Getting Those Ducks in a Row

By Paula Margulies

One of the most important elements of successful book publicity is having printed copies ready for distribution. While this may sound like a no-brainer to some, many authors ask publicists to promote their published work before the books are available for stores to order. This situation creates a dilemma for everyone involved: the bookseller, who wants to give the writer a signing date, but finds the book isn't available through the distribution channels he likes to work with; the publicist, who has to scramble to contact the publisher about the distribution issue; the publisher, who then has to contact distributors and buyers regarding the listing; and the author who misses out on a good signing event.

Many chain bookstores, like Borders and Barnes & Noble, prefer to order through their own distribution systems. This is an important concept for self-published authors to understand, because it often takes a certain amount of time (sometimes up to three months) to get the books into the system. Publishers will handle applying for ISBNs and setting up distributors, but writers should be aware that doing so takes time. And not all publishers do their homework; I've worked with a few authors who've had their promotional efforts stalled while waiting for their book to become available to a certain distributor that a bookseller wants to use.

Many independent booksellers order through wholesale suppliers like Ingram Book Group or Baker & Taylor. And some bookstore managers are willing to order directly from the publisher, especially if the publisher allows returns and will give discounts and/or pay for shipping. But, due to high shipping costs and lack of shelf space for unsold copies, a growing number of booksellers are asking authors to bring books to signings. This is known as a consignment arrangement, where the bookstore will take a certain percentage (usually 40%) of any books sold. So, in addition to the expense of purchasing the books himself, the author also has to get them to the store, which can be a headache when the signing isn't local.

When I contact booksellers for book signing dates, the first question they typically ask is not about the book's content or the author. They usually want to know the ISBN number. Most of them will look up the book as we speak on the phone and their second question is invariably whether the book is available for order. If they see a print-on-demand (POD) listing for the book, they often express concern about availability, so I urge my self-published clients to see if the publisher will consider printing an offset run. Most publishers, if there is enough demand for the book, are willing to do so.

It can be tough out there for self-published authors who are marketing books for the first time. Not being ready to take book orders is a mistake that no author wants to make, especially when s/he often has one shot at a prestigious bookstore, speaking venue, or media appearance. Authors can assure themselves a much better chance at success if they take the time to get those proverbial distribution ducks all lined up before they kick off their promotional plans.
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Paula Margulies is a book publicity and promotions expert in San Diego, California. You can reach her at paula@paulamargulies.com, or visit her website at www.paulamargulies.com.

The Five Cs of a Good Critique Group

By Chris Stewart

In my first post on this subject, I talked about the biggest contributor to a good critique group (sometimes people also call these workshops, though not meaning one you sign up and pay for) - chemistry. To refresh your memory this link should, in theory, take you to that post: Chemistry

A critique group is a partnership, so let's move on to the other four factors.

The first is Commitment. Pretty self-explanatory. If you agree to take part in a critique group then commit to at least six months. Ideally you should be meeting every 2-3 weeks, but even if it's once a month, it takes about three or so sessions for you to start feeling comfortable and for the group to find its groove (or for you to find your place within the group if you're joining one that's already established). Then it takes another few meetings with your guard down to determine if you are getting what you need in terms of critique (I'll touch on that in more detail in another post when I discuss how to comment). Are they 'getting' your work as well as challenging you to go deeper, experiment, explore? And do you respect them, as well as their comments? If you find yourself at odds with another member to the point where things devolve into sniping and you're in danger of leaping over the chips and salsa to strangle them with their scarf, perhaps you should find another group. Or an anger management class.

The rule here is: you can't bail. If one meeting really stinks - maybe the discussion was lackluster, someone spilled soda or wine on your (insert designer of choice here) dress/pants/shoes, or no one told you how fantastic you are (horrors! You must get over the need for that and leave your ego at the door), or even two meetings, you have to give it the entire six months and then make your decision about whether or not to continue. People are busy and sometimes come to group tired and crabby. Groups can also be in a bad mood as a whole. Not every session can be a love-in. Be fair. You aren't 'all that' 24/7.

Continuity - this is 'part b' of the above. You committed to coming so, show up to each meeting, and on time. Email everyone your writing by the agreed upon deadline, print and read everyone else's work as soon as possible so you give yourself enough time to try to understand and feel each one, and comment in writing on each, signing your name. Everyone needs to be able to count on - meaning - trust each other. In this day and age trust is pretty miraculous. I mean, let's face it, letting someone read and critique your work is more intimate than sex, isn't it? That said, knowing that picturing others in their underwear levels the playing field, and being that we all love a good metaphor, I'm not advocating going as far as requiring nudity during the critiquing process to make a point, okay?

That brings me to Care. Take care with each person's work. Treat it with the same seriousness and heart you would your own. I said above that you should feel it and I meant that. Fast, superficial readings are not allowed. Read each piece at least twice (four times if it's a poem), and make your comments keeping in mind what you think is the goal/meaning of the piece, and the voice of the writer. Don't rework it so it sounds like you. Don't be fooled - this is a very difficult thing to do. It takes alot of - you guessed it - care.

Last is Contribution. What you turn in to the group will depend on your motives for joining a group. Ideally, you should have a project in mind. You should have a firm idea of what you want to accomplish. Don't offer up random writing from ten or five or two years ago because the deadline crept up on you and you hadn't written anything. Don't turn in anything you don't care about. You're going to get out of this group what you put into it. If you put in crap - guess what? Write something new for every meeting. Even if it's only five pages, or an outline of upcoming chapters, or a few revised poems the group has already seen - permit me a twist on Ezra Pound's famous saying - 'Make it new.'

A good critique group is really a good relationship, just with three or more people (what you've always dreamed of, right?). It requires all the Cs above and more, including communication, which we'll get to in the commenting post. As such, it's a growth experience, for you and your writing. Plus it gets you out of the house, which, for hermit writers, is a good thing.


Chris Stewart is the founding director of the Write Here, Write Now workshops in Baltimore, and the program director for arts in education and literature with the Maryland State Arts Council. Her website is www.therealwriter.com.

How Agents Build Writers' Careers

By Richard Curtis

A literary agent's life involves far more than reading, lunching, and deal-making. His or her services embrace the literary, legal, financial, social, political, psychological, and even the spiritual; and the jobs they are obliged to tackle run the gamut from computer troubleshooting to espionage. But because our business is a day-to-day, book-to-book affair, we tend to lose perspective. With our preoccupation with advances and royalties, payout schedules and discounts, movie rights and foreign rights and serial rights and merchandise rights, with option clauses and agency clauses and acceptability clauses and termination clauses, it is all too easy for us to forget that our primary goal is to build careers, to take writers of raw talents, modest accomplishments, and unimpressive incomes and render them prosperous, successful, and emotionally fulfilled.

This endeavor demands the application of all the skill and experience we command, plus something else: vision. Vision in this context may be defined as an agent's ideal of the best work an author is capable of achieving, matched to the best job his publishers can perform. An agent's vision should illuminate the author's path, oftentimes far into his future, if not for his entire career.

In order for our vision to be fulfilled, three conditions must be met. First, we have to learn and understand what the author's own vision is. Second, we have to align that vision with our perception of the author's talent: do we believe he or she has what it takes to realize that dream? And finally, we have to help the author fashion his or her work to suit the demands and expectations of the marketplace.

I cannot overstate how much easier said than done the process of building an author's career is. Human nature being what it is, the forces militating against success are heartbreakingly formidable. The agent's vision and the author's vision may be at serious odds with one another, or at odds with the publisher's, and sometimes it's at odds with the vision of the fans! Authors' a talents or stamina or financial resources may simply not be up to the task they have set for themselves. Their publishers may not like or understand their work. Their audience may reject it. Every imaginable contingency may beset an author along life's path: death and disability, divorce and disaster - the same ones that beset everybody else, plus a few that are indigenous to creative people. The attrition rate for authors and their dreams is extremely high, and the odds against talent flourishing under perfect conditions are prohibitive. With so much at stake, it should come as no surprise that agents approach the building of their clients' careers with the utmost solemnity.

When a writer becomes my client I sit down with him or her to explore immediate and long-term goals. I ask writers how much it costs to live comfortably, how much they earn per book, and how long it takes them to write. It should then be a matter of simple arithmetic to determine what I must do to keep their careers on a steady keel: simply divide their yearly expenses by the number of books they are capable of producing annually. This gives me the amount of money they must earn (after commission, I hasten to remind them) per book to make a living.

Unfortunately, life is not a matter of simple arithmetic. Even in the unlikely event that authors live within their means and nothing untoward befalls them and their family, there is no room in the above equation for profit, and visions of greatness require an author to earn a profit.

Now, books that earn a profit for authors are not easily come by (not, at any rate, as easily come by as books that earn a profit for publishers). Good luck and good agenting may sometimes make one happen, but it is unwise for an author to depend on either. This means authors have to make it on their own by writing a breakout book. But how can they do that if they can't afford to buy the time?

Even if you are blessed with an unexpected windfall, there is no guarantee that you will achieve your dream, thanks to Fehrenbach's Law. T. R. Fehrenbach, the brilliant Texas historian, once wrote to me that, "Expenses rise to meet the cost of every sellout." In other words, the profit that authors make does not necessarily go into the fund marked, "This Time I'm Really Going to Write That Book." More likely, it will go toward something that is easier to grasp, like a new Buick, a home theater with all the bells and whistles, or a two-week vacation on Lake George.

The truth is that writers are no better equipped to fulfill their dreams than are other middle-class people, because compromise is an easy habit to get into when it is rewarded with comforts and luxuries. Austerity, integrity, sacrifice, relentless determination, and other virtues associated with uncompromising artistic endeavor are seldom a match for a brand-new living room suite or wall-to-wall carpeting for the master bedroom. And so an author's dream gets postponed a bit longer, and a bit longer after that, until perhaps that terrible day comes when the dream deferred pops, in Langston Hughes's phrase, "like a raisin in the sun." Death and disability, divorce and disaster are not the only terrible things that can befall an author, or even the worst things. Giving up his dream is the worst thing, and that is truly tragic. I believe it is an agent's sacred duty to keep this from happening, to keep the flame of hope burning in the author's breast, to encourage him or her in every way possible to seize the moment when an opportunity to reach for greatness presents itself.

Just as importantly, the agent must make a judgment as to whether your talents are up to your ambitious projects. They are not always, by any means. Authors are no more objective about their strengths and weaknesses than anyone else, and when their self-perceptions are deficient, it is vital for their agents to shed light on those blind spots.

Another way that agents help authors build their careers is to match their "product" - an unpleasant but useful word - to the demands of the marketplace. In other words, to make it commercial. It is not enough for a writer to fulfill his dream if his dream happens to be to write perfect imitations of Virgil, parodies of Thackeray, or metaphysical poetry. The agent must therefore be as intimate with publishing and reading trends as he is with the soul of his author, and to make sure the author's work plays into those trends.

The problem doesn't always lie with the author. Some publishers are simply better at publishing certain types of books than others, and an author's development may eventually reach the point where the publisher simply can no longer accommodate it. Then it may be time to move the author to a house that understands the author's needs and work and offers an environment in which these can be nurtured properly. It is not always greed that motivates agents to switch authors to new publishers. (Most of the time, yes, but not always.)

If all goes well - and we have seen how seldom it does - you will gradually, or perhaps suddenly, move on to a new and lofty plateau, maybe even onto the very summit itself. Hand clasped in your agent's, you will breathe the heady, rarefied atmosphere of success. You will have fulfilled your dream, your talent will now be a splendidly fashioned tool, and you will be published by a publisher that knows how to realize every dollar of commercial value from your masterpieces for your mutual enrichment. Only one thing remains to be done to place the capstone on your sublime triumph.

Why, fire your agent, of course.

Richard Curtis is president of Richard Curtis Associates, Inc., a leading New York literary agency and founder of E-Reads, a leading e-book publisher dedicated to bringing out-of-print books back into electronic and printed forms as well as publishing new titles. He is an author, as well as an author advocate and writes a blog on the future of publishing, Richard Curtis on Publishing in the 21st Century.

Speaking or Should I Say Viewing of Book Trailers

By Anthony S. Policastro

A colleague of mine directed me to an excellent site devoted exclusively to author videos called Meet the Author.

Here you can view a personalized video of your favorite author. The copy from the site says,

"The video clips are NOT reviews, they are NOT written by the marketing departments of publishers - these are authors speaking from their heart - to YOU.

Meet the Author is updated daily..."

The site also has a Marketplace, where they tell you how to pitch your book idea to agents, publishers and readers by making a personalized video.

And lastly, the site has an Authors' Lounge, where published authors talk to you about their books and how and why they wrote them. Some of the authors include Patricia Cornwell, Preethi Nair, David Baldacci, and Tim Bowler among others.

Take a look and start promoting your work with a book trailer.

Working the Book Video

By Paula Margulies

In the May 29 Random House/Zogby poll, 46% of respondents indicated that they spent the same amount of time reading as they had in the past year. 23% are spending more time reading (a good thing), while 30% said they are reading less than usual.

It's this last group that we all need to think about. The trend these days, especially for the younger set, is that people are reading less than in previous years.

So, what are these 30% who read less doing instead? Nearly two-thirds of them (65%) told Zogby that they're spending more time online, while 37% spend more time watching television or movies and 18% claim to be devoting more time to computer and video games.

These data show why so many writers are now making book trailers (a term coined by Circle of Seven Productions CEO Sheila Clover) to promote their work. For those who haven't seen one yet, a book trailer is basically a one-to-three minute promotional video about the book. The majority of them are mini-documentaries that include voice-over, visual images, and some type of musical score. A few show actors acting out scenes from the book and some include author sound-bites or even (least recommended) authors reading their work. Most authors run these on their websites and social networking sites like YouTube, MySpace, and Facebook. And publishers run them, as well. In fact, according to a June 7 Wall Street Journal article, many publishers are now creating divisions dedicated to making book trailers for their authors.

With so many readers spending time on the Internet, it makes sense for authors to use the web as a promotional space for their work. Yet, many authors make the mistake of creating videos and plunking them down in their websites, assuming that just having them there will entice readers to buy their books. It's true, having a book trailer out there is important. But even more important is working it. Like your business card and press release, a video does no good unless someone sees it. That means you need to tell everyone you know, including the media, about it and invent creative ways to distribute it.

And that's where a good publicist comes in. Your publicist can announce your book trailer release to the media, send out copies to reviewers and book sellers (in the old days, we sent video news releases (VNR's) on VHS tapes; now we send links to your trailer), and use your video to market to distributors, bookstores, universities, and libraries. It's all in the pitch, of course, but having a good video (more on that in a future post) and a sharp publicity person working for you will help get your book the attention it deserves.
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Paula Margulies is a book publicity and promotions expert in San Diego, California. You can reach her at paula@paulamargulies.com, or visit her website at www.paulamargulies.com.

What Your Agent Has Done For You Lately

By Richard Curtis

One day, I got a phone call from an agitated editor. His voice was trembling and he could scarcely contain his emotion. The emotion was fear.

It seems that a hotheaded client of mine had gotten so upset over some editorial work done on his book that he'd threatened in a loud voice, during a visit to the editor's office, to pulp his face. Some of his colleagues had interceded and ushered the distraught author out of the building. Of course, beating up your editor is a time-honored writer's fantasy, but my client had taken it further than most authors do. Pulping an editor's face is a serious breach of etiquette.
"What can I do to help?" I offered.
"Restrain him," the editor said.
"You mean, physically?"
"Yes, if need be."
I could not suppress an ill-timed laugh.
"What the hell is so funny?" he demanded.
"Well," I said, "I've done everything else, I might as well be a bodyguard for an editor, too."
After settling the dispute by eliciting promises of good behavior from my client in exchange for assurances of more thoughtful blue-penciling from the editor, I reflected on some of the unusual things that agents are called upon to do in the course of their careers. I am often asked to speak to groups of aspiring writers and to explain just what literary agents do. I wonder how the audience would react if I told them that among other things, literary agents babysit for their clients' kids, paint their clients' houses, and bail their clients out of jail. They even fall in love with their clients and marry them. In fact, I have done all these things and more.

Years ago, before it merged with another agents' organization to form the Association of Authors' Representatives, the Society of Authors' Representatives issued a brochure describing some functions that authors should not expect their agents to perform. Most of my colleagues would lose half their clients overnight if they took these guidelines seriously. For instance, the brochure advised that you shouldn't expect your agent to edit your book. But most agents I know would consider themselves remiss if they did not do some light, and sometimes heavy, editing to improve a book's chances of acceptance.

Here are some other things the brochure mentioned:

* The agent cannot solve authors' personal problems. As a writer myself, and a friend or agent of many writers, I can testify to how tightly interconnected the personal, financial, and creative elements of an author's life are. Trouble in one area almost invariably indicates trouble in the others. The agent who turns his back on an author's personal problems may well be diminishing that author's earning power. So for reasons of self-interest if not compassion, agents may find themselves playing psychiatrist to clients, sticking their noses into authors' marital disputes or taking depressed clients to baseball games.

* The agent cannot lend authors money. Ha! In this age of glacial cash flow, agents are being asked more and more frequently to play banker. I'm not sure authors always appreciate that the agent who advances them money lends it interest-free, or that the agent's total loans to clients at any given time may come to tens of thousands of dollars. But I don't know too many agents who can gaze unflinchingly into the eyes of a desperate client and say, "If you need a loan, go to a bank."

* The agent cannot be available outside office hours except by appointment. Double ha! with a cherry on top. Many business and personal crises arise for authors at times that, inconveniently, do not correspond to regular business hours. Book negotiations can carry over into the evening, and global time differentials put Hollywood three hours behind New York, New York at least five hours behind Europe, and Japan or Australia half a day away. An agent's day is not the same as a civil servant's. Many of my clients have my home phone number. I only ask them to use it sparingly.

*The agent cannot be a press agent, social secretary, or travel agent. A lot of agents I know take on these functions to supplement the author's or publisher's efforts. Literary agenting is a service business, and anything within reason that an agent can do to free a client from care should be given thoughtful consideration. Rare is the agent who has not driven clients to the airport or booked them into hotels, arranged business or social appointments, or helped them secure tickets to a hot Broadway show. We stop at procuring intimate companions, but many of us have made love matches and a few have had babies named after them. The roles of agents have shifted in the last decade from mere dealmakers to business managers.

Like my colleagues I have a large quiver full of sales techniques ranging from sweet talk to harangues. But I wonder how many agents have donned costumes and performed burlesque routines to sell books? It happened. Some clients of mine had written a satire of the best-selling book The One Minute Manager. Theirs was called The One Minute Relationship, demonstrating how you could meet, fall in love, marry, and divorce within sixty seconds of the first heartthrob. It was to be published by Pinnacle, but about a week before Pinnacle's sales conference, the editor-in-chief called me. "I'm thinking of something different for presenting this book to the sales staff. Could your clients cook up a cute skit?"

I promised to see what I could do, and called my clients. They came to my home and we brainstormed a skit over take-out Chinese food. The shtick we came up with featured an Indian swami who has developed the One Minute Technique. He has to wear a white robe and a turban with a jewel in it. The "jewel" in this case was a thick slice of kosher salami, and we called it the Star of Deli. My clients and I fell on the floor laughing. Then they suggested that since I had the robe, the turban, and the salami, and did a passing fair imitation of a Hindu fakir, I should perform the starring role in front of the Pinnacle salespeople. It took several bottles of Chinese beer to make me agree, but at length I went along, reasoning that these days, whatever it takes to sell books is okay by me. The skit went over well, climaxed of course by my gleefully stuffing the Star of Deli into my mouth. Pinnacle loved it so much they took our show on the road, videotaping our performance and featuring it at the American Booksellers Association convention. Last time I looked, The One Minute Manager was ranked #6,150,172 on Amazon.com.

Agents are not the tight-lipped stiffs that some have made us out to be. Like Shylock, we bleed if you prick us and laugh if you tickle us. I have cried with and for my authors when misfortune strikes, and rejoiced with them at their weddings and the births of their children.
I have also had some great laughs, not a few at the expense of clients and colleagues, for I am an inveterate practical joker. A client and good friend who'd bought himself a telephone answering machine (long before voicemail) was so anxious about missing important calls that whenever he was away for any length of time he called home every fifteen minutes to get his messages by means of a remote control signal. He worried that machine to death. If he returned to find no messages, he would examine the phone and the answering machine for malfunctions.

One day, I decided to indulge his worst paranoid fantasy, and left the following message on his answering machine: ". . . Studios. If you don't return my call by five P.M. we will assume you're not interested and we will withdraw our offer." The poor fellow spent an hour phoning movie studio executives on both coasts explaining that his phone machine had malfunctioned in the middle of a message, and asking if they happened to be the studio that left an offer on his machine that day.

Most people do not think of literary agents as leading adventurous lives, and that is largely true. Most of the time our conduct is as tightly circumscribed as that of business people in any other profession. Our greatest thrill is grappling in close combat with an editor during a six-figure negotiation, or stalking a check through the treacherous thickets of a publisher's bookkeeping system. Accounts of such adventures make for exciting listening only if you happen to be another literary agent, but somehow they don't carry the same weight as the tales of mountainous seas and mutinous tribes, challenging mountains and charging rhinos, that you can routinely hear at any meeting of the Explorers Club.

Nevertheless, because our profession brings us into contact with unusual characters, we do occasionally find ourselves carried far from the stereotypical role of submitting manuscripts in the morning, collecting checks in the afternoon, and going to lunch for three hours in between.
Early in my careerI was in London setting up the English office of Scott Meredith's literary agency. Novelist Evan Hunter (since passed on to his well deserved reward) and his wife were passing through London on their way to the Cotswolds, and we spent a delightful afternoon dining al fresco at my boss's expense. I bade them goodbye and wished them a pleasant journey, and figured that was that. About a week later, however, I got a call from Evan in Southampton. They were about to embark on a ship for America when his wife realized she had left her jewelry in a safe in the Ligon Arms Hotel in the Cotswold town of Broadway. "I'm going to ask an important favor of you," Evan said. "I want you to take a train out there and get the jewels back. Bring them to London and we'll arrange for them to be shipped home."

At that time I was in my twenties and, beyond getting stuck in an elevator for two hours and having my tonsils taken out, I had never been at hazard in many "real life situations." This sounded like an opportunity to experience the kind of peril that confronted the Burtons, Spekes, and Hilarys through whom I'd lived vicariously.
"They're not just going to hand the jewels over to me," I protested.
"Of course not," said Evan. "There'll be a password."
"A password?"
"When you get to the hotel, go to the desk and tell the lady you're there to recover our jewelry. Then say the password."
A password! This was a scheme worthy of Evan Hunter, who under the pen name of Ed McBain had created my favorite police procedural series, "The 87th Precinct."
"And what is the password?" I asked.
There was a long pause and I sensed that Evan was looking furtively around for eavesdroppers. He uttered a phrase in voce so sotto I had to ask him to say it again. "'Phoenix Rising'," he said. "Repeat it."
"'Phoenix Rising'," I said. "Heavy!"

That afternoon I caught a British Railways train to Evesham, the station closest to Broadway. The taxi driver I hired to take me to Broadway looked like Central Casting's notion of a Dickensian cutpurse, including addressing me as "Guv'nor." When he asked me, just being friendly, my business in Broadway, I told him, "Just touring." He arched an eyebrow. I wore a three-piece English-cut suit and a tense smile and didn't look remotely like a tourist. I looked like a man trying not to look like a man who was soon to bear tens of thousands of dollars' worth of jewelry on his person.

The Ligon Arms Hotel had been built in an era when Englishmen were four feet tall, as I quickly discovered when I grazed my skull on a lintel. I wobbled to the desk and found a diminutive woman peering at me who looked as if she would crumble into powder if I spoke too loudly. I cleared my throat and murmured, "Phoenix Rising." She gazed owlishly at me and my heart sank. Something had gone wrong. Evan had not told her the password. He had told her the wrong password. She had not heard it correctly. She had stolen the jewels.

"Phoenix Rising. Phoenix Rising," she muttered, searching at least ninety years of memory for an association with this mysterious phrase. Then the light of recognition kindled in her eyes. Her hand leaped to her mouth. "Phoenix Rising! You're Phoenix Rising! EVERYONE, IT'S PHOENIX RISING! HE'S HEAH, HE'S HEAH!" Whereupon bellhops, maids, cooks, and guests poured into the lobby to see The Bearer of the Password. I doubt if anything quite like this had happened here since the Norman Invasion.

We crowded around the safe as the jewels, rolled in a pocketed length of embroidered velvet, were set before me. Delicately, my friend untied a drawstring, making certain not to touch the jewelry itself. I stared at a handsome collection of baubles. There was a hurried conference when we realized I had no inventory of what was supposed to be there, and I was required to sign a receipt itemizing each piece. The staff gathered at the entrance to bid adieu to Alias Phoenix Rising. "Quick tour, Guv'nor," my driver observed as I stepped back into the taxi. "Saw what I came to see," I replied tersely, clutching the pouch in a death grip.

Obviously, these days authors don't merely ask their agents what they've done for them lately, but rather, what else they've done for them lately, and I guess just about anything goes.

This article was originally written for Locus, The Newspaper of the Science Fiction Field. It's reprinted in Mastering the Business of Writing. Copyright © 1990 by Richard Curtis. All Rights Reserved.

Richard Curtis is president of Richard Curtis Associates, Inc., a leading New York literary agency and founder of E-Reads, a leading e-book publisher dedicated to bringing out-of-print books back into electronic and printed forms as well as publishing new titles. He is an author, as well as an author advocate and writes a blog on the future of publishing, Richard Curtis on Publishing in the 21st Century.

Use Caution Before Choosing Writer Conferences

By Michael Neff

A couple things to be aware of before choosing a conference.

Just recently, a writers conference in America advertised on Publisher's Marketplace and implied in their text that anyone who attended this event could "Pitch [their] manuscript to the 27 literary agents and editors attending ..." Okay, to any veteran of writers conferences, this is as close to TALL story as you can get. Maybe a flunky at the White House might believe it, but you gotta be smarter if you ever hope to be a published author.

I personally know writers with boundless energy and a full wallet who have wildly bounced around to as many as a dozen agents at a huge conference like Maui ... but 27? No way. There will be 27 present, yes, but you will only get the opportunity to personally interact with a small portion of these individuals--the actual number depending on circumstances.

Next, a few writers conferences appear to do their best to humiliate rather than help writers. They place writers in an American Idol-like context, i.e., they force the writer to stand up before a panel of agents and get lashed. Some agents can be helpful, while others behave badly, as if they are competing for the Snarkster of The Year award. But take it from me, this is NOT an environment conducive to learning. Writers need to know how to fix it, or at least, how best to acquire the skill of literary mechanic. Simply tearing them down in front of others only benefits the predators.

Writers need to be in an honest and beneficial environ, and they need time to interact one-on-one with professionals in a relaxed atmosphere. Even writers conferences that don't grill you in public often make you wait in long lines or run to the sound of bells (to get in long lines), and there you are ... one of hundreds waiting to see agents who will be glazed over and dreaming of escape long before you talk to them.

Be careful out there!

Horton Roams the Floor at BEA

By Paula Margulies

And that Yopp…

That one small, extra Yopp put it over!

Finally, at last! From that speck on that clover

Their voices were heard! They rang out clear and clean.

And the elephant smiled. “Do you see what I mean?…

This year's Book Expo America at the Los Angeles Convention Center from May 30 - June 1 was like many of it's previous incarnations: long lines for Starbuck's coffee addicts, $7.50 sandwiches at the food court, attendees eating their lunches while camped out on the floor along the walls, bored-looking sales reps at lonely exhibit tables, and blue-haired ladies hauling rolling carts filled with free books. There were some strange exhibits - Oreck vacuum cleaners and dentists offering $20 teeth-whitening - and a number of mascots wearing elephant, mice, and bear suits roaming the children's book section of the West Hall. Most notable were a couple of actors scantily dressed as a warrior prince and princess, who paraded the aisles to promote a self-published erotic thriller.

I spent most of my time at this year's BEA at an exhibit for one of my authors in the West Hall's African American Pavilion. That area of the convention was much quieter than the larger South Hall, where the big publishing houses were exhibiting. After venturing to the South Hall for a brief stint and enduring the crush of attendees fighting to gather free books from the likes of Harcourt, Norton, Little, Brown, etc., it was a pleasure to retreat back to the West Hall. There, the crowd was more dignified and sedate; those in the long lines for the author signings listened patiently to the jazz notes emanating from the African American Pavilion stage, while authors on the main stage set out Cuisinarts and knives for cookbook demos.

I found the show to be insular and calm - almost eerily so, considering that BEA is one of the largest book trade events in the world. Many of the African American Pavilion exhibitors were self-published authors, who spent the majority of their time sharing their work and experiences with each other. The spirit of the exhibitors was friendly and open - a good thing, given that visitor attendance this year was spotty in that part of the convention center.

The African American Pavilion, in its fifth year at BEA, held a ribbon cutting ceremony on Friday morning, replete with champagne and a speech by co-founder, Tony Rose. Although a small part of the convention in terms of size, the authors and publishers there were serious about their work. At one point, a children's book exhibitor in an elephant suit wandered the aisles, reminding me of the Dr. Seuss character Horton, from Horton Hears a Who. While it may not have been the busiest corner of the convention hall, those at the African American Pavilion appeared happy to have had their voices heard.
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Paula Margulies is a book publicity and promotions expert in San Diego, California. You can reach her at paula@paulamargulies.com, or visit her website at http://www.paulamargulies.com/.

Critique Groups: Good and Bad Things

by Christine Stewart

This is a four? five? part series (we’ll see how it goes!)

Let’s talk about two of the big factors in a workshop group. One good, one bad. One you want, one you don’t.

GOOD THING

It’s chemistry. This is fairly self-explanatory if you’re dating, but maybe not so clear when it comes to a workshop or critique group. You don’t want to be nervous and sweaty or want to have a quickie in the closet with anyone in the group. (No, you really don’t.) What to look for:

Longevity: if it’s an established group you’re joining, how long have they been meeting? A year or more shows they’re solid. If you're starting a group, ask for at least a 6 month commitment, where the group meets every 2-3 weeks and agree to reevaluate at the end of the 6 months.

Training: not to be snotty, but ideally everyone in the group has either taken workshops that included discussions and applications of craft, or has a degree of some kind in writing. The best writers know what the tools of writing are and when and how to use them, and experiment regularly with various elements of craft to keep stretching their skill set.

Humor and a Thick Skin: in general - don’t be a sourpuss. You cannot take critiquing personally. You must be able to distance yourself enough to hear that your poem or story doesn’t work and why. Even if only one person tells you that, there is always a grain of truth in what’s said. Be objective enough to find and consider that grain. Bake it into the rewrite even. Don’t be the one that brings the group down because you can’t take it. People will begin to censor themselves when critiquing you and that compromises the integrity of the group and just plain sucks. If the group already has one of these and it looks like he or she isn't going anywhere because no one has the nerve to bump them out, don't join that group. If you find a group that laughs a lot when critiquing, hang on for dear life.

Integrity: as just mentioned, this means that nobody pulls punches. Because of their training (see above), each member knows how to critique using the terminology of whatever form is being discussed, and gives examples and makes suggestions for how to strengthen the work and, this is crucial, they do so based on the voice and style of the writer, and what they perceive the writer is trying to accomplish, not what they personally want the writer to do or what they would do. You can certainly say, ‘as a reader, I would wish/hope/look for…’ but that’s it. Let them be themselves.

Comfort and Challenge: when you’re with this group, do you feel comfortable? Great. But do you also respect and admire the work of the other writers? Do they challenge you to write at your highest and best level because of that respect and admiration? Or are you so green with envy that you have to slather lots of that color correcting makeup before you meet up with them? Comfort without challenge is a no-go.

When it comes to chemistry (and this is similar to dating) size matters (sorry guys). I was recently invited to join a group that has 9, sometimes 10 members. Though it’s a good group, I declined, not because I already belong to a group - it’s fine to belong to more than one group, but maybe a maximum of 2, or you will spend more time preparing for meeting with them than you do on other worthy endeavors like, um, writing – but because the group only workshops 3 pieces, which means members are critiqued only 4 times a year (they meet monthly), which, to me, is not worth the time. My current group meets every 3 weeks and everyone gets critiqued each time (there are 3 of us - shout out to Evan and Frank; we just had our one year anniversary!)

So think in terms of crowd control. I think odd numbers are best; there's something about the balance and symmetry of even numbers that creates too much agreement and not enough discussion. So I would suggest 3 or 5. A smaller odd-numbered group is a more intimate, truthful group; it has a little edge, which keeps you on your toes. You’ll spend more time on each other’s work, get to know each other’s style better, everyone can be critiqued at each meeting, and there will be less chit chat at the beginning of each session, which brings me to the:

BAD THING

Therapy and gossip. This is not what workshops are for. As mentioned above, there is always some chit chat when people get together, but comparing Brazilian wax horror stories, fantasies about your boss, complaining about the kids, or plotting how to impeach the current president has no place in the workshop (unless your piece is about one of these things).

If you just caught your husband in bed with the 18 year old boy next door you had your eye on, keep it to yourself and share it with friends at another time. Better yet, write about it!

If the members of your group would like to spend time discussing/brainstorming about practical things like: finding time to write, health insurance for freelancers, query letters, or which conferences to go to, add an extra half hour to your meeting time (do not cut regular time short in favor of doing this, that’s a bad habit to start), or meet on another day for lunch or dinner and do it then.

Too much talk and before you know it forty five minutes have gone by or one or more members of the group are asleep or have left altogether.

In future posts: Besides chemistry, what else makes a good workshop? How to run the group (including where), how to critique (how to say more than, “I like…., I don’t like…), and how to know when it’s over, or when to break up with your group and more!

Chris Stewart is the founding director of the Write Here, Write Now workshops in Baltimore and a program director for literature with the Maryland State Arts Council. Her website is www.therealwriter.com

Straight Talk on Book Publicity Costs

By Paula Margulies

The question I hear most often from writers these days is a simple one: What should an author expect to pay for a typical book promotion campaign?

The answer is equally simple: It depends. Different public relations agencies will charge different fees, so costs will vary depending on the type of publicist you decide to hire.

As an independent public relations specialist, I work one-on-one with clients directly and usually only handle one or two clients at a time. I like to meet with my clients to go over their requirements, and the extent of my services is determined by what they want in the way of publicity. Some just want a press release and/or limited media coverage for a one-day event; others want speaking engagements, a book tour, a blog tour, radio and TV coverage, etc. I charge $50 per hour, and usually work about ten-fifteen hours per week for each of my clients. I've had clients who contract for as little as five hours of work, and others who I work with for several months. I keep detailed time sheets that I send out every two weeks, and I always do only what clients have contracted with me to do. Most of my authors are self-published, although I have a couple who have published with larger houses and want to do a little more than what's covered in their publisher's publicity contract.

Many writers also ask about success rates for promoting self-published books. I've been pretty successful with self-published authors. For example, one of my clients, Paul Woodring, an African American writer, made the bestseller list at HueMan Bookstore in New York for three months after reading there. It was very difficult to get him in to the store, but I persisted and finally got the managers to say yes. He's also done a featured signing at Marcus Books in San Francisco (another prestigious black bookstore that was difficult to get in to) and did a national book tour that was very successful. He's exhibiting at BEA this coming week and has had a book trailer created by an established filmmaker, so he's really put a lot of effort into his marketing.

But, even those who can't afford to exhibit at book expos and create video clips can still do a lot with a little publicity. I recommend that most authors at least have a professional press release done, and do some book signings, even if they're local. In addition to creating buzz and making personal contacts with readers, the writer can get some additional mileage out of those events by getting his/her books stocked in the store and placing photos from the signing on his/her website. I also think a blog tour is a relatively easy way to get noticed, although it can be time-consuming to set up (I research appropriate bloggers and their sites, and then contact them directly regarding participation in the tour).

The main thing I bring to the table is the phone work -- I really push media and bookstore representatives to look at my clients. And I think that objectivity is what convinces them to say yes. It's hard for an author to call a radio producer or bookstore owner to pitch his own book, but when I call and say a client's work is great, the producers and store managers listen. And I'm persistent, which is key. It's often easy for people to say no, so I keep going back with new angles and approaches until I get them to say yes (this can be the time-consuming part, but it works!).

When you're ready to hire a publicist, be sure to check out a lot of agencies and individual consultants and find one with the right attitude and fit for you and your work. And don't be afraid to ask for references -- a good public relations professional should always be willing to put you in touch with his/her clients so you can hear firsthand what they have to say about the publicist's professionalism, follow-through, and success rates.
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Paula Margulies is a book publicity and promotions expert in San Diego, California. You can reach her at paula@paulamargulies.com, or visit her website at http://www.paulamargulies.com/.

Are Literary Agents Friends or Rivals?

By Richard Curtis

Are literary agents friendly with each other? Are they mutually suspicious or hostile? Do they steal authors from each other at every opportunity, or do they cooperate with one another? Do they have a code of behavior? Are they too competitive to act collectively?

To the extent that the book publishing business is a pie to be sliced into just so many pieces, and the number of profitable authors is a finite one, I suppose it can be argued that agents are rivals. Yet I don't think most agents feel that way. Unlike some other businesses we can think of, where the survival of one firm is achieved only at the expense of another, there appears to be enough business in the publishing field to enable all literary agents who stay in the game long enough and run their businesses prudently to earn a living and to be gracious toward each other while doing so.

Though we have seen bad times in our industry, they have never been so bad that no publisher was buying books. Nor has the pool of potential clients ever shrunk to the degree that a resourceful agent could not find authors to make money with. In short, I don't believe agents lose too much sleep worrying that the supply of or the demand for their products and services is going to dry up.

What agents do worry about is maximizing the earning power of their clients, helping their authors realize the full measure of their talents, and exploiting every bit of financial potential in their work: to put it plainly, making them rich and famous. Obviously, the agent whose clients become rich and famous will become rich and famous too. And, just as obviously, a dissatisfied author will eventually seek new representation.

And it is here that agents sometimes start throwing elbows.

Antagonism between agents flares up over the interpretation of just how loudly, sweetly, and aggressively an agent sings his firm's praises to an author represented by another agent. You might think of it as the Smoking Gun theory of client-stealing: if the author walks in the door of another agency in a state of uncertainty but walks out clutching a signed agreement with his new agent, it can be inferred that something considerably more than a soft-sell occurred behind that door. At least, most of the time such an inference is justified. But not always.

Many an author not comfortable with his agent has visited another agency and, with little persuasion, realized from a brief chat and a look around and a sniff of the atmosphere that he has actually been quite miserable with his old agent, but could not admit it until that moment.

However that may be so, the author's old agent is going to strongly suspect that the other agent gave a snow job to his former client. Because I treasure the friendships of (most of) my colleagues, I call them when I become the beneficiary of a former client of theirs to reassure them that I did not actively solicit that client, and to pave the way for cooperation on old business concerning that author. And I have always appreciated it when my colleagues did the same for me. In some cases, when the parting is friendly and by mutual consent, agents will refer authors to other agents.

Most agents have had the experience of having their colleagues refer clients to them. In point of fact, agents work with each other to a much greater degree than they work against each other. I know of a few suspicious, curmudgeonly types who jealously guard their flocks as if their colleagues were wolves poised to pounce on helpless clients and carry them off to their lairs. On the whole, though, agents enjoy each other's company, help each other, are anxious to remain on one another's good side, and to a degree act cooperatively on matters that affect the author community.

The Association of Authors' Representatives (AAR), an amalgamation of two earlier literary agents' guilds, was formed in 1991 to better serve that community. I particularly commend to your attention the organization's Canon of Ethics.

Agents call each other frequently seeking advice on all manner of problems: Who do you know at Random House? How do you phrase your option clause? Who's buying westerns? How did you conduct that auction? How did you get that terrific price? What should I do about this problem client?

On occasion, agents cooperate on deals. For instance, if an author leaving Agent A wishes Agent B to handle subsidiary rights to his old books—a situation fraught with the potential for mean-spirited behavior - the two agents might work things out so that they split a commission. Agent A will be satisfied because he doesn't have to do all that much work to earn his share of the commission, and Agent B will be satisfied because he didn't have to sell the books originally.

In other cases, such as collaborations, there may be two agents for two authors and the agents work out the division of labor and commissions. I may have a client with a fantastic story to tell who can't write, but I don't represent quite the right author to team up with him. And my buddy Agent X may have just the right author. After exploring the questions of our clients' compatibility and the division of work and money, Agent X and I discuss just how we're going to cooperate. Am I going to be the principal agent in making a deal with the publisher? If so, am I to take my commission off the top - off the total advance, that is - or do I take my commission only on that portion of the advance allocated to my client? Who is going to handle the subsidiary rights, Agent X or my agency? You can see that unless there is a solid friendship and abundant good will between agents, there is going to be friction, and in potentially fatal doses. Many a lucrative deal has gone down the tubes because two agents couldn't reach agreement on such matters.

An editor once told me about a meeting in her office of two agent heavyweights, one whose client possessed the essential source material for a book, the other representing a star author whose byline and talent guaranteed a bestseller. The discussions went swimmingly until the question of commissions was raised. "Since I brought this project to the publisher and made the deal," said the first agent, "I expect to get my commission off the top. You can take your commission out of your client's share, net after I have taken my commission."

"Uh-uh," said the second agent. "My client is critical to the success of this book. I want a commission off the top too."

The first agent glared at him for a moment, then rose and went to the phone on the editor's desk.

"Who are you calling?" the editor asked.

"My driver," said the agent. And that was the end of that

Richard Curtis is president of Richard Curtis Associates, Inc., a leading New York literary agency and founder of E-Reads, a leading e-book publisher dedicated to bringing out-of-print books back into electronic and printed forms as well as publishing new titles. He is an author, as well as an author advocate and writes a blog on the future of publishing, Richard Curtis on Publishing in the 21st Century.

Photo by Anthony S. Policastro - a Kenyan wood carving of two giraffes scratching each other's necks.

The Kwan of Book Publicity

By Paula Margulies

In the seminal movie Jerry Maguire, we all remember the scene where Cuba Gooding, Jr.'s character, Rod Tidwell, shouts "Show me the money!"" into the phone at his agent, Jerry Maguire. Tom Cruise's Maguire responds by begging his client to "help me help you" by proving himself worthy of the amount he's requesting. When Tidwell finally steps up and resurrects himself after a consciousness-losing hit on the field, Maguire lands him the deal of a lifetime, and everyone lives happily ever after.

Chock full of famous one-liners ("You had me at hello!"), this well-written comedy contains some nuggets of wisdom for writers seeking to land the best marketing deals from their publicists. Of course, we all want our publicists to "show (us) the money." But like Tidwell, we have to do our share. Here are a few suggestions for writers who want to help their publicists help them:

Be available. Your publicist is working hard to schedule signings and reviews, radio and TV spots, newspaper and magazine interviews, speaking engagements, and blog tours. Be forthcoming about your availability, show up on time for confirmed events, and make promoting your book a priority in your own schedule.

Be committed. It's hard work convincing bookstores and media folks to give precious air time to writers, especially those who are unknown. And the last thing your publicist wants to do is call back someone who's agreed to interview you and reschedule the date. Agree only to what you can honestly handle, and be committed to what you say you'll do.

Be patient. Like your agent, your publicist is working hard to promote you to those who may not be familiar with your work. The real magic of public relations - smiling and dialing, I call it - takes place at all hours, through continuous networking and numerous telephone calls and emails. Give your publicist some space, and trust that s/he is working hard for you. If you don't get the results you want after an agreed-to amount of time, move on, but make sure you've allowed your publicist the same distance and courtesy that you required when you were writing your book.

Be willing to go the extra mile. Place ads for your book signings, enter book contests, do pro bono speaking engagements, maintain your website, attend book expos, create a book trailer, etc. If you're willing to do whatever it takes to promote your work, you'll make it easier for your publicist to obtain the media exposure you and your book deserve.
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Paula Margulies is a book publicity and promotions expert in San Diego, California. You can reach her at paula@paulamargulies.com, or visit her website at http://www.paulamargulies.com/.

Algonkian Conferences Presents The Fisherman's Wharf Writers Conference - Stop by and Say Hello

On August 6-10, Algonkian Writer Conferences will be holding its first event in San Francisco. We've selected a great venue in SF--the Fort Mason Center. It's close to everything and with a great view of the Bay. Faculty include the team of Larsen-Pomada as well as agents from Sandra Djikstra. We plan on including book publicity pros also.

If you're in the SF area in early August, stop by and say hello!

http://fwwriters.algonkianconferences.com

Fort Mason Bldg. C, Room 210
Marina Blvd. and Buchanan - San Francisco

All Agencies Great and Small: Part 2

By Richard Curtis

In the first installment of this piece we discussed the advantages and disadvantages of sole practitioner literary agencies.

With the introduction of a second person into the agency - even a secretary with no discretionary power - the dynamics of the firm usually alter sharply. The agent can if he chooses make himself less accessible, a state that is often tactically desirable. He at last has somebody to blame, perhaps not for negotiating and other serious mistakes, but at least for some of the clerical screwups that bedevil all business enterprises. On the other hand, the operation of the business should become more efficient, a fair tradeoff for the agent's withdrawal from the firing line. If the employee is anything more than a warm body occupying a desk, he or she can create some important opportunities for strategic games, can serve as a reader, rendering a second viewpoint on the salability of manuscripts, or as a sounding board for marketing, negotiating, and other decisions. And if that person is interested in and good at certain specialized tasks—handling movie, television, magazine, or foreign rights, for example—or has a good grasp of certain markets that the boss has no interest in or feel for, or if he or she is good at handling certain clients, then you have the makings of a potent team and the foundation for a successful agency.

From that point on it becomes a matter of adding new staff members and deploying them according to the organization that best suits the agent's style - a style that may transmute as the agent gains experience. As a rule, the smaller the agency the less specialized are the tasks performed by its staff: in other words, everybody handles everything. As the firm grows, a structure usually emerges along lines of staff specialization. One structure might be described as vertical, with the agent at the pinnacle handling the clients, supported by a staff that services the clients' properties but does not necessarily have contact with the clients themselves. One staff member might handle foreign rights, another movie, another serial, another bookkeeping, another filing, and so on.

The advantage of a vertical system, generally, is excellent service, for every aspect of the client's needs; every facet of the property will be taken care of by a specialist. The disadvantage is that the client list must be kept relatively small- no larger than the capacity of the head of the company to handle his clients' work and needs comfortably. Another disadvantage is the vulnerability of the agency in the event of the death or disability of its owner, for there will be no one with deep experience at handling clients to take his or her place. If the agent should go out of town for an extended trip or vacation, the agency may be reduced to a maintenance capacity and not be capable of dealing forcefully with the sorts of emergencies that always seem to attack writers the moment their agents board an airplane.

As an agent becomes successful, he or she will be solicited by many authors seeking representation. Many are excellent writers with good track records who need the guidance and assistance of a good agency. A combination of profit motive and compassion will compel the agent to offer representation to them. But how can agents fit them into their stables without curtailing the time, attention, and service he is now able to lavish on the rest of his clients?

Some agents resist this temptation, harden their hearts, and shut their doors to newcomers. Others resort to hiring employees to handle the overflow of clients. An agency engaging a roster of agents might be described as horizontal, and obviously there is no limit to the number of clients such a firm can take on, for, as soon as it reaches capacity, it can always add a new agent to take on the excess. The boss will still be the boss, and there will still be a staff of specialists to handle subsidiary rights and clerical and administrative functions. But on the middle level will be those other agents, replicating what their boss does. They may be generalists, handling the gamut of literature from genre to mainstream, or they may deal in such specialties as juveniles, nonfiction, or science fiction. I would say that most middle-sized and large agencies fit this horizontal pattern; in fact, it's hard to imagine how an agency can become large unless it does expand horizontally.

From the writer's viewpoint, an agency of this type is attractive for several reasons. First, it enables him to locate within the organization the individual agent best suited to his work and style. Second, if the organization is well run, he will enjoy the benefit of a team approach under the supervision of the principal agent. And third, if one's agent is out of town or on vacation, or is so thoughtless as to die, there is a good likelihood that he will find a replacement in the ranks of the other agents at the same firm. In other words, the bumpy ups and downs you often experience with a one-person agency will be absorbed by a larger organization, and that is a secure feeling. But there's also a catch.

Most clients of middle-sized and large agencies are content to be represented by an agent who is not the head man or woman, as long as there is a sense that the chief is at least overseeing the work of the subordinate agents and making sure that all of the agency's authors are being properly serviced. Inherent in the very nature of large organizations, however, is a degree of insulation between the head of the company and the activities of those clients he or she does not directly represent. If an author begins to feel that the agent handling his work is not doing an adequate job, he may conclude that the head of the company has more important concerns than the scribblings of a fifteen-thousand-dollar-a-year midlist writer. Thus is created what might be described as the "A-List/B-List Syndrome," meaning that the agency has two client lists: the Grade A clients handled by the boss, and the Grade B ones handled by the secondary agents. When that sort of suspicion begins to gnaw at a client, he may eventually decide he must either move up or move out and seek an agency where he will receive more personal attention from the top agent.

It is therefore incumbent on the heads of agencies to make sure that the subordinate agents keep in very close touch with him and with each other. At many agencies, that is precisely what happens. In others, the boss has administrative and client demands that make supervision of the other agents' activities difficult. Now, it can certainly be assumed that some of those agents are ambitious, and so an atmosphere is created in which a subordinate agent, operating with little supervision, begins to wonder just what he needs a boss for anyway. He may be making a good salary and even collecting commissions, but as so much of the revenue he generates must go to paying overhead and a profit to the firm he works for, as surely as the sun will rise tomorrow the idea will occur to him that he could do better on his own. For many of his clients, the notion of joining this agent when he starts his own agency is extremely appealing, for in a stroke those clients will be transformed from B-Listers to A-Listers. Things don't always turn out to be as satisfying as that fantasy, though, for the agent may discover that he does not, on his own, enjoy the same success he did when he was a member of a large and influential organization. It is extremely hard and perhaps impossible for the client of a larger agency to sort out just what is the true source of his agent's power and success. Does the person handling you consult with the head of the company or is he handling your account strictly on his own? Is his effectiveness due in good measure to the influence, reputation, and support of his organization, or are these incidental to his performance? Some authors discover the answers to these questions by leaving; others, by staying on.

At the summit are the giant agencies, representing many illustrious authors, extremely well connected in the movie and television area, and moving tremendous amounts of properties, rights, and money. These firms are often broken down into departments, and you the author will be handled by someone in the literary department. These departments usually have senior and junior staff members and operate as potent fiefdoms in a great bicoastal kingdom. Because the overhead of these firms is stupendous, the clients they take on must be pretty heavy hitters and often are authors whose work is highly adaptable to film and television. The disadvantage is the intimidating vastness of such organizations.

Somewhere in all this is a place for you, and in few businesses is it truer that what's great for one person may be awful for another. I doubt if many authors retain one agent for the span of their entire career. Indeed, for the sake of an author's personal growth, having the same agent from cradle to grave may be a very poor idea.

At least, that's what I tell myself whenever I lose a client.

This article was originally written for Locus, The Newspaper of the Science Fiction Field. It's reprinted in Mastering the Business of Writing. Copyright © 1990 by Richard Curtis. All Rights Reserved.

Richard Curtis is president of Richard Curtis Associates, Inc., a leading New York literary agency and founder of E-Reads, a leading e-book publisher dedicated to bringing out-of-print books back into electronic and printed forms as well as publishing new titles. He is an author, as well as an author advocate and writes a blog on the future of publishing, Richard Curtis on Publishing in the 21st Century.

All Agencies Great and Small: Part 1

By Richard Curtis

I'm not sure that authors understand the structures of literary agencies much better than they understand those of publishing companies. For those of you who are shopping for an agent or thinking of switching agencies, or who are simply interested in organizational dynamics, it might be interesting to compare agencies of different sizes and structures and to discuss the advantages and disadvantages of each type.

First, but not least, is the one-man or one-woman agency. And when I say one man or woman I don't mean one man or woman plus a secretary, for, as we shall soon see, the presence of a second person can radically alter an agent's style, service, and clout. Most such agents start out either as editors of publishing companies or as staff members of large agencies; a few join our profession from the legal and other related fields. To agenting they bring their special knowledge and experience, and those are always big pluses for prospective clients. They can also be handicaps, however. The lawyer who becomes a literary agent will soon discover that publishing law is so vastly different in theory and practice from any other kind of law as to render his training and experience virtually useless. Agents who leave big agencies to set up their own don't always make good agents, as they may be unused to operating outside the context of a supporting organization. Editors who become agents may know a great deal about publishing procedures, but that knowledge doesn't necessarily make them good deal-makers.

The sole practitioner must do everything by and for himself, and from an author's viewpoint there are many desirable aspects of such a setup. Chief among them is accessibility. Phone answering machines or services notwithstanding, you know that when you call your agent, you will get him or her. That means you can maximize your input, communications, and control, which is great unless your input, communications, and control happen to be lousy. Remember that you hired an agent in the first place because you need someone who understands the publishing business better than you, someone who is more experienced and skillful in negotiations, is more objective, and remains calm when push comes to shove. If you take advantage of your agent's accessibility, then all you are doing is manipulating him like a puppet, programming into him the very same emotional shortcomings that you most desperately need to be defended from.

For the sole practitioner, the credit for success belongs exclusively to him or her, and deservedly so. But so, deservedly, does the blame for mistakes. Because there is no insulation between author and agent, both positive and negative emotions tend to run stronger than they might if the author were not so intimate with everything having to do with the handling of his business. Indeed, the author represented by a sole practitioner is all too often quite intimate with the business of his agent's other clients, too, and among the emotions that run strongly in these cases, therefore, is jealousy.

In short, you cannot ask for more personalized service than you get when you engage a one-man or one-woman agency, and if the relationship is solid and harmonious it can be like owning a custom-made automobile. But custom-made automobiles tend to react oversensitively to every bump in the road. And their owners tend to tinker with them.

From the