Pub Rants

Category: agents

Here’s A Genre I Didn’t Think Of!

by Kristin Nelson

STATUS: From the blog silence, you can imagine how hectic this trip as been. Meetings all day. Catching up on emails in the evening, and you have to fit a little bit of fun in there too!

What’s playing on the XM or iPod right now? CALL ME MAYBE by Carly Rae Jepsen

I’ve been in New York for the past 3 weeks doing meetings with a lot of different editors at all the different houses. I started off with the editors who acquire young adult and middle grade.

Of course I ask, “What have you been seeing lately?”

Imagine my surprise when no less than three editors (all from different houses) responded with, “crap.”

At first, I wasn’t quite certain how to reply. That wasn’t exactly the answer I was expecting! I opted for, “would you care to define ‘crap.’

And they did. They mentioned recently that they’ve seen a whole slew of submissions that weren’t really ready for an editor to see. By the way, these were submissions from agents.

I asked why they thought that was so. I got three main reasons:

1) They were seeing hot genre stuff, such as dystopian, that they felt like the agents were not vetting as thoroughly as they should.

In other words, in any hot genre, the market gets crowded yet those submitting hope that because the genre is hot, it will sell.

2) There were some agents submitting young adult projects that don’t traditionally rep it and to be blunt, it’s different than repping fiction in the adult realm.

3) A lot of submissions could have benefited from a solid edit and revision before submitting. In other words, they were not in strong shape even if the concept or idea was solid.

Some agents don’t edit before submitting. Some do.

So interesting. I’m definitely looking to avoid submitting crap.

*grin*

I think I can do that!

Because You’ve Asked For It….

by Kristin Nelson

STATUS: Another Gorgeous day! Repeat yesterday’s status.

What’s playing on the XM or iPod right now? LADY IN RED by Chris de Burgh

Or maybe you didn’t but are a glutton for punishment anyway. I’m doing my very popular Agent Reads The Slush Pile as an online Webinar coming up on May 2, 2012 6-8 pm MST.

If you can’t make it to Denver for the LitFest version of this webinar put on by Lighthouse Writers (where the price is not to be believed but the travel to get there might be rough!), here’s your chance to finally experience it for yourself.

Have you ever wondered how an agent reads the fiction submission slush pile? What an agent is thinking during the first opening pages? What makes an agent stop and what makes an agent read on? 
If you have ever wished to be a fly on the wall during that process, this workshop is your chance to get the inside scoop without metamorphosing. 

Literary Agent Kristin Nelson will read the first 2 pages of any submission, the “slush pile”, and give honest feedback as to why she would or would not read on for the sample pages in front of her.

 A couple of things before you click on that button:

1) This webinar is not for the faint of heart. It’s brutal. Now trust me, I will be as helpful and honest as possible. This is not to ridicule writers.  But don’t kid yourself, it will be tough. If you are feeling fragile or that feedback might crush your writer dream, now is not the time for this workshop. If you are tough as nails, just about to submit, want an immediate honest response, then this might be worth doing.

2) It needs to be the actual, opening first 2 pages of your manuscript. If you have a prologue, skip it and grab page 1 and 2 from your chapter one.

3) We can’t promise to read every single entry but we are definitely going to try. If I only have a few left over, I’ll respond on the sample pages and we can send to those writers privately. Right now, I know we can get through them all.

4) You can “audit” the class. Sign up to be there and listen in but you don’t send on the 2 pages. This is for those who are curious about it but not ready to have sample pages read.

If you’ve ever wondered how an agent could make a decision so fast on whether to read on or not or to ask for pages, this webinar will definitely answer that question!

The Criterion For Evaluating An Agent

by Kristin Nelson

STATUS: Gorgeous day! Must. Leave. Early. Chutney seconds that.

What’s playing on the XM or iPod right now? TAKE MY BREATHE AWAY by Berlin

This week, Blogger decided to completely reformat their dashboard. I honestly cannot find anything or tweak the colors. Took me five minutes to find my previous postings so I could do my after-posting editing for Friday’s entry. LOL. I should never blog in a hurry but sometimes, I have to do it on the fly or it’s just not going to happen.

I want to expand a little on Friday’s post. I think the most important criterion to evaluate before querying an agent is that agent’s record of sales. Agents should be agenting and therefore selling stuff on a fairly regular basis. And they should be selling stuff that is in the genre of the work you are pursuing representation for.

If an agent is fairly new but at an established house, they should still have a track record of sales since they are using the agency’s reputation when approaching editors. Their stuff will get looked at and since they usually read in front of an established agent and have “training” so to speak; they have honed their eye and will know what will sell.

How can you find out what agents have sold and recent deals? Well, Publishers Marketplace is an excellent resource. Keep in mind, however, that not all agents list their sales there. So that’s not the end all be all. I’ve actually not been announcing a lot of stuff lately for a variety of reasons.

Still, a lot of agents will have pages on Publishers Marketplace or dedicated websites which will show covers of recent releases etc.

If an agent has been “agenting” for awhile (such as 3 years or more) but doesn’t have a lot of sales and to the major publishers, well, I’d take that as negative indicator of their agenting ability.

Also, just in general, agenting is a full-time job. I’d also be hesitant about agents who have been established for a long time but are doing a variety of other jobs on top of agenting.

How Do You Know If An Agent Is A Good Agent?

by Kristin Nelson

STATUS: Today I crushed many a sensitive soul during my crafting your query pitch workshop. Just kidding. They all said it was great and learned a lot. I’ll take them at their word.

What’s playing on the XM or iPod right now? LET’S GET IT ON by Marvin Gaye

This evening, a writer sat down next to me and asked if I knew XYZ agent and what I thought of her. I actually didn’t recognize the agent’s name and so I couldn’t help her by sharing an opinion. Certainly I know a lot of agents in the biz but it’s simply not possible to know ALL the agents practicing out there–especially a lot of the newer agents who are just starting out.

She then wanted to know how she could tell whether an agent is a good agent.

This is definitely a question that has been tackled on Absolute Write and Backspace.org and any search could probably bring up hundreds of forum posts regarding it.

For me, it’s simple. What is an agent’s track record of sales? If solid, then it’s probably just going to be a matter of whether you also connect with the agent as a person. By the way, whether an agent with a good track record is a good fit for you as an author is actually a whole different question than whether an agent is a good agent. One agent might be fantastic for one kind of client and disaster for another client who has different needs.

If the agent is new, how new? Are they with an established agency or agent with a good history of sales so the newbie has a mentor for questions? If an agency is brand new, did the agent work for an established firm before going out solo (so even though the sales record might be small at the moment, it’s understood that the agent comes with a solid background in the field).

Trust your common sense and what your gut tells you. Make sure you’re not wearing blinders when it comes to your publishing dream. The idea that any agent is better than no agent is most often not true.

Why Asking About The Next Trend Is The Wrong Way To Go

by Kristin Nelson

(Just a note, this post is from our archives. Some references and links may be from past years.)

STATUS: I feel like I’m being pulled in 10 different directions. I’m here at the RT Convention. On Tuesday, I offered rep to a potential new client. Wednesday I did an hour phone conference with a film producer for another client. Yesterday, I reviewed 5 different offers for a UK auction going down. Today let’s talk about romance. It’s almost time for Pitch-a-Palooza!

What’s playing on the XM or iPod right now? IF IT’S LOVE by Train

But writers can’t help themselves. They still ask this question anyway.

At best, this question is unhelpful. If you start writing for the “next hot trend” by the time you finish your project, that particularly trend is on the way out.

Not to mention, if you ask me the question, “What are you looking for?” I can ramble on about something I’d love to see (such as a completely charming, witty, and fun historical romance a la Julia Quinn) but what I offered rep for just this week would never have landed on my “This is what I’m looking for” list.

I’m constantly taken by surprise by what I fall in love with.

After being here at RT, certainly I can tell you that editors are weary of paranormal romance. That everyone is talking about erotica because of 50 Shades (by the way, I don’t rep erotica so please don’t query me for that.)

That “hook-y” women’s fiction novels (i.e. hooks like a knitting club or cupcake club) are still on editors’ wish lists (which by the way, are topics that don’t ring my bell much).

I can tell you that a lot of the romance editors also rep YA and they might be moved to violence if just one more YA paranormal romance lands in their submission inbox.

I can tell you all these things and then I can also tell you that the minute the “right” project lands in that same inbox–even if it contains any of the above–but it blows them away, they’ll offer for it.

So I can’t tell you what I’m looking for as an agent. I can only say that I’m going to know it when I see it and this: I haven’t taken on a romance author in over the year. I’m opening my universe up to that possibility as I’d love to read an awesome romance right now.

I’ve been in my “dark” phase for the last 7 months by taking on dark and gritty SF.

Creative Commons Credit: Andy.Brandon50

Talking NLA’S DLP

by Kristin Nelson

STATUS: This morning I thought I had a mild day in front of me. After the third fire before 10 a.m., I gave up that notion.

What’s playing on the XM or iPod right now? REMINISCING by Little River Band

So yesterday’s announcement is not the be all end all of this topic. I’m happy to chat some more about our new Digital Platform.

As I said yesterday, we developed our model in conversation with our clients. In fact, their input modeled it. I went to them and said, “If an agent was going to offer a supported environment for self publishing, what would make sense to you? What would be of concern? What would make it worth an agent’s commission?”

And they told me. They also were gracious enough to review various model outlines and the DLP agreement that any author interested in using the DLP would need to click “I Agree” to use it.

And their help was absolutely invaluable and I feel quite comfortable that what we’ve created is the right approach–that we have not created something that will be a conflict of interest in representing clients and is a very ethical way for an agent to provide yet another facet of services to our authors.

My client Courtney Milan was gracious enough to post a blog entry on the topic today if you’d like some insight from an author who is currently self pubbing happily and successfully and not through our DLP–which by the way, bothers me not at all. I support her choice. Another client plans to do a guest entry on why she is using the full-service option and why she has been over-the-moon to do so.

Just wait until you see her totally kick-a** cover–something I don’t think she would have gotten on her own. It’s stunning.

I imagine that if a writer believes that all an agent does is sell books to publishers, there might be questioning on why an author would bother using an agency’s DLP. After all, a writer can certainly write the book, convert the efiles (or pay someone to), and put the titles up on Amazon, BN, Smashwords, Apple, what have you.

But you see, my authors know I do so much more than that.

And as an agent, I have relationships with folks that most writers can’t even imagine. Will all of them be valuable? No. Have some already proven to be? Yep.

But let’s talk DLP stuff.

1) First a correction. In yesterday’s entry, I realized that I typed “term of license.” Oi! In our DLP agreement, it’s a “term of liaison.” Not quite the same thing in a rather big way. So my apologies. For our full-service option, NLA foots all the upfront costs–which is why we specify a 2 year term of liaison. Could you imagine plunking down the money and have the author pull it a month later and we are simply out of luck? Quite frankly, my authors are awesome and I can’t imagine any one of them doing that but as an agent, I still have to be smart about it.

In short, for full-service, it needs to be on our DLP for 2 years and that’s it. After that, authors are free to do as they please and we will even give them their files. After all, they own it. They didn’t grant rights to us.

If we haven’t recouped in 2 and they take it, are we screwed? Yep. But I’m betting that it’s so worthwhile, that they are happy to keep it there. Nothing is in perpetuity. Why would an author do that?

For distribution only venue, an author can come and go as they please. All we are providing is access to venues they can’t access. It’s our standard 15% commission. For anyone who doesn’t think that’s worth it, they obviously have not wrestled with google’s very unfriendly platform. Not to mention, we have venues that authors individually do not have access to. And let me tell you, having been there and done that, it’s probably not worth the headache for an author. Amazon and BN have designed it to be easy. Not all venues have done the same.

2) Now remember, the author is in full control of their work. In the full-service option, they have access to a rather in-depth list of resources for cover artists, copyeditors, proofreaders, developmental editors, publicists, web designers, etc. They choose; we pay. The only exception is the developmental editor. The only reason for that is because we have no say in the revision process and I could see an author running up a rather big tab on the agency’s dime by doing endless revisions for months on end. Probably unlikely but once again, we need to be smart about things.

Now, keep in mind, as many of my clients can attest to (for good or for bad *grin*), I’m an agent who edits–probably to the level of a developmental editor.

3) On our full service, we rep the subrights–foreign, film, etc.

One commenter asked “It seems an inherent conflict–the agent has a vested interest in the author NOT publishing with a publishing house else, but instead self-publishing using services NLA benefits from financially.”

Actually no. The author client is self-publishing so it’s not even a choice for me. I have no say on whether they are on the DLP or not. If they are looking for an agent, my assumption is it’s because they want a finger in all pies and are looking for a print/ebook deal with a “traditional” publisher (for lack of a better word). I’m not taking on writers who just want to use our DLP.

That is not the point of offering this service.

Hopefully I’ve answered all questions. It’s after 8 p.m. and all I really want to do is go home and eat dinner.

The Rapidly Evolving Role of Agent

by Kristin Nelson

STATUS: What a way to start the day. Our ISP had a huge network outage that lasted for 45 minutes. No emails coming in or going out. It’s a Monday!

What’s playing on the XM or iPod right now? UPSIDE DOWN by Jack Johnson

Last Thursday I highlighted that the AAR has made some observations on the role of agents in ePublishing. If an agent is both an agent and ePublisher, well, that’s pretty much a conflict of interest. If the agent has a biz interest stake in a client’s decision, it rather eliminates our disinterested and objective viewpoint when giving guidance to a client.

But the digital landscape is shifting so rapidly and the agent’s role is evolving so quickly, what is an agent to do if clients want assistance making backlist titles available in eFormat?

Well, I can tell you what NLA is doing. And because I believe in involving greater minds than my own, I used the best resource of all–our own clients. Working in partnership with them, we developed NLA’s Digital Liaison Platform. My lawyer was also a big help but he simply formulated the agreement language once we had nailed down the model.

So what exactly are we doing?

We created a platform where NLA clients can self-publish their content within a supported environment. This is not a publishing house.

Before you say, “isn’t this a matter of semantics?” The answer is no. In a publishing house model, the author grants her rights to the publisher and cedes control in that grant.
That is not what we are doing. In our model, our clients maintain full control of their titles. They are not granting them to us. They have full say on covers, editing, pricing, etc. The program is voluntary so if they want to participate on our DLP, they can, but they are also welcome to handle their backlist themselves.

We offer two different options. The first is full service where we hook the client up with cover artists, copyeditors, publicists, and we do the file conversion and make it available on all the electronic distribution venues. We use our individual leverage with all the venues to promote. The second is a distribution-only venue. In this option, the author handles all the details of self-pubbing and conversions themselves but simply want access to venues they can’t reach on their own. Overdrive (main source for libraries) would be an example of a venue that individual authors can’t reach but we can.

If they are on our full-service DLP, we ask them to commit to a two-year term of license [correction: it’s a two year term of liaison, not license. My apologies for not proofreading more thoroughly. There is quite the difference between the two!] since we undergo all the expense and that would be rather uncool for a client to let us do that and then pull the title a month later.

Our agency commission split is the same as it’s always been.

Indie Booksellers–we are also on Google eBookstore and Ingram but if you have your own dedicated eBookstore, feel free to contact us directly as we are happy to add your venue to our platform.

Our Launch Title:

SKATER BOY by Mari Mancusi $3.99
The first novel in the sweet, tween-oriented First Kiss Club series.

Amazon
BN
Google
Apple – access through iTunes

Fridays With Agent Kristin: Episode 1 – How To Become A Literary Agent

by Kristin Nelson

STATUS: Through snow and more snow, the show must go on!

What’s playing on the XM or iPod right now? I FALL TO PIECES by Patsy Cline

Without further ado, I’m delighted to debut in 2012 a series of video blog rants called Fridays With Agent Kristin. And I hope you cut me some slack with this first one because let me tell you, this was hard to do.

Let me take that back. It was really easy to do a crappy video clip. To do a decent one took me an hour and 15 or 20 takes to nail a clip that was even remotely worth taking on to the editing stage.

I have a WHOLE new appreciation for anyone in the broadcasting arts. Seriously! You have to concentrate on pacing, breathing, every word, every pause, and oddly enough, every blink of the eyes.

If you blink normally during a video clip, you’ll look very strange in the finished product. Good thing I didn’t know what I was getting into when I started. If I did, it would have never left the idea stage.

So, welcome to Episode 1: How to Become A Literary Agent.

And if you’d like to suggest some topics for me to tackle in future episodes, that’s what the comment section is for. *grin*

The AAR Makes ‘Observations’ On Agent Roles & ePublishing

by Kristin Nelson

STATUS: I need to go home and eat dinner.

What’s playing on the XM or iPod right now? HOT HOT HOT by Buster Poindexter

Just last week, The Association of Authors’ Representatives sent out an email alert to all its members highlighting that the Board has been discussing the current AAR Canon of Ethics as it relates to agent members helping clients with ePublishing.

To sum up, the AAR realizes that the role of literary agent is changing and that many author clients will be asking their agents for assistance in making backlist titles available in electronic form.

For full disclosure, I am a member of the AAR and will continue to be in 2012.

As of this January, the AAR is not making any changes to the current Canon of Ethics but the organization is, however, sharing these observations which I’ll paraphrase here:

1) An AAR member may receive compensation only from the client for the agent’s services. Agents may not separately engage in business, ie. electronic publication, where they receive compensation from exploiting the client’s work. In short, Agents can’t be publishers and still be AAR members.

So for example, Agent Richard Curtis has a separate ePublishing company called eReads. He is not a member of AAR. And please, do not take this as any personal commentary on Richard. This is just an example.

2) Agent is obligated to inform client of all the financial implications of any ePublisher and the agent can’t take action to put his own biz interest above the interest of the client.

In other words, it pretty much is a conflict of interest for agents to be both an agent and an ePublisher as they may want their clients to publish with them instead of with some other ePublisher.

And yet, the role of agent is evolving rapidly. So what do agents do with clients who are interested in making their reverted backlist titles available on electronic platforms?

Well, I can’t speak for all agents but I can finally tell you what NLA will be doing as we launched our Digital Liaison Platform in November of 2011. And last week I did ring up the AAR lawyer to discuss our current model and whether that would be in conflict with the AAR Canon or its current observations.

It is not. In fact, he asked me to share the details of our model so as to share with the AAR board. They are reviewing any number of approaches that agents are pursuing.

And starting tomorrow, I’ll be sharing our model with y’all.

Games Agents Play

by Kristin Nelson

STATUS: Started off the day with 80 new e-mails in the inbox. That’s a tough Monday.

What’s playing on the XM or iPod right now? GOLD by John Stewart

When we obviously have nothing better to do….

Last year, I had dinner in the home of a client and her husband. After the dessert, we decided to play a game that they often do with their friends.

From a bookshelf in their office, the player grabs a published book from the shelf. Any book. Once back at the table, the player reads aloud a page from anywhere in the novel.

The question is two-fold. For the non-agent players, would they have continued reading? Why or why not? For the agent, would I have offered representation for the book based on that one sample page?

It was eye-opening and hilarious. The basic idea is that a novel should be able to hold up to intense scrutiny even if a random page is selected from anywhere in the story.

For my part, I would have passed on a well-known romance writer (oops!). To be honest, the writing didn’t hold up. I was completely surprised when the author was revealed.

For several readings, I admired the writing but knew I wouldn’t have represented it–despite the obvious quality of it. Sorry Cormack McCarthy! (Remember, taste really does play a factor in this!)

And out of the all the readings we did that night, there was only one that when the reader came to the end of the page passage, I said, “absolutely! I’d have offered rep for that in a New York minute.”

That author was Margaret Atwood.

Kind of interesting, don’t you think? I wonder how much we are swayed by recognizing an author’s name and reputation. In this game, you didn’t know and had to make a judgement based solely on the words on the page.