Agent @ MindSay

I finally got a good agent!

Of course, that's a real estate agent, not a book agent, but it's good nonetheless, right?  

Well regardless, I've got a good real estate agent.  After all the suspense and plot twists, the house buying drama has a happy ending: the seller agreed to make the repairs we requested.

We make settlement August 19, and move in August 29.  Quite a lovely number: my birthday is January 29, my mom's is March 29, my dog's was November 29 (my dad being the outcast: November 30), I grew up on 29 Orchard Lane, my friend lived on 129 Knox Road, my hockey number was 29, I got engaged on May 29, and I got married on June 29.   

So yeah, we got the house.  Thanks to a great agent.

Now if only this story could have a real happy ending and I could get a literary agent.

But what's going on with that?  Why do I keep saying I've decided I'm going to write short stories and see if I can get them published and use that as leverage to nab an agent?  Why do I keep writing book after book after book without doing anything about it, even though a Writer's Market book is sitting on my shelf, given to me on a January 29?  

Well, because I have no idea if any of these books are any good.  The last three I've written have had a readership of one: me.  I need my English teacher wife to review them, to critique them, to help me fine-tune them.  I need to spruce them up before I can actually take them to an agent.

In other words, I'm doing what all failed novelists do: I'm blaming someone else!

But hey, at least we got the house.  

Remember the grand plan we had?  While waiting to hear back from an agent, I was supposed to fill you in on all the things I learned at my recent trip to a writer’s conference?  Well, turns out we’re not going to have time for that, because my new agent buddy already got back to me.

On November 30, my father’s 59th birthday, he rejected me.   

Matthew
It was nice meeting you at MC3 and I appreciate the look at your novel.
Unfortunately, the writing didn’t work for me.  But I still think you are on the right track with the subject matter.
Good luck.
Adam

I just received this, and I have to say it hurts.  Did he not like the main character?  Was it the plot that didn’t grab him?  No, it was something more fundamental than that.  It was the actual writing.

Could there be a worse blow to a writer’s ego?  I really thought I had something special with this one.  I was going to adopt the writing style for all my future works.  My wife in her first note when reading it over wrote, “this is so poetic!”  But perhaps she was just protecting my fragile psyche, and perhaps I was just delusional.  An agent didn’t reject the plot, he rejected the writing.  Ouch.

I wrote back and thanked him for getting back to me, and asked him for some short advice on what he disliked about the writing.  And maybe he’ll reply.  But I doubt it.  He’s busy with clients, and real potential clients.  He doesn’t owe me anything.  He doesn’t need to waste time on me.  In all likelihood, I’ll never know his issue with it.

And sure, there are countless stories of books that were rejected hundreds if not thousands of times before going on to get published, to become bestsellers, to win Pulitzer Prizes.  

And sure, there are books that speak to some people, and books that don’t.  And while this guy could dislike the writing, another agent could be moved by it.  But that doesn’t really help me right now, as I’m reeling from the blow.  That doesn’t change my gut reaction – that my time and efforts were for naught, and that my wife’s gift of the Writer’s Market book has been rendered pointless.   

I mean, what happens when a writer gets told he can’t write?  How does he pick himself up after that?  Can that dust ever be brushed off?  

Is the horse even still there to get back on, or did he kick me off in a fit of agitation and just take off, disappearing deep into the woods, lost forever?  Right now, I don’t know.

I really don’t know.     

By the way, this is a bit ironic, isn't it?  In my first post after asking if good writing can be taught, I get an F in the class.   Buuurn.

So let me fill you in on what exactly went down in my agent meeting.

We had five minutes to meet with an agent, but the person slated to go before me never showed, so I got some extra time. Lucky me.

Most people spent their five minutes pitching a book, but I didn't want a tuna steak, I wanted to learn how to fish, so to speak. So instead of just pitching him one of my books and hoping for the best, I asked if I could briefly describe the three that I thought were the most sellable, and wanted him to let me know if he thought there was a market for any of them. He obliged.

So I went to work describing Angel of Life and The Fall of Paris. Then I got to Running Electricity, and led with, "The main character suffers from a neurological condition that makes him associate colors with people."

"Wait, let me stop you there," he said.

"Uh, okay."

"Is this a real condition?"

"Oh yeah, it's called synethesia, and the colors can work for people, numbers, whatever. Some people who have it know their phone number as red blue green - orange blue whatever."

A head nod. A wave of his hand. "Go on."

So I finish, and he leans in and says, "Okay, so you're obviously very creative, I love your imagination, but here's the thing. The first two books, they could be anything. Are you making everything up? I don't know. But this synethesia thing, that really catches my eye. That gets me excited."

He asked me if I had heard of The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time, and talked about how it's just a mystery, and a mundane one at that - it's about a dead dog - but that it has a great hook, and that hook is that the narrator has Autism. He told me that when he heard that, he thought, "now that's a six figure deal."

He said my other books sound like everything else. "Yeah, the one takes place in Hell, and that's different and that's cool, but it still sounds like other things. I've never heard of another book with synethsia. So I would view those first two books as practice for you. They were stepping stones to hone your craft and build your imagination."

And then someone came to tell us our time was up, and before I stood, I said, "So you're saying the synethesia is the pitch?"

"Absolutely." And then he shook my hand and said, "And you can send me that book. Since I'm requesting it, you can send it to me," and he handed me his card. And that was that.

So I'm going to send it. I've printed the first three chapters and I'm going to send it to him. And while we wait for a response, I'll spend the next few posts relaying cool tips I learned at the conference. You guys in?

“Okay, Matthew is it?  You’re next.  Go right ahead.  And good luck!”

 

And so I took a deep breath, stepped through large brown double doors, and met with a book agent.

 

Wait, what?

 

That’s right.  My lovely bride told me I had to leave work at 1:30 on Friday for a surprise.  And what was that surprise?  A weekend-long writer’s conference that started with a Q&A session with Frank McCourt, Pulitzer-Prize winning author of Angela’s Ashes, and ended with a meeting with a book agent. 

 

We were given five-minute time slots to meet with our agent, but because the person slated to go before me never showed, I got extra time with the slickster.  But even more time can often be too little time, and before I knew it, our session had ended, and he was telling me I could send him my latest book, and he was handing me his card, and then I was whisked away, replaced by another aspiring author, and I was left standing in the hallway, wondering what my next move should be.

 

Remember my dilemma with the Cooke Agency, and how to respond to them in a way that garnered me the appropriate information without annoying them?  I’m in a similar situation again.

 

“You can send me that one.  And because I asked for it, you can send it directly to me.”

 

That’s what he had said, but what exactly does that mean?  Send him my whole manuscript?  Send him the first three chapters?  Send him a formal query letter? 

 

Should I send it (whatever it is) via e-mail?  Snail mail?  A carrier pigeon?  What is my next move?

 

On the one hand, I think it’d be nice to send him a quick e-mail explaining who I am and that I am seeking more clarification in order to make his job as easy as possible.  On the other hand, that in itself is making his job harder, and it’s also creating an extra step that involves me sitting around waiting for a return correspondence.    

 

So I think the best thing to do is give him the first three chapters of my book, with a note explaining that, if he liked what he read, I’d be happy to send along the rest.  But do I do it via e-mail to save me money on printing and mailing?  Maybe, but there’s a good chance he won’t open an e-mail with an attachment from an address he doesn’t recognize.  So should I print the pages out and mail it to him and hope for the best?  Do I really have any other choice?

 

His website doesn’t clarify, which leaves me here with this dilemma.  This is a great opportunity, and I do not want to blow it.  Again. 

Okay so there was really no agent from Disney or Nickelodeon, as they had promised. Yes he got accepted tothe school. No they do not provide financial aid. TODAY they wanted me to come up there prepared to hand over ONE THOUSAND DOLLARS as a deposit on his 20 week education. If not that then 600 TODAY. Im like WTF? I am willing to pay, but you didnt say crap about having a deposit ready this very minute yesterday. You didnt say that the scouts werent taking anyone yesterday. You said it was an audition, not just one to get into the school but an actual real audition. Im so pissed. Yes, he got called back to be in their school which I knew he would... This is just ridiculous. How can they NOT tell people about that the day they come up? I was there under false pretenses to start with as they PROMISED that the scouts for both kids channels would be auditioning children there. Maybe in another room, but not with us. SO therefore, no acting school for him. I am going to find him an agent and research what he needs to know. I am sure there is a book somewhere that will help me to teach him all the stuff he needs to know till we can find an intermediary arts school that won't take my legs from under me the week I have to pay rent.