Day in the life

[DennisB]

You know, I don't think I've ever seen a "day in the life" story about an agent.
Specifically, just what kind of hoops do they jump through to get a book published?
I keep reading that someone's agent submitted the mss to certain publishers. Is that it? Or does the agent do any selling?
Is an agent's job just to have a good handle on what subjects are hot and what houses may be looking at a year or so from now?
Does an agent ever go back and ask a pub to reconsider, or is a rejection written in stone?

[waylander]

You could do worse than take a look at 'From Pitch to Publication' by London agent Carole Blake to get an idea of the whole process.

[BethS]

Originally Posted by DennisB

You know, I don't think I've ever seen a "day in the life" story about an agent.
Specifically, just what kind of hoops do they jump through to get a book published?

Read the archives of Kristin Nelson's blog, particularly the ones labeled Agenting 101.

[DennisB]

I may have missed it, but I still didn't see much about what goes into a pitch... or pitches.

[Old Hack]

Read Carole's book. You'll understand more then.

Agents sell books to publishers. They do pitch them, in all sorts of ways. But agents do so much more than that: they negotiate contracts, ensure those contracts are complied with, they check royalty statements and payments are accurate, they sell subsidiary rights...

Just read Carole's book. It's a great guide to publishing, not just agenting, and she's one of the best agents there is.

[Debbie V]

Some agent blogs, author blogs and conference presentations have discussed a single work's path from author through agent and editor to published book. These give an idea of an agent's day.

A quick google search turned up this blog post http://www.rachellegardner.com/2011/12/an-agents-day/

[victoriastrauss]

Google (not in quotes) "day in the life literary agent". You'll find a number of informative essays and blog posts.

- Victoria

[suki]

Search for the hashtag #agenting on twitter - you will see all kinds of insights into the daily work of an agent. And within the last year or so on Twitter there was a whole day where agents tweeted what they were doing at any given time, but I can't remember the hashtag. You might come across it while reading back.

As for pitches, submissions, following up, discussing revisions or rejections, etc....books have many different paths, and agents can be involved in many different activities from drafting the pitch, researching the sub list, making the pitches, keeping up their contacts/communications with editors so they have an idea what the editor might take on, following up on submissions, handling questions, calls with the author, negotiations, auctions, contracts, etc.

There are many, many steps that can be taken between acquisition and deal.

~suki