Rosecliff Literary

[kaitie]

Hi guys. I came across this one awhile back and had meant to ask about it. The agent in question is apparently opening soon.

Link: https://www.rosecliffliterary.com/

Agent is named Jessica Berg. My first impressions:

• No books/authors listed on her website
• No books sold
• No publishing industry experience listed, just an MFA in creative writing
• Member of AALA
• Is going to be making appearances at a LOT of conferences

I saw a client comment that she has years of experience, but none of that is listed so I'm not sure what that is. She says she's opening soon, but my impression isn't that she's opening for the first time, but just that she's been closed. Perhaps I'm wrong on that and the reason we don't see authors/sales is because she's brand new?

She's not on QT so there's no way to check for info there. I don't have PM so I can't look for sales there.

My initial thought is that this is someone to pass by, but if she really does have years of experience, she might just have a bad website and I don't want to skip over someone just because of that. I've definitely found some legit agents with sales and experience who have less than stellar websites. Thoughts?

 

[Woollybear]

She's very actively seeking clients: https://x.com/jesssica__berg/status/1832386499502813549

She's on MSWL as well. https://www.manuscriptwishlist.com/mswl-post/jessica-berg/

My experience-from-afar with new agents who seem to be pounding the pavement in this way (= asking for lots of fulls, attending conferences, hosting workshops) is that they are ... pretty good. As in, they are working hard, man, and seem to give solid advice. So, while I wouldn't put money on any new agent sticking with the job for more than a couple years, because it's a jungle at every level, if one of her upcoming conferences was in my city, and if her MSWL was a match, I might try to meet with her (and the other attending agents.) She is investing heavily in her career, which has a certain value.

 

[Unimportant]

but if she really does have years of experience,

I think her years of experience are as a romance writer. As an agent she seems to be brand new with no training under her belt.

 

[Unimportant]

Adding: as an author, she seems to have published with Red Adept Publishing, which accepts unagented submissions, so I expect that as an agent she's willing to submit her clients' manuscripts to the smaller presses. This article correcting to This article from a few months ago says that J Berg is represented by Amy Collins (who, weirdly, doesn't seem to represent either of the genres J Berg writes in) of Talcott Notch.

 

[JackieMcMahonWriter]

I've seen a couple of people post about signing with Jessica but I've yet to see anything that indicates she actually has industry connections. I hope she's not scamming them.

 

[kaitie]

I've seen a couple of people post about signing with Jessica but I've yet to see anything that indicates she actually has industry connections. I hope she's not scamming them.

Same. I don't think she's a scam, but I do think it's possible that she doesn't have industry experience/connections to be an effective agent. I'm more concerned with that than a scam.

 

[Woollybear]

Hmm. In my procrastination I've been surfing to links in above posts.

@Unimportant -- one of yours doesn't work anymore, but from googling it looks like she's repped by Jill Marsal, not Amy Collins. Although twitter does say it's Amy Collins. So I don't know if that's a recent change or what. (ETA: Her website still says Jill Marsal.)

I don't see the Red Adept published book, though I only looked at a couple titles so I assume that was one I didn't click on, and as near as I can tell, her super-successful books as well as her not-so successful books are self published. J.L.BergLLC.

This is all kinda surprising, but if nothing else she has a good handle on how to succeed in romance series. I might not try to meet with her after all, unless I was writing romance and wanted to ask her about making self-pub work for my stuff. Which is not really the reason we try to get agents in the first place.

 

[Unimportant]

@Unimportant -- one of yours doesn't work anymore, but from googling it looks like she's repped by Jill Marsal, not Amy Collins. So I don't know if that's a recent change or what.

Thanks for the heads-up! I replaced the link; the article says this at the bottom:

BIO: Jessica Berg is a literary agent with Rosecliff Literary. She provides developmental editorial feedback for Writer’s Digest, Uncharted Magazine, and Fractured Lit. A multi-nominated writer, she holds an MFA from Spalding University and is represented by Amy Collins of Talcott Notch.

and is dated June 2024 so recent?

 

[JackieMcMahonWriter]

Same. I don't think she's a scam, but I do think it's possible that she doesn't have industry experience/connections to be an effective agent. I'm more concerned with that than a scam.

I mean maybe "scam" is the wrong word, but like you, I've seen her clients talk about her "years of experience" and I just personally don't see any evidence of that experience. It kinda hurts my heart to see people get all excited when I'm not sure where their books will end up, if anywhere.

I tried looking her up on LinkedIn and couldn't find a profile, so I don't know her career history.

 

[Woollybear]

For additional procrastination, I've been trawling the twitterdom.

I think she announced agenting on May 31 of this year--which means she has only been reading queries and signing clients for 3.5 months. There probably wouldn't be any sales yet, on such a short time frame.

On the other hand, @kaitie --Personally, I'd now lean gently but definitively toward putting this option on a wait-and-see list. Too many people try agenting and burn out.

 

[kaitie]

For additional procrastination, I've been trawling the twitterdom.

I think she announced agenting on May 31 of this year--which means she has only been reading queries and signing clients for 3.5 months. There probably wouldn't be any sales yet, on such a short time frame.

On the other hand, @kaitie --Personally, I'd now lean gently but definitively toward putting this option on a wait-and-see list. Too many people try agenting and burn out.

This is where I'm leaning, too. She seems nice and apparently does a lot of craft help which is great, but I definitely feel like this is better as a wait and see.