Progress Report: 11/29/2010

Champagne! I have an agent.

I spoke with Ms. Devra Jacobs of Dancing Word Group this weekend, and it looks like she's a go to represent Rose & Jade. She's breaking into the Young Adult market, and she's very enthusiastic about the book and its potential. Not so hot on the title, so we'll be coming up with something else that telegraphs the content a little more clearly. Y'know, something to do with dragons.

I'm very psyched, folks.

Oh, so in terms of contacting an agent who's been holding onto your manuscript, I think it's worth it. The other agent that was in the running was taking quite a while to get back to me, though she eventually did. And she decided not to take the book on, which made my own decision much easier.

The thing is, it seems that agents will gnaw on a book for a long time if they're interested, and will send it out to other people in their inner circle to read and evaluate. This is why it takes so long. My experience is that they don't provide a stream of updates about this, so if the waiting is driving you mad (as it was for me), then you're probably best off dropping your potential agent a polite email to ask for an update. Might take a while to get a response to that, too.

Patience. This business requires patience.

Next up for me: book proposal. And, I'm told, creating a website for your book with an ambiguous "coming soon" is not a bad notion, if you can find a website designer and illustrator to help you out. Fortunately, I have both those skills myself, so there's a head start. Time to get to work!