I'm just back from World Fantasy Con 2013, held in Brighton. World Fantasy is a literary event and so the panels are about writing, agenting, editing, etc.

I took a lot of notes, and got pretty star-struck at some of the people on the panels, especially for TV/film stuff.

Below are the notes I took from the panel of agents, working roughly around the question, "Are agents redundant?". I figured this might be of most interest to WriteWorders.

You'll note that I have refrained from making any comments . . .

Panel:

Ian Dury, Barry Goldblatt, Joshua Bilmes, Meg Davis, John Jarrold, Juliet Mushens

Are agents redundant?

Ian: You can publish yourself, but most books fail. The public will conclude that a book priced at 99p is probably worth just that.

Juliet: But I have a client - in this audience - who sold 350,000 copies of his self-published book. I'm helping him with rights, etc - things he doesn't have time/skill to do as well as write and continue with his day job.

Joshua: Go to Dean Wesley Smith's or Kristine Kathryn Rusch's blogs if you want to find out why agents are redundant or criminal. They must have had bad agents . . . Writers are generally best at writing; we bring skills developed from making mistakes; something you can't replicate as a writer.

Are you overpaid?

Barry: No, I work hard.

John: Authors are individuals with different needs. There are no absolutes in publishing.

Why is it hard to get an agent?


Juliet: There's that saying, 'Everyone has a novel in them'. Well, most of them should stay there. I get up to 80 submissions a week. 90% get rejected because, e.g. the cover letter's a mess - I had one case last week of a book that was dictated by a ghost! It's hard to be a good writer. You don't sit down at the piano with no musical skill and expect to bash out a tune; but people do with books. Of the 10% that aren't an instant No, often the writing lets it down, or some things just don't work. Then you get The One - that makes it all worthwhile. Advice: you learn from your mistakes - it's very rare a first book gets taken on; most writers have lots of books in the vault.

Ian: Iain Banks took 14 years from submitting to get an acceptance, with 6 previous novels in the vault. He said that's where he learned his craft.

Barry: For an agent, it's all about your track record.

Ian: An editor's work has changed greatly in the last twenty years. It's now not so much about editing as being an advocate, an agent even, for your book within your company.

Do you edit your clients' work?

Joshua: Yes, as much as they will let me. Not all want it. Others do. For instance, I worked on a lot of Brandon Sanderson's early books to the point where I phoned him up one day and said, "Stop sending me shit books!".

What if you don't like a client's new book?

Juliet: You have a proper sit-down conversation with them in which you say you really liked this and this but there are some things that just don't work. As an agent, you're not just about one book, you're managing a career.

Barry: Writers tend to be bad at explaining/pitching their books. So I prefer them to write a book first, then we'll discuss it.

John: Voice is everything. You can tell by the first page; then the question is, can they write the book?

How far do you look ahead?

Juliet: It depends on the author. Some will say they just want this book to be a one-off; others have whole series planned out.

Horror stories?

John: Don't be adversarial. Sometimes a book just doesn't sell. You can't second-guess the public.

Barry: The agent's role has evolved, e.g. expanded into marketing. Everything now happens at this stage. The worst thing for an agent is when you think a book's brilliant but you just can't sell it; have to tell the author to put it away for now and try something else.

John: I started in marketing [at Orion]. The majority of publishers' books don't have any marketing - we spent on just 12 out of 60 books. There are exceptions, e.g. The Hare with the Golden Eyes, bought for £5,000, not much marketing but sold in millions. However, you can't base your career on exceptions.

Should agents publish their clients' backlist?

Joshua: We're marketing our clients' backlists in ebook form that we're also publishing. We believe in getting them out. Don't spend a lot on this marketing however, because it's too expensive. Are going to try Open Road soon [specialised marketing firm].

Ian: We began a discreet backlist because publishers either didn't want to do it or the terms were no good. Tried to get Catherine Cookson's publisher to re-publish her backlist but the terms were terrrible, so we did them instead. In fact, the terms offered by publishers for both frontlist and backlist are poor (e.g. 85/15%).

What are your success rates?

Joshua: When I started it was about a third to a half; now it's 75% and up. But every book is rejected several times first.

Barry: I took on a book I believe in. 23 editors rejected; the 24th bought it and it went on to sell 150,000 copies.

Is publishing ageist? (Question from a 57 year old man in the audience who has just got a two-book contract with Tor but can't get an agent.)

John: No. It's all about the writing. Mary Wesley sold her first book at 65.

Do you look at an author's earlier career?

Ian: Yes, absolutely.

Does an author need a web presence?

Ian: Not necessarily, but when we read something we love, we'll check out the author online. Not to see how many Twitter followers you have, but how you come across online.

Juliet: Yes, don't act badly online.

Other points:


Ian: Authors have to champion their books when submitting to agents,e.g. -
What it's about
Why it's good
and make it punchy.

Juliet: Yes, go into bookshops and see where in which genre your book would be published.

John: Most of my (SF/Fantasy) authors can talk about their genre and its history for hours. Knowing what the areas are of a genre is more important than saying my book is like X's.

John: And follow the submission guidelines. If they ask for the first three chapters, don't send them your 'best' three from various places in the book. Every page has to be your best.

Joshua: The exception being John Grisham, who sent in what he said were the best three, not the first three - but don't submit saying you're doing a 'Grisham'!

John: There are no absolutes in publishing.


Edited by Terry Edge at 18:32:00 on 03 November 2013

Hi Terry,
You posted this without a subject so only geeks like me will be able to get in (by View - Source to locate the URL, if you're interested...).

You may want to repost and include a subject if you want to get some replies!

G