Revelations I & II

The last sesson at yesterday's conference was a panel discussion of editors and agents that was extremely informative. In fact, I learned two important revelations about my relationship with my agent.

First, it was clear from listening to each of the agents speak about what they were looking for in both a proposal and an author, that each one was extremely selective. In fact, the entire process of getting a book published is akin to a long climb up a ladder of selectivity, with each rung being progressively narrow. If you make it past the first step of getting published at all, to the next rung of compiling a portfolio of clips, to the next level of being signed by an agent to the next level of actually getting your book "shopped" then it is STILL a long climb to the top. The selectivity on the part of the agents is designed to protect their investments of time (their chief commodity) and energy. In other words, they are not going to sign you unless they feel they can sell your book. There are simply too many other possibilities out there for them to waste time on projects that will not pan out. Hence the dificulty in procurring an agent to begin with.

That being said, the fact that my agent procurred me indicates that he truly believes the book will sell. Otherwise he would not have wasted his time, energy and resources to date on getting my proposal into "fighting' shape.

Second, not only can the process take anywhere from three days to three years (yes, someone actually took three years to sell a book....), once your project has been "shopped" by one agent, it is very unusual for another to touch it with a ten foot pole. Of course, editors do move and publishing house rules do change, but once an agent has given it his or her "all," very few are willing to take on someone's failures.

So, it looks as if I am "wed" to my agent for the long haul. Once he has put his imprimatur on my proposal, no one else is going to touch it. If he can't sell it, chances are no one else can.

So where does that leave me, other than a little more savvy about the world of publishing? Back on square one: believing (on good days) that my agent knows what he is doing or he would not have taken me on and wondering (on bad days) whether or not he is doing all that can be done.

In other words, stuck between two rungs...