Hi all, another newbie here enjoying his free trial.

Two days ago I emailed an agency requesting submission guidelines for my novel, and today was surprised to recieve this reply:

"I should tell you that at the moment we are not taking on new manuscripts for the purposes of book publishing. However, we are open to considering new feature film and TV projects, and could in principle help turn your story into a screenplay and work on getting it produced."

After two years using my free time to produce a novel I'm happy with, I now have the opportunity to work for another few months changing it into a screenplay on the off chance the agency might like it! Surely it's much more difficult to sell a $200 million sci-fi epic to a Hollywood studio than a finished novel to a publisher?

Still, I will email them my sample chapters just to get them read. In fact it's ideal as my printer is broken and I am currently waiting for rejections before I can send the returned chapters to new agents.

Hi

Welcome to WW. Not meaning to burst your bubble or anything, but the first thing I'd check out is if this agency are planning to charge you anything for 'turning your novel into a screenplay'.

Secondly, I'd check what Preditors and Editors have to say about this agency.

http://anotherealm.com/prededitors/

An indispensible guide to the industry.

It just seems a little strange that they would reject a fiction novel MS but offer to rework it as a screenplay. I hope I'm wrong, but you can never be too careful.

Best

JB

<Added>

Sorry, I just noticed they haven't rejected your MS or even seen it. I think that makes it even stranger.

Weird! It does sound rather dodgy, but sounds like you already know that...