Purgatory's Pit of Doom

P.S.

I signed the WH agency agreement once, and I remember being struck by a phrase.

The phrase stuck with me since 2009 because at the time it seemed so honest. I just dug up the contract, and the phrase is exactly as I remembered. Paragraph (3) of the WH agency agreement says,

You (the agent) agrees. .. to try and place my Work(s) for as long as you believe it is profitable to do so.

So when the agent determines that submitting the work is no longer profitable, meaning the money gained from any sale will not be worth the time, the agent may stop submitting.

I am willing to spend 200 hours submitting a novel for an advance of $7,500, but it seems to me that agents who do that sort of thing habitually -- while making money for their clients -- will soon be out of business.

ETA: I am arguing because arguing with Steve is fun. I am NOT I repeat NOT trying to convince people to follow me into no-agent-land, which isn't easy either.

It is the lack of "good faith" that has me so mad. But, Teri's point and example is well taken. Any agent's interest or effort for a client is dictated by their overall workload. I've been so quick to blame the marketplace, and that may play a role in some cases, but others might really be about how the agent wants to allocate their time.

Bad Agent Sydney T. Cat says, "

If Sydney has Big Deal going that requires all her attention, every other manuscript in her office looks just a little bit more like crap

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OL, Even worse than throwing a book out there with no support is signing a contract with an author but then refusing to publish the book. A local author in my area has been paid for a book by one of the big six but the publisher no longer plans to publish it. They don't want their money back, but they won't release the rights to the title either. She earned money for the book, but we all know how vexing it would be to have one our books in limbo like that. It isn't really a surprise that the agent isn't working day and night to get it published or get the rights back. She's already gotten paid, right?

What a nightmare, Octavia. We all want to get paid, but given a choice, I'd rather be published well but not paid than the other way around.

Yes, it is fun to argue with Teri.

To that end, of course, I somewhat disagree with her new point. Yes, the agent works in her own interest first, and they may differ from that of thevwriter. BUT, the agent still doesnt get paid unless the writer gets paid under any of Teri's scenarios.

In other words, the agent cant sell a book and the agent gets paid without the writer also getting paid.

We know this because agents work on commission and thays the naure of the fee arrangement. Contrast that from my day job. Clients pay me on an hourly fee as a litigator. Thus, I get paidbeven if my client doesnt get any money out of it.

SteveCordero said:

Yes, it is fun to argue with Teri.

To that end, of course, I somewhat disagree with her new point. Yes, the agent works in her own interest first, and they may differ from that of thevwriter. BUT, the agent still doesnt get paid unless the writer gets paid under any of Teri's scenarios.

In other words, the agent cant sell a book and the agent gets paid without the writer also getting paid.

We know this because agents work on commission and thays the naure of the fee arrangement. Contrast that from my day job. Clients pay me on an hourly fee as a litigator. Thus, I get paidbeven if my client doesnt get any money out of it.

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The only quarrel I have is over your use of the singular "writer."

If there are 50 agents on the writer's list, the agent can earn a very good living even if 25 of them are not earning a dime.

Why? Because it averages. So an agent can do things which will specifically cause one of his writers not to earn money but the agent will still earn money. In fact, the way to earn more money as an agents it to put your time where it will pay off, which means some writers don't earn anything.

Also, unless the agent is a saint (and yes, some probably are) it is likely that #1 and 3 would be neglected entirely under my scenario particularly if the writer had no idea that another day's work on the agent's part would net the writer additional money. And if you think every agent possessing that kind of information would divulge the information to the writer (hey if I put in about 10 hours I might be able to get you 100 more dollars, but I'm not gonna) I have a bridge for sale.

Octavia, I happen to still have the WH agency agreement open, and it specifies that the agent "negotiate in good faith on my behalf," but not that the agent will make a good faith effort to sell the works.

alias octavia said:

They don't want their money back, but they won't release the rights to the title either. She earned money for the book, but we all know how vexing it would be to have one our books in limbo like that. It isn't really a surprise that the agent isn't working day and night to get it published or get the rights back. She's already gotten paid, right?

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This is the part that doesn't make sense. I'll bet there's a way to get the rights back. In my contracts, the rights revert automatically after the book goes out of print. (It's more complicated, of course)

She needs a good lawyer.

There's also the "sue me" method of getting her rights back. She just publishes the book elsewhere and waits for the publisher to sue her. They won't unless it makes a whole lot of money, and then the additional publicity will probably help her earn more money. (Um, the above is NOT and I mean NOT legal advice.

Yes, she has a lawyer working on it. I oversimplified the issue somewhat to make my point. The publisher hasn't outright refused to publish it yet but it just keeps getting bumped. Endlessly bumped, moved around to different editors (the one who worked with her on the previous 4 books is gone). This has been going on for a few years. It is hard for mid-list authors these days, very hard. I feel for her.

And yet I dream of midlist!

Just got five queries ready. I got a nice personal rejection on a picture book last week -- it doesn't take much to encourage me. But with picture books especially, if it's a competently written, marketable story, I really think it's a matter of getting on the right desk at the right time. It might never happen no matter how much you send it, but it MIGHT.

kellion92 said:

And yet I dream of midlist!

Just got five queries ready. I got a nice personal rejection on a picture book last week -- it doesn't take much to encourage me. But with picture books especially, if it's a competently written, marketable story, I really think it's a matter of getting on the right desk at the right time. It might never happen no matter how much you send it, but it MIGHT.

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That's the spirit, Kellion. It helps to be crazy because I think you have to be able to continue past the point a sane person woud give up.

Re: hard to be mid list: I thought you publish one book at a time. What else? Well what I've learned if do that, I'd never earn a living. You'll have one book maybe every 3 or 4 years You gotta have several things going at once. I am trying to set that up.

Next post: agents and midlist and trying to earn a living and my argument with Steve.

The midlist comments give me another idea for my argument with Steve.


Suppose an agent has 50 cleints each earning $15,000 per year. A writer can't live on 15,000 which means he has to work full time which means never enough time to write more to break out.

The agent, however is earning over 100K, which is a nice living even in NYC. (15,000 x 50 = 750,000 / 15% = 112,000.)

It's smart business to spread your income out over many baskets. Big agency averages over hundreds and hundreds of writers. The effort it takes to bring one writer from 15,000 to 40,000 so the writer can quit her day job is much harder than to bring in a brand new writer. (Agents are always looking for new writers even if there are writers on their list who really want to be earning more money.)

Once again, Steve, I am NOT encouraging you to follow me over the cliff, into deep water. Just having fun taking apart "agents earn money when writers earn money so agents must be working in the best interest of each writer on his list."

Teriann said:

The midlist comments give me another idea for my argument with Steve.


Suppose an agent has 50 cleints each earning $15,000 per year. A writer can't live on 15,000 which means he has to work full time which means never enough time to write more to break out.

The agent, however is earning over 100K, which is a nice living even in NYC. (15,000 x 50 = 750,000 / 15% = 112,000.)

It's smart business to spread your income out over many baskets. Big agency averages over hundreds and hundreds of writers. The effort it takes to bring one writer from 15,000 to 40,000 so the writer can quit her day job is much harder than to bring in a brand new writer. (Agents are always looking for new writers even if there are writers on their list who really want to be earning more money.)

Once again, Steve, I am NOT encouraging you to follow me over the cliff, into deep water. Just having fun taking apart "agents earn money when writers earn money so agents must be working in the best interest of each writer on his list."

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You do realize, Teri, that under your scenario above the agent is still only making money once her clients make money, right?

If her 50 clients or a portion of them weren't making money, then the agent wouldn't be making money either.

You are making a whole v. part fallacy., confusing the scenario of agent's writers with any given writer.

Agents make money when their writers as a whole average a certain income.

But an agent can do fine while working against the interests of any number of individual writers. You can be on the list not making any money while the agent still earns plenty. Do you want to take your chances? (Yes! Enough writers do.)

Steve we can switch sides. You argue against the agent model, and I'll argue for. Some sides are easier to argue. The prosecutor always has a easier time. It's easier to argue against agents because, well, they are agents

Heh. I love watching you guys joust. It's like a rom com minus the sexual chemistry.

P.S. I do understand what it means to earn only on commission.

I hear people say, agents work on commission, therefore, I can trust my agent is always working in my best interest to help me maximize my earnings. For complicated reasons that is a fallacy. What is good for the whole may not be good for each part.

Haupe said:

Heh. I love watching you guys joust. It's like a rom com minus the sexual chemistry.

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ROFL. Lawyers Not in Love.

Teri, I never said agents work in the best interest of clients because unless the client makes money the agent doesnt.

Its called convergent interests. The agents No. 1 goal is to make money for herself. That interest converges with the client's interest because the client making money is the vehicle by which the agent makes money.

Of course, the agent wants a stable of clients because that increases the opportunity to make money.

Last, Im not advocating for one model over another, just clarifying the situation.

PS, LOL Haupe & Kell

Haupe said:

Heh. I love watching you guys joust. It's like a rom com minus the sexual chemistry.

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kellion92 said:

ROFL. Lawyers Not in Love.

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So glad I wasn't the only one thinking this.

Glad to provide the weekend entertainment. glad we agreed.

I can think of so many ways an agent can work against the interest of one or more clients while increasing his overall income.

Not that writers should not work with agents, but it is good to clarify what their job actually is.

As the WH contract makes clear, they don't see themselves as having a good faith duty to try to sell a client's work ; they reserve the right to stop when further submissions are no longer profitable. Hence, the shop and drop phenomena so many of us experiences.

To quote the Godfather, it's just business. Don't take it personally. (so he says as he slips the garrote around your neck. )

Change of subject (lighter note)

I figured out how to get all my submissions lists on a single spreadsheet.

Wasn't easy. At all.

(((Filigree))) Have you contacted Mac? AW has been named in suits before, I believe. If you have been sued, AW probably has too, and I think they have defended themselves well in the past.

You guys pulled me right into your discussion. Now here's my good-bad news:

Dear Chris,


I’m happy to have received the manuscript for this project. The first three chapters were interesting, and unique, enough so to lure my closer attention.
Reading further into a new work, I am more critical and make comments in the document. One of my tasks, at this stage, is to determine the amount of editing a manuscript requires. I begin commenting at the point where I left off reading in the sample.

It is from that scrutiny that chapter four began to be a problem for me. At around page 42, the number of proof-reading edits became apparent. I suggest that you look at the text as I have done, and run through it again to make improvements. You will also see the type of style, or narrative comments that I normally make to an author who has our interest.

You have my interest, this is not a rejection. It is an opportunity to proof your work with a more focused eye, before we continue our review. I forward all prospective manuscripts to our president, and editing is a primary element in our judgment to publish, or pass. You really only want him seeing my story comments, and none of the editing points. I also want to focus entirely on the story, and others in my queue, and avoid a time-consuming beta read

Please send a clean manuscript in the very near future. I will keep this title in my prospective list, and continue reading with good hopes for a future relationship.

Regards,
XXXXXXXX


Well, that's my first R & R ever from a publisher. I'm not kidding. But it's so fricken embarrassing because he's, for the most part, outlining stupid grammar and spelling errors, left-out words, and some agreement issues.

That'll teach me to rush a manuscript. I've never had a regular beta reader because I never wanted to bother anybody. But maybe I should seriously look into that option. Now I'm going over this YA tale, page by page, trying to spot anything wrong or missing. On the one hand, I'm thrilled. On the other, I've never felt like such a damn incompetent slacker.

RE and inline with the agent thing, my agent Does Not line by line proof read for any of us stablemates. Now I have to confess to her that I got a bite, (I'm allowed to submit a few) but I have these conditions for a resubmit.

Not only that, my agent hasn't even received this newest book from me!

Well, into the corner painted me.

Tri--whose problems are never normal or routine.

Filigree said:

How pittish is this? I have my first lawsuit against me, due to my comments against Brighton Publishing on AW's Bewares thread. Seems they don't like to have their business model questioned in public.

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Ack. Just saw this. Filligree, this is total crapola. They haven't got a leg to stand on, nor a brain to think with.

Tri, congrats for the R&R! The editor must really like your premise and writing.

And, boy, you have a unique way of doing things! You're agented, but seems like you're as close to Teri's view of agents as you can be when you have an agent. I get that too... agents can open doors, but you always have to manage your own career. Some agents get in the way of that.

kellion92 said:

Tri, congrats for the R&R! The editor must really like your premise and writing.

And, boy, you have a unique way of doing things! You're agented, but seems like you're as close to Teri's view of agents as you can be when you have an agent. I get that too... agents can open doors, but you always have to manage your own career. Some agents get in the way of that.

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Know what, Kell? I think that put it in a nutshell accurately.

Tri, congrats on the R and R. I'd feel the same way. On the agents topic, I bristled inwardly at the idea that your agent "allows" you to submit a few on your own. Brings me back to my last experience . . . you should be in charge (but then, I also think we should have world peace,)

Now two of us are in lawsuits. I haven't asked my lawyer what's happening at all. At first I worried. Now I just forgot about it.

Well, it isn't quite that I don't trust agents, but I sure haven't had one sell a book for me in the past 23 years, and I've had three very reputable, successful agents and nine manuscripts that hammered on doors. So I adopted the idea that I would help with some research and cover subs to the smaller houses that pay advances.

As a result of my research and reports to my agents, I've made five sales for stablelmates over the years. Just one example, I had one very good agent that didn't know who Prometheus was--when I tipped the agent off, she/he made a huge advance sale for a client--a friend of mine.

I just love getting involved in the process. If I find a publisher who I think is spot on, and my agent doesn't have them on his/her list, ping! I send the information. I've always had agents write back and thank me profusely for the tips and directions. That's just the way I roll. The trick is, if you are on the submission highways along with your agent, don't cause a car crash on down the line. I've been very close, but lucky so far.