I recenlty sent a sample off to an agent. Two days later I was e-mailed and told that they loved the sample and wanted to see the whole book. A couple of week's later (after I'd contacted the agent to say that a publisher had asked for the novel, too) I was e-mailed and told by the agent that the reader's report was very critical of my work and I was unusually being sent it. the report would be vicious but it wasn't intended for my eyes.

Wait 2 weeks for report (I now know that there was a reasonable reason for this delay).

Then get report, in which the reader lied about the story, content and style, grossly exaggerated, made up character traits, noted usages I didn't deploy, took things ridiculously out of context, refered to dictionary words as 'maddening slang', confused characters, refered to examples of narrative prose as examples of dialogue, complained about events that didn't happen. For example, I was told that one of my characters does nothing but have elocution lessons, manicures and only drinks out of frosted glass when no manicure or lesson takes place or are refered to, and she drinks out of frosted glass once.

I felt kicked - it's one thing to get a rejection but another to be told you can't write, and yet another to be told that all you believe about style is wrong.

I wrote a thorough letter to the agent, complaining about the report (something I would never usually do). Today, get e-mail full of sincere apology from agent, saying it was clear that the reader had not read the book and had distorted out of shape. Said that initially she had liked the book and then was surprised and disappointed that the reader had hated it so much.

So, I'm vindicated, but I worry here that if I hadn't seen the report (rare) and if I wasn't an editor and CW teacher myself, and thus wouldn't be able to suss when someone hasn't read a text, I wouldn;t have known that there was a reader out there, with an influence over my career who is unprofessional and quite frankly nasty. And I have still lost a contact who really liked my stuff.

Anybody else had something like this? Agent's readers are accountable to no one.

Faze

I've never heard of anything like this, but it sounds ghastly, and frightening. I hope this is exceptional.

Ani

The reader needs sacking! Unbelievable! And, like Ani, I hope exceptional.

Harry

Shocking, and like Ani, I hope this is an isolated incident.

As if there weren't enough obtacles to overcome.

Best
Sion

It sounds appallingly unprofessional. I’d be asking the agent why she isn’t offering to take it back and read it herself.

Dee.

I agree with Dee; I think you deserve a second chance. The reader sounds a total joke and not someone that I would want working for me if I was an agent.

It can't be beyond their powers to think, that if they particularly dislike a genre, that they can't give it a fair appraisal. Say, for example, a reader utterly hates chick-lit (whatever that is) then, for a start, they are never going to like it anyway, but it's the nature of predjudice to see cliche and stereotypes on every page. If they aren't there, then the characters can be taken out of context to fit stereotypes.

If an agent wants to consider certain genres, then they should be confident that their readers be receptive to them.

Of course, it is possible that your work may not have been the problem at all. Perhaps the reader just hates their job and their boss.

Colin M

I'm with everyone else on this. I really do think you should ask this agent how many other writers this reader has assessed for her; if she is now getting a member of staff to check some of the manuscripts against the submitted reader reports; and whether her initial response to your manuscript can now be tested, either by another reader or, better still, the agent herself. They are dealing here with months or years of hard work by writers who may be tomorrow's best-sellers. It doesn't just work against you, it works against her. It's not good enough to make aplogies, she needs to ensure, if she is reputable, that it doesn't happen again. Shyama

Thanks for that everyone. Not just me then. Agent says she'll look into it and get back to me.

I did put to her that if her reader misreads and overreacts to everything, then the agency is missing out. I also put it to her that every writer knows they write for a minority and can't please everyone. I didn't ask her to read it again, because I didn't want to seem whiney. And initially, i thought, if this is your reader's values, then you're not for me.

We'll see.

Faze

Good luck Faze,
You seem to be handling the situation very professionally (unlike them!)
Elspeth

This doesn't surprise me at all anymore. My agent (old) liked my book, had one of his under agents read it liked it but weren't sure of marketing. Sent for a report to an official reader type. the report was vindictive and unprofessional in my opinion. The woman who wrote it had either been upset by what I had written (offended by the sex and the attitude portrayed by teh character (with reason) to the rich cos she's from that background? possibly) anyway it was prejorative and insulting. at one point the character says something like 'places she couldn't name' and the reader said is this Clare being lazy becasue she can't be bothered to look it up? etc etc there were loads of examples like that. (i'd have to go dig it out to remember more _ i have tried to forget it...) she did also completely misread the book.

I was shocked and horrified. The agent said he too felt the report was overly harsh but it led to him requesting I write the book as thriller or else. I took the or else.

I am sorry to hear you've had similar and I am glad you wrote and put the record straight.

these people - I don't know who they ***ing think they are.

Bloody hell. Self publishing grows more attrictive by the day...

Colin M

Yes - the difference is that we know that what we know is only that. WIth some of them, what they know is all there is to know.

I'm really glad you posted this, because I had a similar experience with a reader's report I had paid for. The list of criticisms was endless, and up to a point I accept that if I had as a writer not made certain things clear that was my fault. But she pointed to a number of things that had been made explicitly clear, confused characters etc etc and the whole tone of her report was just plain nasty.

But my biggest beef was it was a young adult novel (clearly aimed at the upper end of that age range) in which it was mentioned - without involving any description - that a 17 and 18 year old character had made love. The reader found this "sexual content" totally unsuitable to a young adult novel, saying that young adult ended at 14 (which is total bobbins). Using that premise, she then made inappropriate suggestions such as making the leading characters younger, making them orphans etc etc. Now even forgetting the Melvyn Burgess end of the young adult sex scale, Malorie Blackman's award-winning and completely inoffensive Noughts and Crosses has the lead characters make love, the boy accused of rape and the girl defiantly pregnant - and that's on Key Stage 3 (ie 11-14) National Curriculum. I e-mailed the agency pointing the above out, saying I was disturbed to have paid for a report on my novel when I seemed to know more about the current young adult market than the reader did. The agency apologised, agreed and said that perhaps the reader they had used had been inappropriate and they were going to seek a reader more in touch with the young adult market for future YA reports.

I didn't bother complaining about all the factual inaccuracies in the report, but I did feel that the reader had been so disgusted with the "sexual content" that she had really disliked the book, and set out to savage it. (Incidentally, although I didn't complain about the factual inaccuracies, the agency did say reading the report they felt it was confusing and dismissive. Which made me wonder if they actually vet the work of the reader before employing them).

In future I shall want to know more about the reader I am paying good money to.

Andrea

<Added>

Incidentally, I commissioned another 2 reports on the same book - while both of course suggesting improvements (which was the point of the exercise) one was very positive and the other absolutely glowing.

these experiences sound like an article needing to be written for the Society of Authers mag and/or other writing mags. Fuss should be made of this. If this was the financial industry with such cock ups they'd all be on Watchdog by now!

<Added>

try Authors....

Andrea, having had such a bad report, did the agency offer you another for free from a more suitable reader. Afterall, if you've paid for a service then you deserve to have that service. If I went to a pub and paid for a pint of beer, only to receive half a lemonade because the barman liked serving that particular drink, I'd want more than an apology: I'd want me beer!

Colin M