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Researching Publishers and Agents

Too many people submit manuscripts to publishers.

Simply to read enough of those manuscripts to judge them unworthy would take
the full-time services of several salaried editors. Most publishers simply
can't afford to plow through the slush pile in hopes of someday finding a
Great Novelist.

So they indicate in Writer's Market that they will consider only "agented
submissions"--work that a professional literary agent, who knows the market,
thinks has some sales potential.

That simply draws fire onto the agents, who now find that they too have huge
slush piles. And, like the publishers, the agents can't make money reading
unsalable junk.

Where does that leave you?

In better shape than you think. If you've hammered out a credible but
surprising plot about interesting people in a hell of a jam, and you're
showing them in action instead of telling us what they're like, and your
grammar, spelling and punctuation are first-rate--you're already ahead of 80
per cent of your competition.

Now the problem is finding the right market. Too many novice writers simply
fire off their work to a publisher they've vaguely heard of, or one that's
supposed to be prestigious, or even one that happens to be conveniently
located right in town. (Those were precisely my three motives in submitting
my first children's book to Parnassus Press. They bought it, which shows that
sometimes even ignoramuses can get lucky. By rights I should have had to send
the ms. to a couple of dozen houses before hitting the right one--if I ever
did.)

Publishers tend to carve out special markets for themselves. A couple of
sharp editors can dominate a genre; because they know how to reach a certain
kind of reader, they attract a certain kind of writer. Or a publisher may be
passionately devoted to supporting a certain kind of fiction, but is deeply
uninterested in any other kind. A feminist publisher wouldn't have the
faintest idea how to market a men's action-adventure novel, and wouldn't care
to learn. A children's publisher won't care how well-crafted your murder
mystery is. And so on.

So step one is almost embarrassingly obvious: Notice which houses publish the
kind of story you're working on. Look carefully at the story elements in the
titles they publish; Del Rey fantasy novels, for example, require magic as a
major component, not just frosting or a gimmick to get the hero somewhere
interesting. Out of all the publishers in North America, only a few are
potentially yours.

Then consult those potential publishers' entries in Writer's Market and see
what they have to say about their own needs and who their editors are in
specific genres. You may learn that your work in progress is too long, or too
short, or needs some particular quality like a heroine aged over 35. You may
also learn how long it takes them to respond to queries and submissions.
Don't take those statements as legally binding promises; responses almost
always take far longer, especially for unagented submissions.

Writer's Market also lists publishers by the genres they publish. This list
can lead you to houses you're not familiar with, but don't just rush your ms.
off to some publisher in Podunk. Check out the entries of these houses also,
and also track down some of their recent titles in your genre. If they strike
you as dreadful garbage, avoid them. Better to stay unpublished than to be
trapped with a bad publisher.

Another useful source of research information is the publishing trade press.
Quill and Quire in Canada, and Publisher's Weekly in the US, are much more
up-to-date than any annual can be. So if the top horror editor in New York
has just moved to a new publisher, or a publisher is starting a new line of
romance novels aimed at Asian women, you may adjust your marketing strategy
accordingly. Magazines like The Writer and Writer's Digest supply similar
market news.

If every possible publisher warns you off with "No unagented submissions,"
you then have to go through a similar process with literary agents. You
should be able to find an annually updated list of agents in your local
library or the reference section of a good bookstore. Some agents, like Scott
Meredith and Richard Curtis, have even written books themselves about the
publishing business; these are worth reading.

As a general rule, you probably need an agent in the city where most of your
publishers are. That, as a general rule, means New York City. You also need
an agent who knows the market for your particular genre, so your work will go
as promptly as possible to the most likely markets. (Some agents may submit a
work in multiple copies to all potential publishers; this can really speed up
the process.)

But also bear in mind that the phone and fax can put almost anyone in close
touch with the New York market, so an agent in Chicago or Los Angeles or
Miami may be quite as effective as somebody in Manhattan--and may also be
familiar with regional publishers.

Consider whether you want a big agent with scores or hundreds of clients, or
a small outfit. The big agent may have clout but little stake in promoting
you; the small agent may work hard for you, but lack entree to some editors.
Talk to published writers, if possible, about their experiences with agents;
sometimes a sympathetic author can suggest a good one.

No agent, however good, can sell your work to an editor who doesn't want to
buy it. What the agent offers the editor is a reasonably trustworthy opinion
about the marketability of a particular manuscript. It's in the agent's
interest to deal only in work with serious sales potential, and to get it
quickly into the hands of its most likely buyers.

You may therefore have to query a number of agents before you find one who's
willing to take you on. And you may find that some highly reputable agents
won't look at your stuff unless you pay them to.

This is not a racket. If you agree to the agent's terms, the reading may give
you a very frank response. Sometimes you'll get a detailed critique that may
devastate your ego but teach you just what you need to learn. In many cases
the agent will waive the reading fee if he feels you're a commercial
possibility and you're willing to sign on as one of his clients. That should
be an encouraging offer indeed.

Sometimes an agent will take you on but strongly suggest certain kinds of
revisions, or even that you tackle a completely different kind of story.
Listen carefully; you're getting advice from someone who knows the market and
wants to share in your prosperity. At least one of my novels greatly profited
from the advice of an agent who thought my originally proposed ending was a
disaster.

Your agreement with an agent may take the form of a detailed contract, or a
simple agreement over the phone, or something in between. Be sure you
understand and accept the terms your agent requires: Ten per cent of what he
makes you, or 15? Deductions for photocopying, postage and phone bills?
Control over all your writing, or just your fiction output?

Once you have an agent, don't be a pest. When he's got something to report,
he'll let you know. If you've got something to report, like the completion of
the manuscript or an idea for turning it into a series, let the agent know.
Otherwise, stay off the phone and stick to your writing.

In some cases, of course, you may find you've sold a novel on your own hook
and then decide to go looking for an agent. Under these happy circumstances
you should find it fairly easy to get an agent's interest. If the publisher's
already offered you a contract (and you haven't signed yet), the agent may be
willing to take you on and then bargain a better deal for you. But you'll
probably do all right even if you negotiate that first contract on your own.
Most publishers are honorable and decent people; sometimes their integrity is
positively intimidating. Even if they weren't honorable, your first book is
likely to make so little money that it wouldn't be worth it to screw you out
of spare change.