Sense of Wonder: A Century of Science Fiction (650 page)

What Do Agents Do, Exactly?

The thing that your agent gets paid for is selling your book to a North American publisher, in return for which she gets about 15% of the money you’re paid for writing the book. But there’s a lot that goes on before, during, and after the book sale that the agent isn’t directly paid for.

Your agent acts as a sort of pre-editor, working with you to make your book more commercial, and anticipating problems editors may have with it ahead of time, before the book gets submitted and rejected because of those problems. She knows the quirks of the various editors in the genre, and also what kinds of books they’re looking for right now, and if your book can be positioned as one of them.

Your agent acts as a liaison between writer and editor when necessary. Mostly you deal directly with your editor, but there are times when you need to vent, or complain about slow payment, or raise a problem, and your agent can do those things without hurting your working relationship with your editor. Likewise, when your editor has a problem with something that you’re doing, he can go to your agent, who will in theory know how to deal with it tactfully.

Your agent tracks royalties, issues you statements and 1099s for tax purposes, and takes care of hounding your publisher when they neglect to pay you on time (which happens a lot). Since agents don’t get paid until the publisher pays, they tend to be really good at this aspect of the job.

Your agent may broker your book to international markets, assuming your publisher hasn’t kept foreign rights. There’s usually an additional fee involved for the foreign agents and other costs (typically 20%), but a foreign sale can still be a nice bonus, especially on a book that has run its course in this country, financially at least. Besides, it’s cool to see a Croatian version of your work.

Perhaps most important, your agent helps keep you sane and productive, knowing when to prod and when to back off. Because writing books can take years to pay off and most writers have other full-time jobs, it’s extremely helpful to have an agent who gives you deadlines and keeps you focused on the writing side of your career goals.

What Don’t Agents Do?

Your agent is not your mom, or your babysitter, and she’s not going to lie to a publisher on your behalf. (Remember that she’s probably got other writers at that publisher, too, and won’t jeopordize her relationship with an editor without a really good reason.) While your agent is an advocate for your work, it’s also part of her job to tactfully tell you when you need to grow up and finish writing the new book already. Remember that if you’re too high maintenance, your agent can drop you as a client.

Literary agents generally won’t represent you for short story sales, since they don’t generate enough commission to be worth the trouble.

They also generally won’t handle all aspects of film sales—there are separate agents who handle this, although your film agent and literary agent will work together (and might be part of the same agency if you’re at one of the bigger agencies like William Morris).

Why Do You Need an Agent?

Once upon a time, you didn’t, although it was still a good idea. Isaac Asimov never had an agent, which certainly didn’t hurt his productivity (more than 500 books), but did hurt him in other ways (some questionable book deals, accidentally selling the same rights to two different publishers). The theoretical advantage of agents is that they take on the business side of the writing profession, leaving you free to pursue the creative side. But the more practical reason is that these days, fewer and fewer publishers will even look at unagented books. And even for publishers that do accept unsolicited material, your agent’s personal connections to the editors allow your work to be sent directly to the editor, rather than going into the slush pile.

What to Look for in an Agent

As an aspiring writer, it can be very hard to turn down a potential agent, but working for an agent who’s a bad fit for you will do nothing for your career. Assuming you’ve done your homework to make sure a prospective agent is legitimate (and read the “avoiding publishing scams” essay), here are some things to keep in mind:

How high-maintenance are you as a writer?
How much contact do you need with your agent? Some writers just like to be left alone to churn out a book every six months, while others want to chat with their agents frequently. Either one of those things is fine, but if you and your agent aren’t on the same wavelength, you’ll drive each other nuts, and the partnership will not end well. If you’re a high-maintenance writer (and um…I am) you need to have an agent who’s comfortable with that.

Are you more comfortable with a small agency or a large one?
Science fiction publishing has a mix of both, and since they’re more-or-less equally effective, you need to weigh what your needs are and which kind of agency can fill those needs better. Larger agencies have more resources, but at smaller shops one person can answer all of your questions. (Larger is not always more impersonal in publishing, although some agencies are friendly and some standoffish, some great about returning calls and some terrible, etc. And no, I’m not naming names…I have to work with all of these people. The traditional way to get this information is to ply editors or writers with alcohol at conventions.)

How well do you fit on your agent’s client list?
Ideally, you want to be a close genre match, but not indistinguishable from your agent’s other clients. It’s no fun to be the third-string space opera writer, or the one who only gets hired if your agent’s better-established clients are booked up. On the other hand, you don’t want to be the only hard science fiction writer in a stable full of fantasy writers: Your agent will be spending 90% of her time talking with fantasy editors, and your name will never come up in those conversations.

What are your agent’s strengths and weaknesses, and do they fit your needs?
In some ways, agents are a lot like baseball managers. Every agent has specific strengths and weaknesses, that ideally will allow you to succeed. By the same token, you may not stick with one agent for your whole career: In the same way that the manager who’s great with a young, up-and-coming team may not be able to get the same performance out of a veteran team filled with high-priced players, your needs as a writer may evolve. Keep that in mind while negotiating the terms of any agency agreement you sign. Watch out for irrevocable agreements, or ones that don’t give you a way out if the match is a terrible fit. (That kind of agreements is rare among legitimate agencies, although the old Scott Meredith Literary Agency, before Scott Meredith died and most of the agents left to form other agencies, was notorious for them. Many agents still work on handshake deals, at least if you’re an established writer, or a one-page letter of agreement outlining your relationship.)

Finding an Agent

The single best way to get an agent is to be recommended by another client of that agent, or by an editor or other publishing pro who that agent knows and respects. Going to conventions, getting to know writers and agents, and getting a reputation for behaving like a professional will go a long way toward accomplishing this, as well as giving you a sense of what individual agents’ strengths and weaknesses are.

Don’t just talk to writers—listen as well. Who’s really happy with their agents? If people are complaining about their agents, why are they doing so? Which agents are actively looking for writers, and which have full stables?

If that’s not an option, think about the contemporary writers whose work most resonates with yours. Look on the acknowledgments pages of their books to find out who their agents are. Go to those agents’ websites and look at their client lists and submissions guidelines (which will be similar to the process outlined in the “submitting a manuscript” essay. Even if that particular agent is full, one of the newer associates at her agency may have an opening, if you fit well with what they’re good at selling.

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An earlier version of this essay was published on DailyKos on August 7, 2006. The original essay, along with other publishing-related essays, is archived at www.swordsmith.com/essays.html

Yes, publishing is a swamp. Most of my publishing essays are devoted to explaining how cattails can be yummy and the ways that marshgrass is sometimes kind of sweet, but I wanted to spend a little bit of time exploring the muckier part of the swamp as well, in the interest of y’all not drowning. There is some solid ground in among the mud, but certain areas of publishing, especially vanity publishing and self-publishing, are especially prone to scams. Another area where scams are common is in fake literary agents, who prey on new writers’ naivete about how publishing works.

Before I get to any specifics, let me quote Yog’s Law, a fundamental rule in professional publishing that will keep you out of 99% of all scams:

Money flows toward the writer.

This sounds simple, but many people forget it when what seems like a golden publishing opportunity is dangled in front of them.

Money flows toward the writer.

As a writer, you don’t have to pay to get your work published. People pay you for specific, limited rights to publish your work. If an agent asks for a fee to read a manuscript, it’s a scam. If a publisher says they’ll publish your work if you agree to pay a fee to an outside editor to have your book revised, it’s a scam. Money may not flow to you very quickly, or in very large amounts—there are legitimate semi-pro SF magazines that pay in copies of the magazine, and publishers who pay on publication of the work, years after you’ve written it—but the key is that they are paying you.

Agency Scams

An agent’s job is to sell your work to a publisher. (There are lots of other things that agents do, but this is the biggie.) In return for selling your work, the agent takes a percentage of the money from sales of your work, typically 15%. The agent doesn’t get any money until he or she sells your work. Once a book is sold, the publisher will make payments directly to your agent, who then sends you a check for 85% of the total. Reputable agents also send you tax forms and periodic statements. One reason good agents are so selective is that they generally have to spend years working with a particular writer before they see any money out of the deal.

Any agent who you are seriously considering signing with should be happy to provide you with a client list. You should recognize some of the names on that list. There should be many writers on that list in the genre that you write in. (Agents tend to specialize in a particular literary area, in which they have ties to all the editors. Yes, my agent also represents me in contract negotiations when I write baseball books, but her specialty is SF and fantasy, because that’s my main area of focus, and she represents a number of other successful writers in the field.) Any agency that balks at sending you a client list, or signs people regardless of genre, should be treated with extreme suspicion.

Any agency that charges an upfront fee, or sponsors a contest with an entry fee whose prize is representation, or who refers you to a freelance editor saying that they’ll represent you if you have this editor work on your book is a scam. (There’s a legitimate place in the field for book doctors, but that isn’t it.) Many of these fake agencies have never sold a book, and make their money by milking writers out of fees which can run into the thousands of dollars.

Be aware that many scam agencies have names that are very close to legitimate agencies (Creative Arts Book Company is not the same as Creative Artists Agency). Many advertise prominently in places like
Writer’s Digest
and other publications geared to new and not-so-savvy writers. Some of them will have slick websites.

There are no particular qualifications for becoming a literary agent. Like marriage counselors, anyone can put up a website and call him- or herself an agent. The best way of all to find an agent is by referral: a writer who knows your work recommends you to an agent. (My agent pretty much only looks at new clients who have been recommended by one of her current stable of writers, for instance.) How do you get to know writers and agents? Go to SF conventions. Be pleasant, polite, and professional. Lots of people will be more than happy to steer you in the right direction.

Vanity Publisher Scams

Vanity publishers make their money by producing your book for a fee. They typically provide no editing to speak of, and have no actual distribution into bookstores, though they will make misleading claims to the contrary. (Saying that the book will be available in Amazon or can be ordered by bookstores is meaningless, because you can accomplish that easily without a vanity publisher, and because no bookstore will carry their nonreturnable, overpriced books.) The typical vanity press book sells about 70 copies—the exact number that the author’s family and friends buy.

If you want to write a book that only your family and friends need access to, there’s no reason for you to go to a vanity publisher. Go to someplace like Lulu.com, which is essentially a glorified copy service, and they will provide print-on-demand books for far less money per book than a vanity press, and you won’t have to pay any up-front fees.

Not all scam publishers charge up-front fees, but none of them are going to get any real kind of book distribution. If you’d like to know how they work, there’s a wonderful, hilariously funny exposé of Publish America by the organizer of Atlanta Nights, an attempt by a group of professional writers to write the worst possible book and get it accepted by Publish America, which pretended to be a selective, legitimate publisher, but actually offered a contract to anything submitted without ever reading it.

There are some cases where self-publishing makes sense, but going to a vanity press never makes sense—remember, money flows to the writer. Think about self-publishing if:

1) you have a huge built in audience for something that no one who isn’t already familiar with it will go to a bookstore to buy. (For instance, you have several thousand dedicated readers for your post-apocalyptic webcomic that concerns the inner workings of the sanitation industry, but only sanitation industry professionals who also read SF get the jokes.)

2) you want to publish something for a select group, but you’re not interested in wider exposure or making money. (For instance, a family genealogy, a book dedicated to local history for the town historical society, or a packet of historical documents for a class that you teach.)

In most other cases, traditional publishing will reach a far broader audience than you can on your own. (Although you’ll have to do most of the publicity yourself.) There are some cases where a book is so nontraditional that no publisher will touch it, but it actually does have an audience. A number of SF and fantasy books like that have started out as self-published, but usually once they’ve established a clear audience, they’re picked up by a traditional publisher, which can expand that audience and maximize the book’s reach. Examples of genre-related books that started out as self-published and went on to become traditional best-sellers include The Celestine Prophecies and the Left Behind series. But for the most part, if a book is well-written and has an audience, you will eventually be able to find a legitimate publisher to take it on.

Resources for Avoiding Scams

There are some excellent resources online for checking on if a publisher is legitimate or not. (I personally don’t put much trust in publications like
Writer’s Digest
geared to newbies, but some genre writer’s organizations, most notably SFWA (www.sfwa.org) do a great job educating their members and new writers alike.)

Preditors and Editors
(http://pred-ed.com/) is a frequently updated list of markets, agents, and contests with annotations by writers as to which can be trusted and which to avoid.

The publishing scams page at
SFF.net
, a terrific website geared to writers and fans of science fiction and fantasy, is another useful resource on a site filled with useful resources.

Writer Beware
is SFWA’s site for alerts about specific scams, as well as general advice on avoiding scams. If you’d like a more detailed version of this segment, that’s the place I’d recommend to start.

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An earlier version of this essay was published on DailyKos on July 23, 2006. The original essay, along with other publishing-related essays, is archived at www.swordsmith.com/essays.html