Sheesh on a cracker. I don't even know where to start.
She lists GONE WITH THE WIND as having had thirty-eight rejections. That's incorrect. Margaret Mitchell met the editor who ended up buying it; she knew him vaguely and he was in Atlanta at the time. She gave him the ms. He started reading it on his train trip home, and he made an offer for it. It was never even submitted anywhere else, much less to thirty-eight different publishing houses; in the age of typewriters, how the heck would that even work? How would someone even know about the existence of that many publishers in 1936/37?
Authors get rejected because they don't know:
who to submit their projects to so they submit them to the wrong agent(s)
how to properly present their projects with the expected industry standard documents & formats
whether their book is ready to send to an agent
You can learn all of that for free here at AW. Or at any number of other sites online, like Agentquery or QueryShark.
I'm the conduit between the authors and the agents
so everybody can get what they want:
a great book that gets published.
Actually, that conduit is called "email." And having an agent is no guarantee of publication. For that matter, it's not a guarantee the book is "great."
Moving on...
http://www.literaryagentmatchmaker.com/authors.htm
Why You Absolutely Need
a Literary Agent Matchmaker
to Get Published
Gee, I guess that's a new rule? Because I've been published quite a few times without one. So has everyone I know.
Every writer runs the risk of getting rejected. In fact, more than 90% of authors often get rejected repeatedly.
It's quite a lot more than 90%, actually. Also, your point is? No "matchmaker" in the world is going to stop a bad book from getting rejected.
She then posts a list of authors who've been rejected (with the GWTW lie), as if that means anything at all. Or as if she could have prevented that from happening by giving someone a couple of names.
In fact, some agents only take 3 seconds
to review and reject what is sent in.
That's because the vast majority of queries don't need more than three seconds. When there are four typos in the first sentence, or homophone errors, or the writing simply doesn't make sense, agents don't need to keep reading to know it's not going to be for them, and most likely isn't publishable at all.
Agents are overwhelmed by the thousands of submissions every week, many of which are inappropriate for them and not in line with what they like to represent. Too many of them are improperly submitted and have to be trashed at first glance.
Again, your point is? Sure, they get a lot of subs and a lot of them are wrong. I suppose if *every* writer in the world used [her] service, that might stop. But that's never going to happen.
And if you really wanted to stop that from happening, you'd post that info for free or link to places where that info could be found.
What A Literary Agent Matchmaker Does:
Hi, I'm Jennifer S. Wilkov and one of my favorite services I provide authors, agents, publishers and the industry is literary agent matchmaking.
As a Literary Agent Matchmaker, I help authors submit their projects properly to the right agents who work with books in their genre and category. I also prepare authors to connect with literary managers, Hollywood agents, publishers, speaking engagement bookers, booksellers and more.
1. A "literary agent matchmaker" does nothing, because there's no such thing.
2. How are you providing a service to
publishers by being a "Literary Agent Matchmaker?"
3. What does connecting them with bookstores etc. have to do with literary agents? And frankly, if you can do all that, why not be a personal manager, and quit pretending you have some sort of "in" with agents and bilking naive writers out of money?
Why I Do It:
I am passionate about helping other authors and writers get published, make a difference for humanity, and leave a legacy for yourself, your family and the human race.
What's the difference between an author and a writer, again? And you know, while I'm very, very proud of my books, and I work hard to make them have a point or address a deeper issue...I really don't think they're making much of a difference for humanity. I really don't think the vast majority of books make a difference for humanity.
I want authors like you to stop guessing what to do and who to send your book to. I also want you to stop getting rejection letters or wondering if an agent ever saw your book in the first place.
What about the writers? Do you want them to stop guessing, too?
You cannot stop anyone from getting rejection letters, FFS. You can't force agents to read full mss when it's obvious the mss are lousy.
Sorry, but the vast majority of books that get rejected? Deserve to be rejected. Because they're just not any good.
Why You Need One:
It's time for you to start getting interest and the right representation for your book.
To be successful, you have to know:
how to find the right agents and
how to properly submit your book to them
AgentQuery.com and others recommend that you have a second set of eyes to identify the right agents.
(Bolding mine)
1. No, you do NOT need this service.
2. AgentQuery recommends that? Where? I don't recall seeing that. It's nonsense. I can tell you the names of a dozen great agents right off the top of my head; I don't need another person to verify that, for example, Jim McCarthy or Ginger Clark or Laura Bradford or, geez, any number of others, including my own agent, are great agents and an asset to any writer's career.
Here we go:
Stop getting rejected and get published faster, easier and with less effort. Connect with the right agent who is going to be a champion for you and your book.
Gaaaaah there are no freaking shortcuts in publishing!!! How can you get someone published "faster" or "easier?" For that matter, how do you get them published "with less effort?"
There is
no way this woman can guarantee someone they won't be rejected, unless she's specifically sending writers to scam agents.
I review your project and documents – to confirm they are ready for submission before you submit them. I then support you with identifying 3 agents that represent books like yours.
In other words, you glance over a query for typos and go to AgentQuery to grab three names from a rudimentary search. Maybe. This "service" is more ridiculous by the minute. THREE agents? Come on.
And of course, this leads me to the Usual Questions: What is your publishing experience? How are you qualified to judge if a work is publishable? How long have you been in the industry?
What You Receive When You Become a Literary Matchmaking Client:
Research and identification of 3 agents in your book's proper genre
Direct contact information of agents
http://www.agentquery.com
Proper submission guidelines, preferences and requirements for each agent
A query letter should be no more than one page; about 250 words tops. The query should describe the book--particularly the plot and characters--in a quick, clean way. The formula for a query letter "hook" is
here on the archived Miss Snark blog (where, incidentally, answers to thousands of publishing questions can be found. For FREE).
With your query you send the first five or ten pages, usually (you can find that info at AgentQuery, as well). You ms should be double-spaced, in 12-pt Times New Roman or Courier font.
Clarify which industry events to attend to meet & pitch agents for your book in person
It's absolutely unnecessary to attend any of them, or pitch in person to anyone.
Review of proper documents and package prepared by client for submission
In other words, maybe a basic crit, done by someone with no verifiable publishing experience.
Cost: $1,000 (this does not include writing your book proposal and/or sample book chapter)
WOW.
Well, gee, I just gave all that info here, so...make your checks payable to Stacia Kane. Thanks.
There's no "About Me" on the site, but from what she says on her "Proposal Services" page, she's self-published and is, of course, a "Bestselling author." (She doesn't explain how she managed to get published without using a Literary Agent Matchmaker, btw. Of course, she is self-pubbed, so technically she didn't, but if she's going to say that she can't call herself a bestseller, and...oh, it's just so confusing.)
I wish I had a dime for every self-published person who calls themselves a "Bestselling author." I'm sure she is a bestseller--at her own publishing house, where she only publishes herself.
As a general rule...if they call themselves "Bestselling author
," and you've never heard of them...it means they're fluffing, or exaggerating, or not using the same criteria for "Bestseller" as people in real publishing do. Which means they should be avoided.
A Google search for her doesn't bring up any lists on which she could be/is a bestseller, or any mention of real publishing experience.
You don't have to figure it out on your own anymore. I'm here to help you. I'm an expert at doing this just like you are an expert at what you do.
There is absolutely zero proof of any kind of expertise at doing anything related to agents or commercial publishing.
*shakes head*