Advice From Literary Agent Sara Megibow

For those of you who missed the chat with Sara Megibow of the Nelson Literary Agency last Thursday, I’ve got some of the highlights here. However, if you want it straight from the horse’s mouth, so to speak, you can check out the transcripts here. (You must be an Agent Query member to view them. The good news is, it is free.)

A few highlights:

#1: Having troubles figuring out the genre of your story? Check out the bookstore. Figure out where it would be placed in the store and voila! As well, if your story’s most important aspect and focus is on the romance/relationship between the hero and heroine, it is likely a romance. If you aren’t sure between two genres, say urban fantasy and romance or romance and mystery…read a few books in each genre and see which yours leans towards.

#2: Did you know that some agents, when they get sample pages that they like, they go to Google to check you out? They look for a positive web presence. So don’t go bashing agents, the publishing word or discusses how hard writing is, etc. Make it professional, folks!

#3: Here are a few genres/ideas that are flying over Sara’s desk like mosquitoes in a swamp and may or may not be overdone: vampires, divorced women opening B & Bs, war survivor stories, YA where the hero speaks to the dead or has secret world-saving powers they didn’t know they had and of course, have to save the world. Now, just because these story ideas are common at the moment, it doesn’t mean she’s going to shred your query if your story is based on the above. See #4.

#4: The art of writing is very important. It is more important than the POV (character point of view the story is written from), topic, or even how fresh the story idea happens to be. Fresh, good, strong writing wins. I.e. copycat story ideas can work if the writing is fresh. Although a fresh story idea is always compelling, but it needs good writing to back it up.

#5: Don’t start your novel with one big flashback. Start where the story starts.

#6: If you have quotes in your story, you don’t need the rights to use that quote in a published work at the time of querying–the publishing house will acquire them when the time comes.

#7: Some argue that saying ‘completed’ and giving a word count is redundant when querying. However, if you are querying Sara, do say, “My completed novel X, Y and Z is 100,000 words.” She likes that. Her perfect query would start something like so: “I have a completed 100,000 word romance novel set in regency England.” And then add the pitch paragraph…etc.

For more information on Sara and the agency she works for, be sure to check out the agency website–especially if you are querying.

Critique Partner Gets an Agent!

One of my critique partners got an agent! Woo! I’ll reveal more when she goes “public” with her news.

Isn’t that fantastic?

Michelle Brower is Coming to Chat on AQ

Agent Query‘s literary agent guest for May is Michelle Brower of Wendy Sherman and Associates in New York. Michelle will be chatting to Agent Query’s members tomorrow night (May 12th) at 9 pm Eastern.

A bit about Michelle:

Michelle Brower has been with Wendy Sherman Associates since 2004, and has also previously worked with Joelle Delbourgo Associates. She enjoys working directly with emerging writers and is interested in representing literary and commercial fiction, memoir, pop culture, humor, crafting, graphic novels, popular science and narrative non-fiction. Books that capture elements of the strange and wonderful will always pique her interest, and she also looks for those that offer a unique perspective of the world. She has a MA in Literature from New York University. (From the Wendy Sherman and Associates website.)

She will also be attending the following conferences this year: Thrillerfest, New York, NY ( July 10)
Sewanee Writer’s Conference, Sewanee, TN ( July 18-20).

Join me (I’ll be chat moderator) over on AQ tomorrow night to chat with Michelle. It’s sure to be an educationally good time.

Be An Agent for a Day

Holy Poop!

I had forgotten. Literary agent Nathan Bransford is holding a ‘Be An Agent for the Day’ contest where folks try to pick the 5 queries that are from published authors and which are not.

Well, not only did I forget that I had zipped off my query for his contest’s slush pile, but I actually got picked. A friend over at AQ brought it to my attention and by the time I got over there, guess what? 109 comments on my query!

Wow! Amazing!

I will let you know which one it is when the contest is over as the queries are to be anonymous.

Free Online ‘Contests’

Are you looking for a way to get some feedback and maybe even get noticed?

Well, lucky for us, it is the Internet Age, baby. Yeah!

Here are three things that have come under my nose lately that might interest you:

The Knight Agency is having a ‘Book in a Nutshell’ contest. What you do is find out what they represent and then submit your pitch to them if you have a project that fits their interests. What’s a pitch? Basically, sell your story using a maximum of 150 words  limit  and 3 sentences to make these primo agents sit up and select your story from the undoubtedly thigh high pile of submissions they will be receiving. They are only choosing 20 pitches for which they will be provide feedback. Agent feedback on your writing! That’s golden! You have until April 20th.

Along the same lines (okay not really) is agent Nathan Bransford’s ‘Be An Agent for a Day’ contest. Basically, a bunch of people–probably at least a thousand knowing the pull Nathan’s blog generally has from his readers–send Nathan their queries. He then selects 50 queries which he will post on his blog (April 13th). Now here’s where we come in, over the period of a week, we comment on the posted queries. We can also ‘make requests’ (up to 5) for the queries we like. So what’s the catch? He’s going to slip in queries from published books. Ha! If you pick the ‘real’ winners (the queries that lead to a story being published) you win! That easy. I think it’ll be a great way for those who complain about agents to get a real taste of what it is like in their shoes.

And last, but equally exciting is another ‘Secret Agent Contest: Are You Hooked’ sponsored by Authoress aka Miss Snark’s First Victim. I have looked in on some of the contests she’s had in the past and they’ve been great. This time she is looking for the first 250 words of a completed novel falling under the genre of women’s fiction, commercial or literary middle grade/young adult. She opens the submissions on Monday the 13th and only takes the first 50. The feedback is great–from readers as well as a ‘secret’ agent. Again, another fantastic chance to improve your writing.

So go forth and enter my friends!

Enjoy and good luck.