California with twenty
years of experience and three dozen multi-published clients
is clearly a better expert than an editorial assistant
in Manhattan who gets laid off and decides to open her
own agency in her boyfriend's living room. On the other
hand, someone who started as a receptionist at a respected
New York literary agency and has recently worked her way
up to agent status, well-supervised by the company, is
a much more promising career prospect than someone who
woke up one day in Denver twenty years ago, suddenly decided
to be a literary agent, and has made one or two small
sales per year since then. Personally, I do prefer an
agency in New York; but it's definitely not a consideration
which would prevent me from hiring an agent I respected
who was located elsewhere. There are, for example, some
respected out-of-town agents who learned their profession
at agencies in New York before leaving the city behind
them; this is preferable to an agent in New York who has
not learned her profession even after years of practicing
it.
The ability
to communicate comfortably with an agent is an important
factor in your choice, since the relationship relies heavily
on trust and communication. Mutual esteem is essential,
too; the agent needs to believe in your writing, and you
need to believe in the agent's judgment. Relationships
where communication or esteem falter are agent-author
relationships which eventually end.
Shared goals
are another major component of a good author-agent relationship.
If an agent seems to share your goals and your vision
for your career, that's very promising. (Note: This means
that upon searching for an agent, you need to have already
thought about your goals and your vision.) It's important
to discuss these up front, and to occasionally re-open
the subject as time passes. If you see yourself writing
single title fiction and your agent only envisions you
writing series romance, for example, your goals conflict
and there will be trouble.
However, it's
important to listen. What some writers interpret as an
agent belittling or limiting them is really just an agent
trying to give them sensible career advice. If an agent
advises against writing paranormals because the market
is bad, or advises against pursuing a second subgenre
before you've firmly established yourself in your first
subgenre, this isn't necessarily a conflicting goal --
it really may just be good business advice based on experience
and expertise.
And that point,
actually, is one of the reasons it's harder to define
a good agent than a bad one. The truth is, even a very
good agent isn't always right. Agenting isn't a science,
and every situation contains surprises and elements of
risk. Time and time again, you'll hear stories of authors
who went against their agents' advice and succeeded brilliantly
in their goals. The confusing thing is that this doesn't
necessarily mean their agents were wrong for them; sometimes,
on the other hand, it means their agents were incredibly
wrong for them. Sometimes agents and authors part after
an incident like this without ever even knowing if they
were wrong for each other; they only know that they had
an experience which shook up their mutual goals and mutual
trust enough that the relationship is no longer solid.
Similarly,
there are many instances where a client followed an agent's
advice... and ended up in a career catastrophe. The confusing
thing is, sometimes it really was good advice, and the
bad results were unforeseeable. Other times, it was genuinely
bad advice for that particular writer, even if the same
advice had previously worked well for other clients.
There are so
many individual circumstances that it becomes very hard
to determine a standard yardstick for a good agent --
and sometimes even hard to determine a specific standard
to measure who's a good agent for you.
However, some
of the factors we've discussed here are helpful general
guidelines: shared goals, good communication, specialization
in your particular areas of interest, and (if you're a
novice) a track record of recent sales by novices. Various
books, web sites, and articles provide handy lists of
questions you might consider asking when you interview
agents. I myself also recommend talking to some of their
current clients and (if possible) perhaps some of their
former clients, too. Approach writers you respect and
see what they say about the agents you're interested in.
Finally, the
author-agent relationship is a highly individual one,
so in addition to relying on self-education as you enter
the process of agent-hunting, you should also be sure
to listen to your gut instinct about the people you encounter.
There are cases where your instinct will be the only available
deciding factor between options which otherwise seem equal.
Laura
Resnick aka Laura Leone, the current OVRWA/PAN Liaison,
is the award-winning author of numerous works of book-length
and short fiction in both the romance and the science
fiction/fantasy genres. She also has her own regular opinion
columns in Nink and the SFWA Bulletin. You can find her
on the web at: http://www.sff.net/people/laresnick.
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