Peace and blessings to you,
Literary Agent

<sigh> <groan>

In King’s On Writing he talks about this stage, but in his book is seemed a short stage---this one for me has been going on for 6 months—the personal praising rejections, I’ve even got a few phone call ones! Ready to go insane.

I belong to the Easter Cherokee People’s Group. (The agency was brought to my attention by a Native American author who had their first book reped and sold by them)(not the ECPG but the agency that sent me the above rejection) That agency is Native American owned and operated --- thus the peace and blessings.

One good thing about the query letter praise---at least I know I am doing something right, now if I could just figure out what little thing I need to do to push it over the edge into acceptance.

Shawn

Well time to send out a bunch more---sent 16 e-queries out on Friday.

Sending out more than one copy of your actual manuscript without telling anyone is not--editors call that "simultaneous submission" even if you're only sending out part of your manuscript.

If you do send out more than one copy of your manuscript (whole or partial), you should indicate that they are simultaneous submissions. (And you should only send simultaneous submissions to those editors who indicate in their guidelines that they are willing to look at simultaneous submissions.)

A query is just a letter describing your book (shorter than an outline, but a bit longer than a "blurb") that asks the editor if s/he has any interest in seeing the manuscript.

You use queries so that you can send out a bunch at once, and to get past the "no unsolicited manuscripts" restriction. If they ask you to send the manuscript after they've read your query, then it isn't an unsolicited manuscript any more.

>What's the deal with agents? I'm assuming it's a little easier to get a foot in the door with one, but I guess there's nothing for sure.

The main deal with agents is that many publishing houses are more or less letting the agents do their filtering for them. Of course, this is only if they consider the agent to be a reputable, dependable one. I know of at least one agent who is well known in science fiction whose submissions are sent to the slush pile (the unsolicited manuscripts pile) by at least one publishing house, as soon as they come in the door.

Only a good agent will do your manuscript any good, because anyone can put "agent" at the top of their letters.

>Also if you're accepted by an agent is there any money exchanged up front?

Any agent who charges money up front is not considered a reputable, dependable agent. The agent is supposed to make money when you make money--that's part of the deal.

>I know there's a couple of publishers out there who do in fact take unsoliciated submissions and swear that they take them seriuosly. I'm not talking fly by night operations either, Tor for example is a publisher I found that takes unagented or unsolicited submissions. Is it possible to get published without an agent?

Yes, it is. Tor is a very good publisher, and it's not the only good one out there that will consider unsolicited manuscripts.

Even if Tor or one of the other publishers accepts your manuscript, though, there's a good chance they'll advise you to get an agent to represent you and help you with the contract.

An agent is easier to get if you have an offer, and sometimes agents are harder to find than publishers, so you just do what you can. If you send a manuscript to a publisher that will accept unsolicited and/or unagented manuscripts, have a list of agents to contact in case the publisher makes you an offer.

(The procedure is to whoop and holler when the editor calls you with the offer--hearing those whoops and hollers is one of the few joys editors get out of editing--and then once you've calmed down, telling the editor that you'll have your agent get in touch with them. Then, you contact the first agent on your list and ask if there is any interest in representing your book in dealing with this publisher.)

Of course, if you get the agent first, that's great--agents can auction books and get you really good advances.

So, as I've said before, go ahead and send queries to agents AND editors when your book is ready.

AND I have had a host of scam agents profess interest in my work. Use Google to search the agencies name----I have always found the good, the bad, the so so, and the downright ugly that way. There are other sites out there to check out as well.

On the idea of sending to both publishers and agents---to me you need to do one or the other, because if you have run the gauntlet of publishers with your ms, then decide I need an agent, then who will an agent send to? Though if yuo do both at once you cover more ground. So it is a toss up and a personal choice.

That said, DAW is another big name that takes complete unsolicited mss.

NO it doesn't. Getting one's foot in the door is a struggle.

Could you e-mail me the name fo that agent. IF they express interest, if I have their name, I do not want them.

A woman in her mid-30s had tried her hand at children's books several times. Having developed one that she particularly liked, she developed it into a proposal. It was handwritten (first mistake), with her own drawings.

She received a letter that went something like this: "Dear XX, Thank you for your submission. It's clear that you have a lot of talent. But I'm afraid we only accept submissions from adult authors."

Don't take this too bad, but the first letter appears to be stating that they think you weren't even professional enough to do even basic research on them.

I've been submitting since January. Getting ready for another round of submissions now, and opening out to publishers and US agents, as well as the last of the reputable Brit ones.

This time I've learned a few important points and tips, so hopefully things will work better on this round.

I've just got to swallow my pride and remember the lesson of patience.

I took some advice from a article written by a professional and rewrote a comic and the way I would have scripted it and the art direction I would have given. It was a Spider-Man story and also following the advice of the professional, I sent it directly to the Spidey editor instead of the submission editor.

I always thought a personlized rejection letter would be better than a form letter. Holy shit, was I way off base.

In the editor's defense I'm grateful he took the time to read and respond submission, and I was wrong on several accounts, but did he ever rip me an new asshole. The editor I sent it to no longer worked as an editor only a freelnce writer and I guess the submission editor who recieved it had had someone piss in his Wheaties the morning he wrote the rejection. I was close to 18 years old and was never an overly senstive person but I thought I was going to f--king cry. I was all happy when I got something in he mail with the Mighty Marvel
"M" logo in the return address protion of the envelope. I'll see if I can dig it up and I'll reprint a portion of it here. The thing was three pages long---single spaced!!!!!!!

I sent another submission to one of the artist who left Marvel over creator's rights issues (Rob Liefeld: greatest comic book artist ever (WARNING: THE LAST REMARK WAS INTENTIONALLY PUT THERE TO IRRITATE ANY COMIC FANS WHO MIGHT POST ON THIS BB)) and I was actually relieved to get a form letter, with one of the company's characters flying across the letter head.

Sorry, I took a lot of room to basically say careful what you wish for...

JOHN!

Sorry to hear that. I have gotten the pissed in the Wheaties rejections, got a two page one with scam attached to it---see other post about agent hell.

The worst I got said---"You would be better off taking up one handed knitting, you'd be more useful."

I've been slam dunked with the best of them. Wrote a thing called "Do Mustangs Belong on the Autobahn?" while in Europe. I drive a big German performance car, and saw many an American "sports" car fried after they went miles and miles at 100+mph---saw the result of too many accidents in those tin cans as well.

So here I had non-fic credits, I'd worked for a car dealer in the US, and I drove the autobahn in the fast lane (100mph PLUS) every day to work. Great time to compare US sports cars to the bigger German performance cars.

Wrong! Some jerk new editor at Car and Driver ripped me a new dorsal crack. Told me he doubted I'd ever been near a 7 series BMW much less drove one. On and on it went even to the point where the guy said---I doubt you've been in Germany. Uh huh—all he had to do was look at my address and the return envelope.

The story was picked up by a German magazine. And I got twice what Car and Driver would have paid.

My point---even a personal rejection is not personal. I have about half and half on my latest book. All that means is that on that day the story didn’t strike the editor as what he wanted and who knows maybe someone cut him off in traffic with BMW that day.

So you go on to the next.

I hate the form letters, many times you know they never even looked at the piece or query. There is no excuse for a rip you a new butt sort either. But the others the tid bits of kindness---one guy called me and said he was truly sorry that they were not taking on new clients, and he meant it. He spent a half hour of his valuable time giving me other agents to try. The above rejection, I missed her new web site by moments I guess because I had just been to the old one—yet her words at the start of it encouraged me—I was doing something right. Another big name agency said at the close of his letter---after a nice couple of paragraphs---I look forward to being proven in error for not taking this on. Turns out his agency votes on the ones they take, other agents had their agendas and marketing is going to go with the big seller. The sure thing.

So I will take the bite and sting of personal rejection letters—they mean I am being read and soon I know I will be signing that contract.

Shawn