Small publisher offer. Should I contact agents I queried?

peters

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I met an editor at a writing conference and she asked me to query her. Three months later, I learned that an offer of a contract is coming.
They're the only publisher I queried (small press). Meanwhile, I have a handful of agent queries sitting at 30 days, others at 60 days. Should I contact them about the offer when I get it?
 

Aggy B.

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Well, if you accept the offer the book will no longer be available. So, at the very least you should let them know that you are no longer seeking representation for that MS.

Depending on the credibility of the publisher, you should probably contact folks with notice of the offer once you receive it. (Not all small presses are created equal. Some will have more appeal to an agent even if they are not getting anything from the deal, especially if you have other books in the hopper that they could take elsewhere. [Not sequels, but other quality MSs.])

It's not recommended to shop a MS to agents and editors at the same time. Even if it's just one editor. Because starting with a small press is not usually the way an agent would do it. (You want to start with the folks with the most money and work your way down. Because the temptation to take the current offer is always strong. That doesn't mean a bigger publisher would make an offer, but if you start small you'll never know if you settled for a lesser deal just because it was the one you got first.)

However, whether or not you try and see if an agent is interested in negotiating this small publisher offer, you should let anyone you queried but haven't heard back from know if the MS is no longer available, just to be polite.
 

mrsmig

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Please...for the sake of due diligence, go to the Bewares, Recommendations & Background Checks subforum, look at the index and see if your small press is listed there. If there's a thread, read it in its entirety. If there isn't an existing thread, there's no harm in starting one to see if anyone here at AW has experience with this particular publisher.

There are way too many small pubs out there which should be avoided. At the very least, you should educate yourself about yours before you even consider signing a contract with them.
 

peters

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I did check that forum, and I have learned about their strengths and weaknesses.

Also, I understand it's bad to query editors when still querying agents, but it's my fourth year of agent rejections with no partial requests. I have updated my query several times, and re-worked my novel with the help of dozens of beta readers (some are editors) to no avail. I rationalized that submitting to the one person who actually requested my work wouldn't be that bad.

Thanks.
 

veinglory

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The question is, is this a publisher an agent will care about. If not you might as well avoid the potentially considerable delay of waiting to hear from them and just withdraw it from all agents.
 

Treehouseman

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A bit late to the party, but with the cost of Agent time and the amount of work that will go in to preparing a contract and all the remuneration afterwards, you need to be looking at the press offering an advance north of $4000 for the agent to get a minimum of $500 for her time.

That's quite a lot of money and a generous print run, so in that ballpark, yes look at an agent.

If you must have the contract appraised - and you should, many Author Societies have one-off services for about $100+
 
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