Let’s talk about what I have learned about agents. Full disclaimer I don not currently have representation as an author, so take these with a grain of salt as I clearly don’t have all the answers yet either.
1: They don’t like to gamble.
- If your novel sounds like a wild stab in the dark they as business men and women are not likely to take a risk of you unless you’re a proven entity.
2: They like an established product.
- I got the same feedback from many agents the first time I queried them. “You don’t have enough online presence.” I thought this was a weird thing to say as how am i going to get a social media following without books on the market for people to read? It’s possible, just get the idea that you’re a writer and you are set up to be around for the long haul. That gives agents the warm fuzzy that you will be actively engaged in selling your work.
3: Agents are there to sell a product, not coddle your artistic expression.
- We authors like to invest ourselves into our work. We then hate having someone tell us to change, edit, or thin our work down. If we want an agent to put their talents of selling writing to work we need to be willing to meet them. It’s one thing to write just for yourself, but if you want it sold you have to be willing to make edits.
-kurt
