Hello there,

I've been lurking on here for a while, after a very long absence from Write Words (five years - under a different name though!). It's good to be back and I'm hoping that one of you might be able to help me with a query that's just cropped up.

Last month, I managed to finish my first novel and submitted it as an experiment to a handful of agents. One requested a full, but ultimately rejected and there have been a few form rejections. I'm still waiting to hear back from a couple of agencies.

In the meantime, I've sent my manuscript to a consultancy for some advice, but yesterday, I read about the acquisition of YA trilogy which uses exactly the same distinctive characters as mine, in exactly the same paranormal way! These aren't minor characters, they're integral to the whole plot.

Has anyone encountered this situation before? And if so, should I be thinking about coming up with something different if I'm to attract agents? I love the story and I don't really want to change it, but I'm prepared to consider a major overhaul if it meant that it would increase my chances of publication. Any feedback would be much appreciated.

Hi Gideonna, and welcome back!

I think this is a question you need to ask the consultancy which you've sent your mss to - they should know the market, and hopefully will know about this trilogy. It's impossible to know without reading both yours and the trilogy and doing a direct comparison of the two whether yours should be reworked or not. There are a lot of published novels which, if you boiled it down to the MCs and the main plot thread would sound very similar, and I had a bit of a wobbly about my own wip when I picked up Haddon's Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-time, and thought it was so similar I almost ditched the project, but after reading the whole of Haddon's novel I realised that, actually, there were enough differences to make it worth my continuing.


- NaomiM

Thanks Naomi,

That's good advice. I believe that the same consultancy may have had a hand in the other author's career so they should know the plot well.I totally agree that if you boil most stories down, you find common elements. I'm probably just panicking - my story has a completely different bias, but it's worth asking the question.

It reminds me of a blog post by the author Louise Doughty, who, when asked if she was worried about posting her synopsis incase someone pinched the idea, said, No, she wasn't worried, because anyone could take the whole of the plot and characters from one of her novels, but they'd never write the same novel.

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However, saying that, writers have been rejected by agents with the words 'we have something similar in the pipeline', in which case it's a matter of submitting elsewhere.

I think this is a question you need to ask the consultancy which you've sent your mss to - they should know the market, and hopefully will know about this trilogy.

Sorry to bang on about this. But sometimes I feel compelled to comment on such casual advice, which can end up costing you a lot of money. Yes, a ms agency might know your market but if they do, it's usually a matter of chance. For example, one large agency uses readers almost entirely from the children's genre; but this doesn't stop them taking fantasy, SF, romance, etc. Which is fine as long as the writer is aware she probably knows more about her market than her reader.

In short:

a) The main task of a manuscript agency is to advise on your writing, not the market.

b) Why would a ms agency know any more about the market than you? Most times, your book will be reported on by another writer: so why would they know any more than you about the market?

I believe that the same consultancy may have had a hand in the other author's career

Some ms agencies are very good at playing up the part they may or may not have had in a writer's career. But, remember, the larger ones see hundreds, if not thousands of ms, a year. It stands to reason that some of those are publishable. And yes, occasionally a writer can get a break via an agency, e.g. the reader loves the book, shows it to her agent who then sells it. But these incidents are rare and in any case simply show that the book was already good and could probably have gone direct to an agent or publisher.

Terry

Terry, I simply advised the member to ask the consultacy agency, because they were already in the process of comissioneing a report from them and so they are killing two birds with one stone. The point is you can't know for certain how similar the two novels are until you've read through and compared both of them.


- NaomiM

Naomi, I think you're still missing my point. Manuscript agencies aren't market advisors, or agents, or publishers. They exist to help writers with their writing; that's all. Yes, most of them include a section in their reports called something like 'Marketability', but as I said, given the reports are nearly always written by writers, and often writers who are less than clued in on what will sell and what won't, there's little point in taking this advice on board.

In the bigger picture, as you know, I've been increasingly concerned about the assumed power roles some ms agencies have been advertising for themselves recently. This occurred with agents a way back, too; when publishers increasingly shifted the burden of sorting the slush to the agents. Ms agencies are now trying to shift the power towards themselves too. However, there is a big difference between ms agencies and agents, namely that agents are directly involved in selling books, working on contracts, etc, but ms agencies are not. An agent will take 15% of your earnings but at least they're doing something for that, hopefully getting you a better deal in the first place. As you know, at least one ms agency has finding ways to take a cut from the author's earnings, but for doing nothing the author couldn't do himself, and having already charged him a large sum of money in the first place!

Terry

You'll have to forgive our Terry, Gideonna, he has a thing about editorial agencies.

Actually, I have more of a thing about casual advice which is based on little actual personal experience.

You mean advice which applies to the actual question asked, Terry? I could throw in a high horse, here, but I think it's probably already been applied.

Now, now.

Take a deep breath and stop flaming. It's always a good idea to take a little while (about the time to make a cup of tea) to read your post before stabbing the post button.

Naomi, sticking to your reply to the question asked: have you ever worked for a manuscript agency? Have you ever had a report from a manuscript agency? If so, did it give you advice on how to get your book published? If so, did you follow that advice and did it get your book published?

Steve, I guess I'm just asking for Naomi's credentials. She gives an awful lot of advice on this site, and there's nothing wrong with offering advice. At the same time, I don't see anything wrong in asking what it's based on. After all, some of this advice can lead to a writer making a big decision about his career. Naomi has several times in the past, for example, recommended people go to manuscript agencies. And although she isn't doing that directly here, she is still recommending agencies as experts on the market (which I disagree with). My concern about some of these agencies is that they can charge a lot of money for services the writer doesn't actually need. That concern is based on having worked for one of the leading agencies and having worked with my own clients for several years now. So, while I may be swaying in the saddle at the moment, at least what I'm saying is based on a lot of experience.

Terry

If you like the book and the characters, continue to send it out, either to agents or directly to publishers. They are the ones to know whether they can sell it to the publisher (in the case of the agent) or sell it to the public (in the case of the editor). If this other script is going to be a big hit, editors may well be on the lookout for products to sit next to it and ride the same wave of success.

Unless you have read that other script, all you know for sure is that they sound the same. They could be worlds apart. More importantly, yours could be better.

So don't panic about it not hitting the market - let an editor and a sales team worry about that.

Like many people on this site, all I know about editorial agencies is what I've heard. And I've heard good and bad. Personally, although I'd be interested to read a report, I wouldn't waste my money. Besides, if you've had a request for a full manuscript, you already know you're doing something right!!

Colin M

Help! Just come back to this and didn't realise that my question had caused such a palaver...Don't know where to start, really.

Terry, thanks for your words of caution, but Naomi gave me a good answer that fitted in with my original query. I'm grateful for that, so once again, cheers Naomi.

I am more than aware of the debate that rages around literary consultancies, and their place within the submission process. I agree that they are now form the third tier in the slush pile. The agents are now almost as powerful as the publishers (at least to aspiring writers) and they are also swamped, which has created a need for a further filter. This has been provided by the consultancies, and I can't see that changing.

I've chosen to pay for a critique for a number of reasons, but mainly because I want someone skilled and reasonably objective to assess my whole project. I'm not expecting instant success, but I am keen to learn and I'm not into the whole workshop-type scenario. Nor do I want to ask friends and family to read my novel as that comes with its own baggage. Regarding the wider market, I do think that a good reader should be able to comment on a simple plot/character query such as mine. However, what I'm not asking them to do, is to analyse my place within that market. That's the agent's job.

I'll be interested to see what the consultancy throws back at me though, and I can definitely let you know whether I find it worthwhile. I'm certain that there are dodgy operators out there, but I have chosen one with an excellent track record so hoping that the experience will be valuable.

Melissa,

Sounds like you've got your head screwed on right and know what you need. Yes, please do let me know if the report was good for you.

I can't agree that consultancies now form the third tier. Some like to think they do, and even tell potential customers that's one of their functions (in so many words). But I still contend that this is a misuse of their role. For a start, they charge all of their clients for a different service, i.e. to have their work looked at editorially. If they're also saying they're acting as a third tier, then obviously that charge covers that service too. But no one should pay anyone to have their work put in front of a publisher or agent. You pay an agent after she's got you a contract, not before. Furthermore, at least one consultancy charges extra, on top of their fee, if an agent takes on a writer they've recommended.

The end result of this is that some consultancies are charging a lot of money (e.g. over £900 for a report) which some authors are led to believe is going to get them an agent. Here, I believe the consultancy is using a false promise to get the author to pay more than he actually needs to for a report. The fact is, a new author with say their first book, does not need a £900 report: an honest agency would give him the kind of report he needs for less than half that amount. But when the promise is dangled in front of him, that he could get an agent by going with this consultancy, then he may be more tempted to invest a big fee. In other words, it's false advertising.

The fact is, if your ms is good enough for an agent to take you on, the chances are it was good enough when you sent it to the consultancy. To put it another way, agents (at least reputable ones) don't charge you a wacking great fee for editing work on the basis that they may then take you on.

Terry