The Scoop on Agents

By John Gilstrap


Last week, our friend and frequent-poster Terri Lynn Coop posted the following comment:


"You've talked about becoming agented and querying. However, what happens once your novel or non-fic is sold to the publisher.
What kind of deadlines are there? How firm are those deadlines? What role does your agent play after the publishing contract is signed? What sort of public face does your agent and publisher expect you to maintain from contract to release (is there a difference between fiction and non-fiction)? When do you see your advance?"


It's a great bunch of questions. I'm going to take a shot at some answers.  The underlying assumption of my answers is that this is a first published book we're talking about.  The rules don't change a lot after you have a chip in the game, but they do change a little.  I'm also going to juggle the order of the questions a little:


What role does your agent play after the publishing contract is signed? 


Understand that a lot of negotiation goes into what a publishing contract looks like.  What rights will be sold?  More importantly, what rights will be retained by the author?  Is this a one-book contract, or a multi-book contract?  What will the pay-out schedule be?  If it's a multi-book contract, will they be individually accounted or jointly accounted?  (Joint accounting means that Book #1 would have to earn back its advances before you could start earning advances on Book #2.  It's by far the least preferable method, but first-timers often don't have a lot of heft there.)


The agent is the go-between for all uncomfortable transactions.  For example, in fifteen years, I have never discussed money issues with an editor, and no editor has had to tell me to my face that I wasn't worth the money I was asking for.  The agent keeps the creative relationship pure.  Beyond that, if everything goes well, the agent doesn't have a lot to do after the contract is negotiated.


But things rarely go well.  What happens if your editor quits or gets fired?  What happens if you really hate the cover, or if the editor is getting carried away with his editorial pen?  On a more positive note, the agent will continue to pursue foreign publishing contracts, movie deals, etc.


What kind of deadlines are there? How firm are those deadlines? 


Deadlines are part of the negotiation process.  You'll have to agree to respond to your editorial letter by a certain date with a corrected manuscript, and then you'll have copyedits and page proofs, all while making your commitment to deliver the next book in the contract if it's a multi-book deal.  I consider deadlines to be inviolable.  I've had to push the delivery date by a couple of weeks once, but I hated doing it because it inconveniences so many people, and it makes me look unprofessional.  Here is another instance where a track record of performance keeps people from losing faith in the author.  For first-timers, blowing a deadline can kill a career.  Remember, by blowing the deadline, you technically violate the contract, which the publisher would have the authority to void.


Writers need to understand that publishing calendars are set 12 to 18 months ahead.  Working backwards from those dates are the in-house deadlines for the production side of things (cover design, copyedits, publicity, ARCs, reviews, and a thousand other details).  If a deadline is blown by as little as a month, publishers may pull the author's book from the calendar and replace it with another, thus potentially adding months to the publication date.


When do you see your advance? 


This is another  negotiated deal point.  Advances are paid out in pieces.  There's always one piece on signing.  After that, the milestones vary from author to author, often depending on the horsepower of the agent, and on the "importance" of the author.  Other payment milestones can include: submission of edited manuscript (this is the "D&A payment--Delivery & Acceptance); hard cover pub date; softcover pub date; and even, in some cases, some period of time after the pub date.  If there's a second book in the contract, there'll likely be a payment milestone for the submission of an outline for the second book, followed by submission of an acceptable manuscript.


Meanwhile, if you're happy at the publishing house, sometime while writing the second book of a two-book deal, your editor and agent will start negotiating the next deal.


What sort of public face does your agent and publisher expect you to maintain from contract to release (is there a difference between fiction and non-fiction)? 


This is where the issue of an author's platform comes in.  If you're a celebrity writing your autobiography, the pressure will be high to be out there to flog it.  Similarly, if you've written a book about a presidential candidate during an election year, the publisher will press hard for you to have media face time.


On the other hand, if you've written a novel featuring a feline crime solver (or about a freelance hostage rescue specialist), chances are that you couldn't buy publicity outside of your local newspaper.  In that regard, an author's public face is only as public as the author wants it to be.


I think that's all of it.  Okay, Killzone comrades, let's hear from you.