Agent of Change

It is sometimes more difficult to get a literary agent to represent you than it is to get your agent to sell your work. My current agent, who shall remain nameless because I truly do need him, is actually my second such professional and the two are very different people.

My first agent, who shall also remain nameless because I don't like to burn bridges, was referred to me by a writer who also happened to be one of my best editors. I trust him and I liked Agent Number One and she represented him. She is British and did a lot of work in Australia including representing Gary Larson (The Far Side) down under. She was excited about my proposal for a book about pets with cancer (prompted by the article Saving Bentley also published in The Gazette) since she herself is a cancer survivor and had lost a pet to cancer.

Since agents don't make a dime until they actually get you a contract, (and then they get much more than a dime), I figured if she was personally invested in my story, she would work her tail off to find it a home. I went to NYC (on my dime), had a long lunch with her (split the check), and cranked out a book proposal that followed her template. A little back and forth; no suggestions about content or style and she went off on her merry way to sell the book, which she never did.

But then again, she never told me any of this until I called her to say I wanted to dissolve out contractual relationship. Our phone conversations over the course of a year and a half were always cheerful, hopeful and initiated by me. To her credit, she always called me back and kept me in the loop of where she had peddled the proposal, but never suggested ways in which it might be more marketble until I called to part ways.

But then again, she never promised me the moon and I had found her.

Not so with Agent Number Two, a subject for another day or two.