What is a Literary Agent & Why I Want One
Good morning, Bloggarts. It occurred to me that some of my readers might not know what a literary agent is, why a writer would want/need one, and what the querying process looks like. Since I’ve jumped feet first into this stage of my writing career, let’s talk about it! What is a Literary Agent? A literary agent is someone who represents authors and their work to the editors at publishing houses. Publishing is a giant business with only four major players (Simon & Schuster, Penguin, Hachette, and HarperCollins). Each of these big companies have smaller “imprints” which typically focus on particular genres of work. And at all of these imprints are Acquiring Editors. People who read manuscripts to find books they want the imprint to buy and publish. But, very rarely will an acquiring editor look at an “unsolicited” manuscript. Meaning, a manuscript that isn’t sent to them by a…
Book Report: #TheLongestDay
This post probably should have happened yesterday, but there was absolutely no juice left in the tank to talk about anything even remotely writing related. Also, we found out we’d been exposed to COVID yesterday and Trevor tested positive, so I really viewed the day as one of rest and resetting. Today is a day of action, I think. We’re quarantining through the first week of good weather here in like, 10 months, so I’m sunbathing on the front porch as I write this. I’m going to write this post, work on this month’s newsletter, and then do some choring around the house so Trevor doesn’t have to convalesce in a sty. But, first things first, how did The Longest Day go? The Longest Day So, I’ve already had a whole blog post introducing the idea – I won’t rehash all that here. But, to sum up, a bunch of…