Agents/reps... what have you been thinking after the webinar?
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@evilrobot I queried an agent FAR too soon (over two years ago now) with my book dummy and that was Stephen Fraser. I had a really great experience though, receiving the best rejection you could possibly get. He got back to me within a day of my initial email and gave me personal feedback (not just a form letter). He was quite complimentary of my illustration, but my writing was quite lacking back then and told me specific things that weren't working about my story. It was incredibly helpful and I was blown away by him taking the time like that. Now, I don't know if he always has the time to respond (likely not!) - let alone so timely like that - but I just wanted to mention I got a really great impression from him because of that experience. Good luck when you query him!
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Great summary @smceccarelli! One thing I hadn't thought about is being able to have an agent that dips in to both the US and European markets. That certainly would be a huge advantage! You're opening yourself up to so much more opportunity then I would think.
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@Sarah-LuAnn I agree with everyone that your work is very strong and professional. I think the main question will be regarding what kind of agent you want, and what kind of work you hope to get. I submitted a few times (including to Stephen Frasier) before I had a really solid book dummy with example illustrations worked out. Based on the responses I got at the time, the message was fairly clear: "You're a strong artist, but show us your storytelling abilities."
It wasn't until I worked out a dummy and accompanying illustrations that I found representation with Andrea Brown Lit Agency (and I had submitted to them before too!)
I was only applying at literary agencies that represented author/illustrators and from what I can gather, you're more likely to get signed with a literary agency as an author/illustrator with a project to sell and then also put out as an stand alone illustrator. Maybe I'm wrong on that, but it seems that my agency works this way.
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Haha, thanks everyone for all the votes of confidence, but I guess I should have said that I wasn't just wanting everyone to give just ME advice and encouragement. I was kind of thinking this thread could have more general information for anybody who might be thinking of looking at agents right now. Though I definitely appreciate everyones kind words
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This is a really interesting thread! Thanks @Sarah-LuAnn for starting it off and for all the great responses
I am interested in finding an agent, though right now I want to give myself a bit more time to make sure I have a consistent body of work together that shows a good upwards direction. I had agent feedback in Nov 16 to the effect that I was nearly there, I just needed to work on a few things ...so I'm currently in the 'working on it' phase.
Then, to decide which one/which type....this is tricky, because I'd like to do children's books, but I also have a library of (successful) surface pattern design that would work well outside of craft papers. I do work with an agency already where our business licences designs from them (for stamps) - actually I had a chat with them today as we're all currently in Frankfurt for a trade show (covering both craft products and paper/stationery/gift products including a designer/licensing area)...which has been really interesting overall, to see the trends, and also to see how surface pattern designers present themselves at a trade show.
So overall, I don't know yet - lol vague I know, but I have learnt from all this that it doesn't seem a quick thing...like starting out a relationship - what kind do you want - are they interested, are you interested, - which deal is on the table, what direction do you both want to go in....all questions that have to be answered by more than one person. So I'm going to take more time to think about it, and to develop my art, and maybe 6-12 months down the line I'll have a better idea
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I'm sorry I missed it. is there a link where we can watch or listen to it again?
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@audrey-dowling Hi Audrey, if you were referring to the third Thursday agent webinar, I was looking for it as well and Rich Green shared it with me in a previous thread- this is the link https://youtu.be/hYtX-GTcRyI enjoy!
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I am not ready personally. Tons of great info to process. Definitely a video I will revisit sooner rather than later.
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I was kind of turned off by the interview I don't think I'd like to have a strictly art rep. I'd rather try with a literary agent who handles writers and artists. I really just want to tell my stories.
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@lmrush Thanks for the link! I'll want to re-watch it.
@evilrobot I also feel like I'd rather go for a literary agent rather than an art rep... which is different from what I thought a couple years ago! I've started writing my own stories and found I really enjoy it.
I bought the book mentioned in the Webinar, the Guide to Literary Agents 2017, and with it comes a membership to WritersMarket.com. I'm just now dipping my toes into both, but wow! AWESOME resources. If the mention in the webinar wasn't enough, I'm just going to bring it up again to say that if anyone else is at the point I am at (starting to research agents to maybe start submtting/querying soon) its a great book to get your hands on.
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@Sarah-LuAnn Hi Sarah I just bought the book as well how do we get the membership?
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Inside the book there is a code and instructions on how to get access.
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thanks @lmrush !
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@Sarah-LuAnn thank you!
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Another resource for learning about agents, an episode on the Stories Unbound podcast: http://oatleyacademy.com/su15/
