ROBUST discussion

Click to get the low down on what literary agents are adding to contracts these days (hint: they can die and still keep on collecting 15% of an author’s royalties -- or you can fire your agent, hire another one and end up having to pay both of them for eternity):

http://www.thepassivevoice.com/06/201...

This is what kicked off the discussion:

http://kriswrites.com/2011/06/01/the-...

The comments following the posts at the above links are worthwhile reading, too.

Well, that's no good. Do you suffer paying them for as long as your books make a profit, or do you pass over the chance at an agent? Not an easy choice. If people didn't love writing, I doubt anyone in their right mind would enter into the industry.

You can cross-out sections on contracts and/or add your own provisions. Whether the agent will go along with your revisions is another question, but you can try.

If you don't have an agent and you're going after traditional publication, chances are your manuscript won't even get read by a anyone at a publishing house. Do any still look at material that isn't submitted by an agent?

It's easy to bypass all that nonsense by insisting on signing only term contracts without any continuance clauses whatsoever. And I must tell you that, while in 1996 I would still sign for fifteen years for the right money, since 2002 I won't sign for longer than ten years. Who knows where we'll be in ten years? I'm thinking of reducing the term to seven or even five years. A publisher who can't make a profit in five years is no good to himself or to you..

The landgrabs by bad agents Kris illustrates are not new. In 1976 I fired Swifty Lazar out of hand for demanding an indemnity for what I said in a book, and a higher commission "for the risk". About 1990, when I fired Curtis Brown for saddling me with an agent who was too slack even to pick up a written cheque my publishers really, really wanted to give me, together with an open three-novel contract, their chairman demanded a cut of the deal as "our commission", and he also tried for a future cut on contracts negotiated while I was with them. I declined to pay on the ground that they were no longer providing services, and invited them to try it on with me in the courts -- and the media, I added silkily. They decided not be stupid.

Hell, that's not the worst. In my early years as a novelist, I fired Innes Rose, once said to be the doyen of British agents, for telling me, "A gentleman doesn't return to a publisher to ask for more money." I ended up with over six times as much money as the publisher offered when Rose was my agent. What a worthless wanker. It figures that Swifty Lazar was Rose's American connection...

I've been read how agents will now 'self-publish' for 15% plus expenses.

It's going over like a lead balloon - on the blogs of some of the snarkiest agencies.

http://www.thepassivevoice.com/08/201...

It agent bashing week again!

The Jute Rule of Literary Agents: When an agent is good, he's very good. When he's bad, he's very bad.

Here's a corollary: The best agent I ever had never let on publicly that he was actually literate for fear that it would undermine his success.

Kat, The Passive Voice is my favorite blogs. Passive Guy's been covering that agency/pub business hot 'n heavy.

Saw you there, Patricia. He's one of my favorites, too.