Where to turn? Fellow writers, I need your help.

I've just started researching agents myself, so I can't give you names. But one resource I've used is http://querytracker.net/clients.php . You can pick an author with a book similar to yours, and find out who his/her agent is.

Good luck, and welcome to AW!

There are loads of good YA agents. If you're worried, then check for recent sales on the agents page (assuming you're using agentquery) and also google said agent to see if any warnings come up.

Preditors and editors is a good site for checking if the agent is not recommended.

Other than that, i do suggest you get someone to look over your work, if you haven't already.

And unbiased someone - you could always try put up the opening in SYW and see what kind of feedback you get.

It's a lot of work, but your best bet is to take those 96 agents one by one and research them. That's the only way you'll know who represents what, if they're on any "beware" lists (check preditors & editors and writers beware), and what they've sold recently. Spend the $20 a month for one or two months and subscribe to Publishers Marketplace online to check sales. Not every agent reports them, but enough do to get a sense of what they've sold.

An agent might list YA on their site, but when you look at what they've sold, it's all military or crime fiction. That's an agent you can probably put low of the list to query. Another agent might have a slew of sold YA novels along the same lines as yours. That's a great agent to put at the top of your list. Look in the agent section of this forum. There's a lot of agents who drop by to answer questions, and you can get a good sense of things from that as well. The moderators here aren't going to let scammer agents into the forums.

Read agent websites, blogs, any interviews they've done. If there are any local conferences (or non local ones) soon, and agents will be there, try going and listing to them to get a feel for who they are and what they like.

Read some of their books to get a feel for what styles they like.

Once you have your list winnowed down, start sending queries. (Assuming you've spent time perfecting your query and it's shines bright).

Oh, and you probably don't want to mention in your query that the book is destined for greatness. Those self promotional phrases tend to turn agents off in a big way. Same with comparing your work to mega bestsellers. Just write a dang good hook and let the book speak for itself. Good books always do.

Hi, Forrest, and welcome to AW!

F.F.:
Not that I have queried an especially large number of agents, I just had a gut feeling of who I wanted to be my agent and sent those letters off. Well, now that I've heard back from a few and have been left unanswered by others I'm turning to the writing community for some sage like guidance.

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If the agents you've queried aren't responding or are giving you a form rejection, then your query letter probably needs some work doing to it. Check out the SYW Forum here on AW and post what you've done so that people can give you feedback (but be warned, people here don't mince their words!).

F.F.:
But the bottom line is, who is good? There are about 96 Young Adult agents on Agentquery to wade through and rather than throw my work into the hands of someone at random just because they work in the right corner of the literary market, I'm primarily concerned about finding the right agent for me.

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I think it's right that you need to think about getting an agent who is right for you, but before you have the luxury of deciding that, you need to get some offers of representation. To that end, I agree with the other commentators about doing your research on agents to make sure you're targeting people who represent your genre or similar authors, but you shouldn't disregard an agent just because they don't represent the authors you like (for example). Query well and query widely should be your first approach.

I'd also recommend querying in batches - most people seem to agree that batches of 5 are a good place to start and I'd agree with that - and start with the agents who you're really keen on and work your way down. That way, you've always got something out on submission and you'll feel that you're making progress.

While you're waiting for a response, start working on your next book and I'd suggest that you make sure that next book is nothing to do with the first (even if you're planning a trilogy or series). This is because there is nothing more heartbreaking than starting work on the next in your trilogy/series, only to discover that no one wants your first book.

F.F.:
who do I send it to, that will not only appreciate it, but champion it to the highest bidder and ensure that it reaches far and wide into the hands of anyone thirsting for entertainment and enlightenment?

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Money's great, but you should bear in mind that selling for the most money might not be the best way forward for sustaining a career in writing. This is because the advance offered to you will be calculated by the publisher with reference to the number of sales they think that they can make. The higher the advance, the more sales they anticipate making. Now, if (for whatever reason - and sometimes it can just be bad luck) your book doesn't make the sales level they thought it would make, they might decide not to take your second book. On top of that, you might find that other publishers will look at your sales figures and decide not to take on other work from you either.

In any event, big money deals in YA fiction are not a regular occurrence - the average figure for advances in the UK for example works out at £5,000 and that will usually be spread between 2 books (not to mention the fact that the advance will be a split payment in any event, with some on acceptance of the deal and a proportion only going to you when the final manuscript has been accepted).

This is all a long way in the future and it's something that will need to be discussed with your agent when the time comes, but sometimes a lower advance but a guaranteed marketing campaign can be better for an author than a big wadge of cash.

MM

Danthia said:

Spend the $20 a month for one or two months and subscribe to Publishers Marketplace online to check sales. Not every agent reports them, but enough do to get a sense of what they've sold.

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ACTUALLY... I have discovered that if you Google an agent's name along with "dealmaker", you can get to their Publisher's Marketplace Dealmaker page by clicking the Cached version (underneath the URL in the results page).

For example...

Don't know how that loophole occurred, but it's pretty useful

Hmm, well, if you want me to throw names...

Tina Wexler

Marianne Merola

Jim McCarthy

Kristin Nelson

Stephen Barbara

Those are a few that I have either had experience with or I know of people who have had good experiences with them. The top two requested my partials and got back promptly with fabulous feedback, even though they ultimately rejected me.

In the end, though, only you can find that super agent. So don't limit yourself at all. Query everyone (unless they blatantly say DON'T QUERY ME. That's asking for trouble.)