This insight into an agent’s work load shows why they sometimes take those 1-3 months to respond to queries, much less partials and complete manuscript submissions.
Jenny Rappaport gives us an inside view of how her work space is stacked up with materials to review and why anyone who submits to her shouldn’t expect a phase-by-phase update on where she is in considering their submissions. It’s not that she doesn’t want to keep people informed, but if she took the time to do so, she’d have none left to actually get any reading done.
One “rule” I’ve come across is that if you’ve submitted something to an agent, and they haven’t got back to you in the time period they ascribed themselves, give them at last half the time extra, if not twice that, before you come calling, asking where your story is. There’s nothing wrong with sending a follow-up email to make sure they got the materials in the first place, but try not to hound them, realizing that any time they spend reassuring you that, yes, they really will read your stuff, is more time that they don’t have to do so. And always make sure to maintain that professional approach, since I think “whining and complaining about the unfairness of life” sits high on an agent’s list of reasons for automatic rejection. Just a hunch.
I see that smile.
Sound advice and another useful link Josh, thanks.
But hey, it doesn’t mean we can’t have a joke at publishers expense. Here’s one:
What do publishers have in common with mountains? They both move at the same speed – about half an inch every million years.
I hear that groan! 🙂
A writer died and was given the option of going to heaven or hell.
She decided to check out each place first. As the writer descended into the fiery pits of Hell, she saw row upon row of writers chained to their desks in a steaming sweatshop. As they worked, they were repeatedly whipped with thorny lashes.
“Oh my,” said the writer. “Let me see heaven now.”
A few moments later, as she ascended into heaven, she saw rows of writers, chained to their desks in a steaming sweatshop. As they worked, they, too, were whipped with thorny lashes.
“Wait a minute,” said the writer. “This is just as bad as hell!”
“Oh no, it’s not,” replied an unseen voice. “Here, your work gets published.”
Cute jokes! I think I might check out the agent’s blog… I did mention wanting to know how one acquires that job in the first place a while back, no?
Technically anyone can become an agent. All you’d have to do is announce “I’m a literary agent,” and you could be one, though likely lacking any true experience, industry contacts or the skills you’d need to be successful. A lot of agents start out where most people do in the publishing industry…as an assistant of some sort. Sometimes they are assistants to a full-blown agent, or they might get started in some other area of publishing, such as editorial, and then eventually flip over into the agenting world. Either way, they get to see the whole process and learn how to read and filter queries, send rejections, take on clients, deal with the contracts and all the other goodness they do for the authors.
My query and partial was at Tor for over a year. somewhere around the 15 month mark, they changed their guidelines, essentially saying that they weren’t going to respond to follow-up queries, and if you don’t hear back in the time frame you submit again. I didn’t. So now I’ve got to get serious about qerying agent instead.
Incidentally, the protagonist of one of my unfinished novels is named Josh. Sort of. He’s a physics student whose unwise participation in a series of experiments got him kicked out of his native universe.
Yeah, that’s one of the reasons why I’ve avoided querying a lot of publishers directly, unless an editor asked for the manuscript. They take so long, which means you’ve probably revised things heavily in the meantime, and there’s the whole guideline-changing aspect, which they do from time to time. At least Tor takes un-agented queries still.
Unwise experiment participation got him kicked out of the whole universe? That had to be some pretty bad experimenting going on.
Yup. Kinda lost his grip on reality, and had to wander off into a different one. Back in his home universe he’s essentially a ghost. Oh, and he’s haunted by the spirit of one of the experimenters and is in love with her.