Andrew Lownie Literary Agency

Plix, did you explore the website? There's a full client list. It answers your question more authoritatively than any of us can.

- Victoria

Very successful and legit.
Next question?

I just queried him....now to wait. Hope he considers U.S. writers

Andrew Lownie is a fabulous agent and a lovely man. He deals mostly in non-fiction, and from what I've heard he really looks after his clients. Everything I've heard about him leads me to believe that he's one of the best.

He doesn't represent me, so I have no vested interest in telling you this: but he did recently add an article of mine to his website.

That is great! he at least has recognized you....I hope to be as lucky....

Well, not so lucky. My ms isn't commerical enough....sigh.... He did read my blog though. That surprised me.

Does anyone have any recent experience with this agency?

Queried Saturday evening through their website because the e-mail bounced back. Got a reply a few hours later (3 a.m. my time) from the agency's fiction agent David Haviland that he had received it, and that "it sounds interesting, and I'd be pleased to take a look."

I e-mailed back to see if he wanted a synopsis and a partial or the whole manuscript.

Waiting to hear back.

DPRichard, I just queried them through the website and got the exact same (word for word) email in reply, so it's probably standardised. I'll no doubt send my MS on anyway, but it's made me a bit suspicious. Glad I saw this thread before I got my hopes up too much at that email!

allmywires said:

DPRichard, I just queried them through the website and got the exact same (word for word) email in reply, so it's probably standardised. I'll no doubt send my MS on anyway, but it's made me a bit suspicious. Glad I saw this thread before I got my hopes up too much at that email!

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Actually, David just replied and told me to send over a synopsis and a few chapters. Sending and crossing fingers and toes for both of us.

Ooh, good! I sent him my synopsis + first 10k, but without asking! Good luck with it

allmywires said:

Ooh, good! I sent him my synopsis + first 10k, but without asking! Good luck with it

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Same to you. Hopefully he offers to rep us both.

For those of you who have submitted fiction to Mr. Haviland, what all did you send him with your query? I found an interview where he says he wants the equivalent of a non-fiction book proposal with 1/2 page summaries for each chapter--for a novel. (as well as the first 3 chapters). But I gather from some of the posts above that this is something he asks for later, if the query looks promising?

Thanks!

Madeleines, I sent a series synopsis and the first few (short) chapters of the first two books. I was asked to send the manuscripts (same wording as noted by previous posters here).

Someone could do me a favor by letting me know how long Mr. Haviland takes to respond, if they can give me a general idea. A month? 3? Does he bother to send a "no thanks" if he decides he doesn't want the works? I really hate hanging in limbo, and I have submitted to agents who asked for manuscripts and then never got back to the author, so I'd like to know. (Not speaking of Mr. Havliand here--the request was just this month).

Thanks,

Danielle

What are people's thoughts on this?

http://www.andrewlownie.co.uk/2013/02/15/thistle-publishing-launch

"The Andrew Lownie Literary Agency has become the latest to set up an in-house digital and p.o.d. publishing imprint. The Thistle imprint will use Amazon publishing programme White Glove to release e-books and print-on-demand copies"

Does an agency having its own publisher present a conflict of interest?
I suppose it only matters if they charge you a fee, because even if they collect their 15% it's still 15% on books sold. If it's e-published your royalties are basically paying for the publicity they can provide you and the better cover design than a DIY e-published book.

From everything I've heard Andrew Lownie is highly respected but this is certainly different. I'd also hope my agent would go for the big publishing houses FIRST and not direct me straight to their e-publisher.

More and more agents are moving into assisting authors with self-publishing, because it's getting so difficult to sell books the traditional way. But it's such a new area that nobody has figured out exactly how to do it or what the best options are. Check out this thread which includes links to several posts that collectively include all the info I've found so far.

One thing in Jan B's post that I haven't heard is that the white glove program includes POD. Note the post on Jane Friedman's blog which says there's no reason to pay an agent to do POD print books. Plus if you want to sell a lot of copies it's a lousy deal financially because the unit cost is so high.

I and a client I write for have been approached by an agent offering this white glove program, and I feel rather skeptical. It apparently has some marketing benefits but are they really more than you could get if you did Amazon Select yourself? Many questions to answer, among them what exactly will the agent be doing to earn his/her 15%? It's not like the agent is working to sell the book.

This is interesting:

Literary agent Andrew Lownie believes that in 5-10 years, 75% of books will be self-published, 20% assisted by agents, and only 5% traditionally published.
http://publishingperspectives.com/2014/10/soon-will-majority-books-self-published/

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Mr Lownie made this claim at the Women's Writing Festival.

The suggestions were politely rejected but the audience’s interest never flagged, as everyone felt that what was under scrutiny here was a crucial moment in publishing history, the passage from print to digital. Yet there never was any polarized position-taking or unpleasant exchange of opinion, no animosity at all.

Is Lownie right? Let us know what you think in the comments.

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My favourite response was from Kell Brigan:

It doesn’t matter what percentage of slush is in the world. All that’s happening is the slush pile is being stored online and called “self-published.”

What matters most:

If I want to be an honorable writer, if I want to be a writer who doesn’t suck, to whom do I submit my stuff?

If I want to read legitimate, professional, literate writers, where do I find them?

That’s it, folks. Instead of talking about “self-publishing” ad nauseam, how about calling out vanity presses that call themselves publishers, or talking about tools for readers that efficiently allow us to weed out crap, or talking about what else will evolve to perform the oh-so-badly needed gatekeeper functions...All I want at this point is something that allows writers to legitimately succeed at writing well, and allows readers to find the legitimate writers in the midst of the shit storm of self-published “marketing” from the clueless and narcissistic.

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I find Lownie's prediction quite bizarre. As an agent he must know how deluded people can be about their literary abilities.

Has anyone had any dealings with this agency in the last couple of years?

They're still a good agency for the right writer and book, if that's what you were wondering.