When to Part Ways with your Literary Agent

I was in a somewhat similar situation. If you have not received info on submissions and have trouble connecting with your agent after a year, I wouldn't hesitate to terminate your relationship. Of course, check your contract. If there's no contractual reason not to, I don't know that I'd let the week close without communicating your intentions.

When you do part ways, make sure (even if you have to get it from one of the managing agents of the firm if your agent isn't quickly forthcoming) that you get a list of where the manuscript was submitted and the outcomes of those submissions. My wish for you is that there were few to no submissions. Then get in contact with one of the other agents who had expressed interest and assess continued interest.

Ugh. I'm sorry this happened to you.

The fact she hasn't told you where she submitted the manuscript seems like a red flag to me.

You and your agent are partners. If your partner isn't helping you, you need to cut her loose. Getting an agent is great, but business is business.

Hopefully she hasn't submitted the manuscript to very many places.

First, if you haven't had an explicit conversation with her, like, I feel like we are not communicating well, I need to know where my manuscript has been and if there has been feedback, I feel very strongly about open and swift communication, can you provide this? Then I'd do that first.

If you HAVE had that convo, and she still isn't doing it, it's time to part ways.

I'm in that boat at the moment, went on sub 6 months ago, and then the agent promptly ceased communication. No sub list, nothing.

And yes, they were flaky with the phone calls too, which makes me wonder if we had the same one, ha!

I'll probably send a letter in a few months terminating the (verbal) agreement. I think even if they were to email me back afterwards, I couldn't feel secure enough with them to rep me. I kind of don't even want to chase them up and explain my displeasure at the whole situation at this point.

Sapphire135 said:

Naturally, I do not want to part ways and go back to querying, but it is looking more and more like that is the way to go.

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I know it sucks to have to go back to the querying stage, but try to think about how, right now, even though you "have" an agent, it basically feels like you don't anyways. Having an agent who isn't really representing you is not any better than not having an agent. And hey, if your query letter was strong enough to attract interest before, I'm sure you'll have similar interest this time. Good luck!

I was in a similar situation a few months ago, doubting my agent. She was very responsive at first and did keep me updated on the sub list for the first six months, but after that I had to nudge her constantly to get updates and she took forever to read a second novel. I eventually set up a call with her at the encouragement of the forum members here and frankly, my agent's issue is really that she's just so busy. I have to prompt her because squeaky wheel gets the grease. I'm not saying your situation is the same at all. It sounds like there are other problems, but I would recommend talking it out with your agent. They're human and make mistakes, but if you feel you need to move on I did hear from numerous others on the forum that they had switched agents before, so it is possible. I hope everything works out for you!!

Fully understand what you're going through, gal. I had the whole issue with the agent dropping off the face of the Earth, then having that sort of wake-up phone call to get things back on track, which again derailed only a month later. At this point, I put in my termination letter two weeks ago and still haven't heard anything back from the agent OR the agency.

Erik Thurman said:

Fully understand what you're going through, gal. I had the whole issue with the agent dropping off the face of the Earth, then having that sort of wake-up phone call to get things back on track, which again derailed only a month later. At this point, I put in my termination letter two weeks ago and still haven't heard anything back from the agent OR the agency.

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Yeah, that's what happened to me. Had the talk, then seven weeks' worth of a big black hole of nothing. Hopefully, this will prove out to be something different for the OP than it was for us.

Having gone through that and then working with an agent now who will occasionally ping me just to check in and say hi, I will forever consider unreplied-to emails and long stretches of no communication to be a problem. That said, I think it's a mark of professionalism for writers not to be needy and high maintenance (which the OP does not appear to be.) My agent isn't my therapist (well, maybe just a teeny bit ) and no news is no news and I need to remember that I'm not her her only writer. But in times where there's action on my work - like, say, when it's on submission, communication has to be regular and unforced.

This business certainly has its stresses, but I don't think the tone of the agent-writer relationship should be one of those.

I'm going to echo what Perks has to say about this, and hope your situation turns out much better than the both of us. Also, is the radio silence happening to just you or is it something that all of this agent's clients are experiencing? Usually when there is trouble, it's not just with one client...

It's important to note that agents are a representative to your work, and while having a small problem on your part does not necessitate an immediate response, they should be able to respond in some way to you when it's needed. I believe that if an agent isn't responding to clients within a timely manner, then they aren't responding to or nudging the editors that they have their submissions out to in a timely manner.

Let us know how it goes. I'm curious as to what excuse could be justifiable in the circumstances.

I've been in the same boat, yes. In fact, it sounds like your agent is my old agent. I had one for almost two years. I was so busy being a playwright (I had 4 plays produced during that time period) and freelancer, that I just let the stagnant novel in her hands kind of leave my mind. When I got back down to business and said enough is enough I was working on the Board of Directors for the Ontario Writers' Conference. I was liaisoning with agents who were attending the conference. I friended up with one and one day I simply bitched to her about my agent-non-agent. She told me there are times when you should just drop your agent, having a bad agent is not better than having no agent at all. In fact, it's worse.

I went through the process of cancelling my contract. Once it went through, my agent/friend offered me representation...something she couldn't ethically do beforehand.

Just make sure you terminate properly and wait the right amount of time before you re-agent yourself. Follow your contract guidelines on that stipulation!

My agent was impossible to reach too...but the odd time she would give me, 'so-and-so is reading it and loves it...etc.' I soused out, after I left her, that she was making up stories about where she placed my work in order to appease my inquiries.

DON'T KEEP AN AGENT THAT ISN'T WORKING FOR YOU.

PS: My agent refused to give me a list of where she submitted. And I know she has done this with other clients too. She appears to be an agent only in name. Tax shelter??? I have no idea...

That's a crappy situation, OP, and I'm sorry to hear about it. Everyone's given you great advice and I hope it works out one way or another. FWIW, many people I know (including myself) have ended up breaking up with their first agent. The majority ended up with agents they were much happier and more comfortable with. Plus, you know, book deals.

Good luck!