Hello forum brainiacs and agony aunts,

I'm new to this forum. Yes, another way to procrastinate when I should be writing or ramming the pen up my nose. My question has surely been asked before...

I've signed to a well-known agency in London, although I live at the arse-end of the world among the kangaroos and outback psychopaths. So I haven't met my agent. Only spoken to him on the phone (once), exchanged emails, signed a contract with my blood at midnight on Halloween. The usual banal stuff.

It took me about six months to find an agent. I got a lot of the usual emails - ''I love it but it doesn't fit my list" - and a certain agent even used her rejection letter to plug the writing manual that she's written. But I did finally get a decent agent.

Now, Mr Agent isn't that communicative. I've been waiting six months. As far as I know, only two editors have read (and passed) on the manuscript.

How long should I expect this process to take? Is six months a long time for an agent to be trying with a debut novel? Or a year?

How long is too long?

I don't want to hassle an agent that I've never met yet. In the meantime, a few other prominent London agencies have contacted me with positive comments about my MSS (it took them eight months to read the bloody MSS that I sent in to their query pile), but I've had to tell them that I'm already signed to agency X.

I'd appreciate your comments.

PS. My novel is an original literary romance about an island of bloodthirsty dinosaurs that are cloned from ancient DNA, a ghastly murder in the Louvre involving the Mona Lisa, and a boy wizard/virgin vampire who gets kidnapped by a creepy guy called Humbert Humbert. Sounds good, huh?

Well it really depends on how much patience you have. Some wait one year, some two. It might be worth contacting The Society Of Authors. I don't know if they deal with overseas authors, but, if they do, they will be able to advise on how to extract yourself from the contract if and when you fnally decide to pull the plug and try your luck elsewhere - bearing in mind that the current credit crunch has put a lot of projects on hold with commissioning editors at the moment, which may be a reason for your agent's delay.
Also, it's worth bearing in mind that only a percentage of agented mss from debut authors find a publisher, and your agent may have more luck with your second mss - assuming you are still writng, and not waiting on the agent to sell this one first.

Good luck.


NaomiM

How long should I expect this process to take? Is six months a long time for an agent to be trying with a debut novel? Or a year?

It depends what's been happening in that six months: has it gone out, in batches of six, say, to every publisher which is above the agent's radar, and s/he's waiting to hear back from the latest interesting independents? Has it gone out to two editors s/he particularly trusts, and got the kind of feedback which means that the agent is bracing themselves to talk revisions with you, only just... hasn't... quite... found.. the time for a tricky conversation? Has it gone out to the first six, and got the kind of feedback which means the agent's seriously wondering if, after all, s/he can sell it? (I know you know it's gone to two, I'm just illustrating the different possible scenarios).

It's absolutely not hassling an agent to say politely, 'Please can you bring me up to date with what's happening so far, and what you're planning to do next.' You are their client, and you're entitled to know what's happening to your book. If your ring them, they might not be able to answer straight away, without digging in their records. But they absolutely should be able to tell you chapter and verse by return of email.

Apparently it took two years to sell a certain mega-selling surprise bestseller about a dog... But that wasn't because she was twiddling her thumbs, any more than the author was.

There are probably excellent answers to the questions you need to ask, but meanwhile, don't lose the details of the other agencies who were interested. You will have to extract yourself from this agent before they'll look at your work - the agreement will tell you what the notice period is and Society of Authors will advise (it gets tricky if the agent gets a sniff of a contract while they're in the notice period).

All in all, it does sound as if you need a State-of-the-Nation conversation with the agent.

Very best of luck, and welcome to WW

Emma

Hey Zuckerman - can feel your frustration on this. When I had an agent a couple of years ago and he was submitting my work, he was really good and forwarded all the publisher's responses by email so I could read the feedback myself. The process took about six months before he gave up, keeping me fully informed along the way. Some publishers take longer than others to respond of course and that is why the process can take so long. I remember him telling me that he got a deal for one client a year later after a publisher requested a manuscript that had already been submitted to him! But I understand agents operate differently and some prefer to keep their cards close to their chest and don't bother informing their clients of every submission and response they make/receive. At the very least though you should have a list of publishers the agent has approached and a time-scale for when they will get back to you.

PS. My novel is an original literary romance about an island of bloodthirsty dinosaurs that are cloned from ancient DNA, a ghastly murder in the Louvre involving the Mona Lisa, and a boy wizard/virgin vampire who gets kidnapped by a creepy guy called Humbert Humbert. Sounds good, huh?

I'd buy it. ;-)

Where do you live? I've discounted Tasmania as they don't have many kangaroos - just the psychopaths AND bizarrely a very specific breed of very short women.

I think you need to know what's been happening during those six months.
If it were me I'd email asking who he has subbed to and what the respective responses have been.
This is a straightforward request which should illicit a straightforward reply...by return.
But then I like to be kept in the loop and my agent knows that.
HB x

I totally agree with Helen. There is nothing wrong with sending your agent a query after this amount of time. I would be howling at the moon with frustration by now.

I'm not sure there's any such thing as "normal" in this business, but if it's anecdotes you want, my agent sent out my novel a week or two after I'd signed, and had gathered all responses, both rejections and offers, within about 3 weeks. She is a fast worker, admittedly, but I have to say, if it had been six months with minimal contact I would have started worrying that she just wasn't that into me, not to coin a phrase.

Sounds like you have other interest, so nothing wrong with giving your current agent a sharp nudge, I would say!

Thanks for all this comments. They really are helpful.

I'm gonna email Mr Agent and see what's up. After all, I've been waiting six months without much word.

I did do a fairly substantial rewrite, in accordance with the agent's comments. But this was before he started sending out to any editors.

Yes, I have the embyonic idea for another book. It's just so much bloody painful work! So I at least want to see what my agent can do with the book I've written. I suppose if the book is original and good enough to get attention from reputable agencies, then it should get offers from publishers.

At least, that's what I'm hoping...

By the way, I hope that you guys see the literary reference connected to my profile name 'Zuckerman'!!!

I suppose if the book is original and good enough to get attention from reputable agencies, then it should get offers from publishers.

I'd love this to be true - but sadly, it's not necessarily the case that representation will lead to publication. My agent took on 12 new clients last year, of whom 8 got deals. The ones who didn't had written books that she loved and felt deserved to be published - but for whatever reason, it didn't happen.

I think a lot of this comes down to the fact that acquisitions are being conducted more and more by committee - it's not enough for one editor to sign a book on the basis that they love it: they have to get it past their colleagues and marketing teams first. And that, from what I hear, is the biggest hurdle.

Fingers crossed for you!

Yes, I have the embyonic idea for another book. It's just so much bloody painful work! So I at least want to see what my agent can do with the book I've written. I suppose if the book is original and good enough to get attention from reputable agencies, then it should get offers from publishers. At least, that's what I'm hoping...

I think you might be running the risk of putting all your eggs in one basket. Even writing a brilliant, original novel is no guarantee of publication. This may well be a bestseller for you but it also may just be the book that whets the appetite and makes an agent/publisher ask for more.

It is bloody painful but if you start book two now you'll either be writing your follow up or you'll be writing the novel that gets you published. It's a game that rewards tenacity.

I suppose if the book is original and good enough to get attention from reputable agencies, then it should get offers from publishers.

Sadly that is not necessarily true. If it's too 'original' to the point where it doesn't fit comfortably within any one genre, the publisher may not know how to market it and so may reject it on that count. Conversly, it may be a subject in which the market is already saturated, with several similar novels already in production, and so they don't want to add one more, however well written, at this point in time.
I would get on with writing the next book, rather than, as others have said, 'put all your eggs in this one basket'.


- NaomiM

<Added>

- it's worth bearing in mind that Mark Haddon's 'Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night time' and Jasper Fforde's 'Thursday Next' series, languished on their respective agents' desks for a year or two before finding publishers.

Yes, I do think it's madness to put off starting another novel until you've heard about this one, though waiting to hear is incredibly distracting, and makes it very hard to concentrate. Apart from anything else, if your prayers are answered and you're offered a two-book contract, the pressure of that can be even harder to cope with, and it's an enormous help to have something that's already got started.

And yes, alas, good enough, with the right balance of originality and familiarity to suit its part of the market, all has to intersect with saleable enough, before you can be reasonably confident that it'll sell. A heart-breaking but common rejection among really, really good writers is 'I absolutely love this, but I can't sell it.' Another is what my agent calls the high competence ones: 'You're doing everything right, I can't fault it, but I just don't love it enough.' An agent's got to fall in love with it to sell it with conviction, which is very personal and subjective (how often have you merely liked a book a friend adored, or vice versa?).

Emma

Oh God, don't put off book two. Many publishers won't look at a writer without knowing what's in the pipeline, even if it's vague. And if they sign you they might not give you long to put out book two.
Crack on, I say.
HB x

Emma, you're on the money.

"I absolutely love this, but I can't sell it".

'You're doing everything right, I can't fault it, but I just don't love it enough.'

I received those comments from about six high-profile agents before I got representation. That took eight months (especially when you're waiting for international postage to deliver your MSS). I was baffled, when agents told me that the book was 'remarkable' but still didn't want to represent me. They had never met me, so the reason wasn't my personal obnoxiousness or physical resemblance to a rubbish bin.

Talk about frustrating!

I reckon there's a market for literary agent voodoo dolls. Start with Andrew Wylie and Ed Victor dolls, then work down the list. If voodoo works, then a lot of literary agents would soon have no heads.