now with a website
A couple of people have recently asked me about my agent, Emily Sylvan Kim, who left Writer's House to start her own agency.
Ta da! Here you go, Prospect Agency.
Ta da! Here you go, Prospect Agency.
more fun and hi-jinks at RWA.
To the Board of Directors of the Romance Writers of America: It has been brought to our attention, by several of our romance authors, that your organization no longer considers Medallion Press, Inc. a legitimate publisher according to your guidelines. We were surprised we did not receive official notification directly, but instead discovered it was posted on several RWA internet loops. Accordingly, we request this letter be published in its entirety in the RWR Report so all members may understand the nature of the process that eliminated Medallion as an RWA approved publisher. We will also send copies of this letter to all our own RWA member authors. We are dismayed you declared Medallion Press no longer a legitimate publisher. In July of 2004 we met all of your qualifications without incident by showing sales of 5000+ copies of USA Today Bestselling author Nan Ryan's The Last Dance. Several months prior to Book Expo America 2005, we received a call from your office alerting us to ...
Can you tell your story of your search and ultimate acquisition of an agent? As someone who is just starting to consider agents, I'm curious.
ReplyDeleteAlso, I've read a couple of other blogs that weigh the question of agents for category and single title. What are your thoughts on that?
MY AGENT HISTORY:
ReplyDeleteI figured out I needed an agent when I saw the contract from Kensington. I went into drool-mode immediately. Pages of stuff and I couldn't tell what mattered and what was trivial. Hell, I couldn't figure out what all that junk meant.
I called a woman who'd been interested in my work and she agreed to take me on. She was a former editor and very good. Very professional and she worked hard. However the personality thing didn't fit (and I was the one who really didn't fit. Entirely me. It was a great shock to realize that I can't work with everyone on the planet.)
She's a New Yorker and scared the bejeezus out of me. There're a lot of people who think having a bulldog of an agent is great, and I think if I were further along in my career it might be fine. But as a newbie, I needed to feel like I could ask lots of dumb questions.
Anyway, that's when I learned that maybe having no agent is better than having a bad fit.
I found Emily when a friend, Susan Meier, suggested I contact her. They'd worked together at some conference or another. Emily's mellow and has a sense of humor.
Do you need an agent if you're writing category instead of mainstream? I don't know.
A lot of my friends who write category don't bother with agents, but I'm getting the impression that the world of category is changing fast. That might mean that the so-called "boiler-plate" contract is also changing? I'd ask a H/S author, if I were you. They're usually a nice bunch.
PS I've made my own sales (so far). I was unagented when Hilary Sares made her offer and when Ellora's Cave took me on.
ReplyDeleteHey! She's got Kate Donovan, too! I haven't seen her in forty freaking forevers! Love her stuff. Oh. And I love Edit Layton, too. (From above post)
ReplyDeleteVery cool design! Useful information. Go on!
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