Do you ever wish that your life was a novel that you could flick to the end to and find out how everything turned out?
I usually know where I'm headed and what I'm doing but lately I've been struggling to make some very important choices. Should I stay in my current job or go for the new one? Should I go back and rewrite an old story or carry on with the one I've been working on since November?
There have been other choices that are on my mind but they are more personal and I'll only let you know when I've made them!
A choice that all writers have to make is whether or not to get an agent.
To get published you can go down two routes; to get an agent and let them do the work or to go it alone and approach a publisher or editor without representation.
I have taken the agented route (and I'll have some news about Agent A in the next two weeks!) for the following reasons:
a) They are the experts. I've got more knowledge of the industry than most due to the Masters course that I did but I'm no expert. Agents know the industry inside and out and will know exactly which editors and publishers to target with your novel so you won't waste precious time and effort sending it out to people who won't be interested.
b) They can guide me. I've got a vague idea of the kind of writer that I want to be but I'm not completely sure how to get there. And a good agent will hopefully find me work that I wouldn't be able to find on my own.
c) They leave a writer free to do what they are supposed to be doing; write. Whilst they are dealing with contracts and wrangling you a higher advance, you can be free to just write and come up with the next best selling idea. A good agent will deal with all of the business side of things and you will only have to sign on the dotted line.
There are downsides to having an agent, of course. The main one is money. Most agents take between 10 and 12% of their clients profits. However, I personally think that this is worth it but it's a choice that everyone has to make individually.
Choosing an agent is also difficult. I wanted to find a small agency so that they would have more time to focus on me, rather than a bigger one in which I'd be just another writer in a big pool of them. But then, a bigger agency will have more money to put behind you...oh decisions!
The best way to find an agent that you think would be suitable for you would be to buy The Children's Artists & Writers Yearbook 2010 because it is literally the writers bible! Every agent and publisher in the UK (and some abroad) who deal in children's literature are listed, along with their details and the types (genre, age range) of literature that they deal in.
My advice would be to make a short list and then whittle it down to five by looking at their websites and trying to get a feel for them. Look at their client list and see if you would fit in with it. Then approach them but don't forget the number one golden rule...
ONLY APPROACH ONE AGENT AT A TIME!
Most agents hate it when writers do multiple submissions (i.e. when they send it to more than one agent at a time) so just send it to one agent and wait for their response. This can take up to six months so this is a very slow, but hopefully worth it, process. Just hang in there!
Anyway, those are my thoughts on being agented, I'll blog about going it alone in the next little while.
Hope everyone is well and good luck if you're trying to get agented - I know how tough it is!
See you soon,
Writer Girl x
