This that and the other thing

I'm moving a tad bit slow today. After my muscles warm up I'll decide whether or not I'll do a video exercise. It snowed several inches here over the weekend, so walking my usual route is out. I'd slip more than I'd walk. And the video may be out since I fell getting on the hay trailer yesterday when we were loading it up for this week's feedings. Every Sunday we load two trailers- One with 30 bales and one with 40 to get us through the week and ready to load again on Sunday. As I was climbing up on the first trailer, my foot slid on the tongue and my glove caught on a nail. Needless to say, my body fell across the tongue and jerked the poor arm attached to the nail. I have a couple bruises I'm not sure how I managed. But we loaded the trailers, and we're ready for this week.

Today you can find me guest blogging at "I do not want to wait I want the book now". Greta asked me lots of great questions, and I'm giving away one of my first books to someone who comments.

I'm doing research for the next Halsey brother book. I know, it should have been written by now, but I've been, hopefully, building some other avenues for my writing.

My plans this week are to finish the fine tuning on my latest book and send out agent queries. What plans do you have for this week?

Friday Five- Agent Thoughts

Yep, you guessed it. This is the last of the Agent Cartel "Five Pearls of Wisdom" from RWA National convention. Today it's Patti Steele-Perkins five ways for the author to shoot themselves in the foot.

1) Rant and rave online- the internet has so many eyes and ears, it is not a good place to vent frustrations.
2) Consistently not delivering on time.
3) Getting drunk at a bar and announcing deal points.
4) Using F U on copy edits
5) Burning bridges- relationships between the author and editors or agents.

That's the last of the pearls of wisdom from the agent cartel. If you've been following along each agent had great information for anyone looking for an agent or just stepping into the publishing business as an author.

Friday Five- Agents

We are winding down. I have info for today and next week then I'll move on to different Friday Five topics.

Today, the Five things I heard agent, Natasha Kern talk about at Nationals was Going Beyond the Deal. What the agent should do to make the partnership work.

1) Good Team- Talk to one another and believe in each of your skills.
2) Put together a marketing and business plan
3) play off of other materials that relate to your book
4) Do long term planning
5) support the author

As I am getting closer and closer to sending a partial out to an agent, you can bet I'll be keeping a eye out for all the things I've been posting on this blog.

Friday Five- More agent info

Today, I have the five things agent Jennifer Jackson said at the RWA national convention in San Francisco in July about what you should know about an agent before you sign with them.

1) Passion- make sure they are as passionate about your work as you are.
2) Open minded- make sure they are open to the same houses and career changes you want.
3)Working- that they understand the way you work.
4) Expectations - What expectations do they have of you as a client.
5) Responsiveness - Be upfront with how often you need or expect to hear from them.

I'm in the process of capturing an agent and these lists I've been putting up and studying the agents during the workshops I attended has helped me cut down my wish list a little.

How about you? Are these lists helping or enlightening you?

Friday Five- Agents

Yep, still working away on the five do's and don'ts from the agent cartel workshop at Nationals. Today, I'm posting Pam Hopkins five don'ts for unpublished authors.

1) Don't revise and rewrite forever
2) Once you finally let the manuscript go, don't stop writing waiting for the call.
3) Don't make entering contests a career.
4) Don't let critique groups stifle your voice.
5) If you get advice from an agent or editor, not listening to what they have to say.


I've known writers who have fallen in at least one of these categories. If you want to get published, yes polish your story, but you have to send it out the door before anyone can call you. And contests are good, but they don't always make a sale. I did #5 ( I took the advice an agent gave me) and hopefully soon it will pay off.

Friday Five- The business side of having an agent

I will be home today and I will get back into my WIP!!! But for now here is five things agent Carolyn Grayson says you need to know about the business sense of writing.

1) You the author have creative value
2) Have a business plan
3)The book is not the sale- you are when you
4) Treat earnings appropriately- always put aside what you receive to use for taxes.
5) Be aware of changes in your genre and the industry as a whole.

Friday Five

Today I'm going to share what I learned from agent Michelle Grajkowski about nailing a pitch in person.

1) Know your genre and mention it at the beginning of the interview.
2) Tell the word count, if it's complete, and the targeted house
3) Give a 2-3 sentence hook or blurb
4) Tell your writing qualifications
5) Ask questions and tell your career goals

Basically an in person pitch is what you would write in a query letter. The best thing though is if something doesn't make sense the agent or editor can ask questions.

Friday Five- Writing for two publishing houses

Continuing with my 5 do's and don'ts from agents, I have Elaine English's thoughts on writing for two publishing houses.

She says:

1) Have a clear picture of what is expected of you by each house.
2) Be realistic in what you can accomplish. If both houses want two books a year, can you produce?
3) Coordinate delivery and publication between the two houses. you don't want books from both places coming out at the same time as they would compete with one another.
4) Cross promote. Use one to promote the other.
5) And always keep your agent involved. They need to know what is going on to help you make the most of a 2 house career.

If you are finding these Friday agent infos helpful or interesting I'd love to hear from you. I still have five more to go! If people are bored I can stop at any time.

Friday Five- More agent do's and don'ts

I can't believe it's Friday already! We are headed to two weddings this weekend. It will be a large gathering of my family. Looking forward to it and not looking forward to it. You know how that goes. All the prep to leave, then gone and wishing I were home getting work done, then coming home exhausted and feeling like we didn't have a weekend. LOL

Today are Agent Lucienne Diver's five things she looks for when considering to represent a writer.

1) Is it a fantastic novel
2) Great hook
3) Do you have a platform to promote
4) Your contest wins and awards
5) Personality and attitude

As you can see from previous posts some of the things the agents said are similar.

Friday Five- More Agent Info

As promised here is another Agent's Five. This is Roberta Brown's Five things for unpublished writers to do to get noticed.

1) Know name- when you send a query to an agent be sure to address the letter to the agent, not Dear Editor, AND make sure you spell the name correctly. That means you did your homework.

2) Use a hook or tag line that catches the attention of the agent, but make sure it has something to do with the story. Perfect the line to tell the story in a catchy way.

3) Be sure your letter tells the agent the word count, line you think it would fit in, and a short summary of the book. Wrap up the story. Tell the agent the ending, they don't like to be kept in the dark because they want to know if you have a good ending and can close a story solidly.

4) Bio- List RWA involvement, Sales, Awards. Keep it brief don't give a play by play of your whole writing career.

5) Brief closing, Thank you, manuscript available, SASE.

One thing all the agents stressed. keep this query to one page. Make it succinct and interesting.

Friday Five- Agent do's and dont's

Since I am seeking an agent, while at RWA Nationals I attended several agent panels to see and get a feel for the various agents. My initial feelings toward them fall in three categories- too nonchalant; enthusiastic, savvy, fun; or all business. I'm not going to name names since they could find this site. LOL But let's just say I found more to be in the enthusiastic, savvy, fun category than the other two.

On one of the panels each agent did their own five things. Pam Ahern listed "Help the agent help you" These were her pearls of wisdom:

1) Keep expectations at your level - Don't expect to get a six-figure advance on your first book
2)Keep agent informed - let the agent know what is going on in your life and who has your work
3)Have honest, open communication - talk to your agent whether your happy or unhappy
4) Read in your field - Read the type of books you write to know the market
5) Remember agents are human too - agents can have family issues crop up too

Next week, I'll have Roberta Brown's five things to get unpublished authors noticed.

(The picture is out the window of the room I stayed at in San Fran for the conference)

Promo- What an Agent or Editor wants in a query letter

At Nationals last week, I sat in on several agent panels and gleaned lots of information. Today I'm going to tell you what they said they are looking for in a query letter. This info would also work for queries sent to editors.

They all said keep it professional: Like a job interview, keep it pithy and to the point. Of course they all said nearly the same about the query letter, but all wanted different amounts of the actual work sent to them.

One said you use this method: Hook, Book, Cook. Which means- Hook, a one to two sentence hook about the story. Book, no more than two paragraphs about the book- like a back cover blurb. Cook, a brief bio (publishing history, awards) about you and any specific reason for writing the book.

They said a query should never be over a page long. An agent or editors time is valuable to them and they don't want to wade through a two or three page letter. Most said if it is longer than a page they won't read it. Also if you have met the agent or editor at a conference, do mention that at the beginning, but don't go on and one about the meeting. Again, be pithy and to the point.

Friday Five- Agents

I've been spending time on agent blogs reading, learning, and making a decision of who I want to start querying. Here are the five agent blogs I've found interesting. They have talked about pitching, query letters, and what they do and don't like. Very interesting. I like reading the blogs. It gives me a better feel if they would even be interested in my stuff. And I'm gaining more knowledge about the whole querying process.

1) Bookends, LLC - http://bookendslitagency.blogspot.com/

2) Pub Rants - Kristen Nelson http://www.pubrants.blogspot.com/

3) Nathan Bransford - http://nathanbransford.blogspot.com/

4) Rachel Vater - http://raleva31.livejournal.com/

5) Caren Johnson Literary Agency - http://cjla.squarespace.com/

Do you have any agent blogs that you enjoy reading? Share.