Agent vs. No agent with small presses

Lots of small presses accept direct submissions. But that's because they have to, as they're usually under agents' radars, as they often don't pay advances.

If you find an agent you're more likely to end up with a good deal at a good house, complete with good advance. Agented writers usually earn more per book than writers without agents--even when published by the same houses.

If you're querying for an agent, stick to that until you're sure you've run out of options. After that, start querying publishers directly--or recognise your book needs work, and take it off the market and either revise it or retire it.

toribov said:

Hey everyone. So I've been querying for about two months now, so I'm still on the early side of the game. I've had a full request that ended in a rejection and that's about it. I'm still querying, but I did pitch madness today and I had some attention from a couple of small presses that don't require agents. Is this shady? Is this something I should even look into? Has anyone else had experience with this?

All advice is welcome!

Click to expand...

Nothing shady about that (do your research into each publisher, of course). I've had three books published by small publishers and all were legit. My first book was with a University Press and don't think anyone would argue that they are shady or not legitimate. If you're targeting smaller presses (like I targeted academic presses with my history books) you might be better off without an agent--and many agents won't be interested if the target market is that small anyway.

Of course, if you think you're book can end up and would be best with a major publisher, I agree with the previous post--stick with querying agents for now.

Hrm, what constitutes runnign out of options? :/

Running out of agents you want to query.