Loose Leaf Literary Agency

Whilst one is always glad to see a new agency who are prepared to look at science fiction and fantasy, I would be much more comfortable if the principals gave details of their experience within the publishing industry.

Oooh, now this is potentially a good opportunity for new writers.

Loose Leaf Literary Agency was founded in Portland, Oregon in June 2012 by Kristen Svenson, Casey Woodworth, and Jeanne Laravuso, three publishing professionals dedicated to connecting good writers with
good publishers.

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I had a look for some qualifications for the ladies.

Casey's past qualifications from LinkedIn (http://www.linkedin.com/pub/casey-woodworth/3a/74/467):
Acquisitions Manager at Ooligan Press
Sell-Through Marketing Manager at Ooligan Press

Kristen's from LinkedIn (http://www.linkedin.com/pub/kristen-svenson/22/36b/131) :
"I have over 5 years of experience in editing, copyediting, and proofing, and over 3 years of experience in marketing and sales."
Publicist/Sales Manager, then Managing Editor at Ooligan Press
Acquisitions Intern at RainTown Press

Can't find any history for Jeanne Laravuso. AbsoluteWrite doesn't seem to have had a thread for Ooligan Press.

EDIT: Ooligan Press seems to focus on taking students from Unis and giving them publication industry experience at their not-for-profit press.

Well, we should probably give them more than one day, and a Saturday, at that, to build up a track record.

On the other hand, and this may just be the old lady in me talking, they seem to have done a ton of stuff "Our agents have diverse backgrounds in publishing, writing, literature, editing, marketing, sales, social media, publicity, medical research, culinary arts, anthropology, linguistics, theatre, music, travel, real estate, library science, horticulture, and more"
considering how young two of the three agents look.

EMaree said:

EDIT: Ooligan Press seems to focus on taking students from Unis and giving them publication industry experience at their not-for-profit press.

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It doesn't sound like they 'focus' on it, it sounds like a publishing course consisting of using students to run Ooligan Press.
Like a culinary school running a restaurant, as opposed to a restaurant hiring culinary students.
Although this does explain something I thought was a bit strange on the Loose Leaf site:
"At Loose Leaf, we are hands-on during every step of the editing, reviewing, and publishing process. ... our agents work closely with authors in both editorial and marketing capacities, before, during, and after publication" which seemed a little over-involved, but after reading the Ooligan site, that seems to be how they were taught.

I did a search on Preditors and Editors and couldn't find anything on any of the afformentioned names and publishers. So I shot them off an email to see if there may be some information they have received.

Well it looked inviting enough for me to query, so we'll see what happens. I'll let you guys know of the response times. Has anyone else queried them?

I queried them yesterday 10/14. Will come back and post response times! ^_^

It's difficult choosing one agent to query when all three of them have my genre on their wish lists! Oh well. I went with Jeanne since she and I have so many interests in common, according to her bio. I will post back here when I get a response (or non-response)!

On response times, I queried Kristen a few days ago, and got this in an e-mail response:

We understand that the waiting period can be a difficult time, but please do not email to follow up on your submission. An agent will contact you within 6 to 8 weeks with our response.

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The agenting business is mostly about having the connections to sell manuscripts to big publishers. I see no evidence these ladies have any such connections. I'd wait until they start making sales.

tbrosz said:

On response times, I queried Kristen a few days ago, and got this in an e-mail response:

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I got the same thing. It was a little disappointing for a form response to come a week later. Most agents have a decision made on it by then. Something like that you'd think you would get that right after pressing the send button.

Undercover said:

I got the same thing. It was a little disappointing for a form response to come a week later. Most agents have a decision made on it by then. Something like that you'd think you would get that right after pressing the send button.

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I thought it was okay. It's scary the number of agents today that simply say on their website "if you don't hear anything at all after six weeks, it's a no," and leave it at that. No way to tell if your query even got there at all. This is better.

tbrosz said:

I thought it was okay. It's scary the number of agents today that simply say on their website "if you don't hear anything at all after six weeks, it's a no," and leave it at that. No way to tell if your query even got there at all. This is better.

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Yeah, I don't mind it either. But you'd think the auto-message would be sooner than a week, ya know?

They still have yet to prove themselves with some sales first to really know how they operate.

On their submissions page, you can download PDFs about each agent. Two hold MAs in publishing from Portland State University, the third holds an MS in publishing from the same university. None of them give any specific information on the publishing experience they have; none of them appear to have worked as literary agents before, or to even have interned at any literary agencies, nor to have been involved in any aspect of the work that literary agents carry out. None of them mention any sales, or any clients, or any specific publishing successes that they've been involved in.

They might be lovely people and full of good intentions, but I wouldn't submit to them.

Just got a response from Jeanne stating that she is "no longer associated with the Loose Leaf Literary Agency." Interesting how less than a month after opening their doors, one of their founding agents has already left. Makes you wonder what was going on that caused her to leave...

Yeah, that's definitely interesting. There's no mention of the change at all on their agency site news, Twitter, or Facebook -- looks like they just removed all her details from the site.

She is the Invisible Agent, obviously.

I got a rejection response today from Kristen, but it was accompanied by specific advice on my query (too short at 28,000 words for middle grade, should be about 40,000.) along with recommended reading (You Can Write Children's Books by Tracey E. Dils.)

This kind of personal and helpful response from an agent on a cold query is rare and appreciated!

Old Hack said:

She is the Invisible Agent, obviously.

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Or she's a Secret Agent.

JUst queried Kristin, and five seconds later I received the auto-response. Finicky, I guess.

Has anyone gotten news from them lately? I'm wondering if anyone has received good news (Or maybe not such good news)

Website has them as closed to submissions in a slightly out-of-date notice: Loose Leaf Literary Agency is not currently accepting submissions. Please visit us again at the start of the New Year to learn when submissions will open up again. Happy Holidays!

There's also a newer update on their Twitter:

Loose Leaf Literary ‏@LooseLeafLit
Just a reminder, submissions are closed while we sort through the (digital) pile of fantastic queries that we received in 2012!
7:50 PM - 2 Jan 13

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I also noted that the agent running the Twitter feed also appears to be a writer. I'm guessing this is Casey since her agent bio also mentions she writes in her spare time.

Loose Leaf Literary
‏@LooseLeafLit
New Years writing #resolution? Mine is to write three times a week. (I'm starting slow!)
Reply Retweet Favorite More
10:41 PM - 31 Dec 12

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Loose Leaf Literary
‏@LooseLeafLit
@billlascher that's an excellent one. I need one of those programs that turns off my Internet while I write!
Reply Retweet Favorite More
10:45 PM - 31 Dec 12

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@Emaree: I was asking since I did receive a full from Kristen Svenson on the 11th of January and I'm trying to collect information on them since they are not on QueryTracker (Im the one who put in the suggestion and I haven't received a response back yet.)

Kristen is a writer too, she talked about querying a book on her own twitter account:

Please keep your fingers crossed as I send my own query letters out to agents.
11:44am - 17 Jan 13

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And she mentioned this the other day:

I just had a 30-minute conversation with the children's editor at HarperCollins. I sincerely love this industry I've chosen to live in!!
1:27pm - 24 Jan 13

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Ah, cool. I can't help you there since I haven't submitted, but it might be worth private messaging Undercover about their status since they never mentioned if they heard back.

Good luck with your full, but query widely and keep in mind the advice given above by Old Hack, Waylander, and Anna L.