Articles Tagged with askagent

Opening to Selective Submissions

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Pumpkins.

There are. so. many. pumpkins in October in California. Green ones, white ones, orange ones, bumpy ones, long ones, lumpy ones. And I fell for them all. I gathered as many as I could in one shopping cart and now they are scattered all over my house and yard, as “decor.” Which is what I wish I could do with all of the fantastic submissions I get, rather than regretfully let them go because I can’t have them all. I’ve been delaying opening to submissions, because I know I can’t take on very many new clients right now, particularly new kid-lit or SFF writers. Yet I still want more upmarket adult fiction. I spent a week in NYC (photo of a weather-bedraggled me in the Aevitas conference room) and realized I was hungry for more. But the idea of opening to submissions just overwhelmed me. The pumpkins are everywhere!

Then I read this post by fellow literary agent Eric Smith of Neighborhood Literary. He had articulated exactly what I was feeling about my list “it’s about making sure you’re giving everyone the right kind of attention.” My SFF and kid-lit clients are getting my best attention, anymore and I risk getting stretched thin. But I do have the capacity for more clients in other genres. So I was inspired to take a page out of his book.

I am opening to selective submissions. I am not opening to children’s or genre SFF. My list is quite robust in both these areas already. I am only opening to adult fiction in other genres. So if you find yourself here, because you are wondering why you couldn’t find your genre/age option in Query Manager, hopefully you now understand. I am still actively reading and keeping up-to-date in these areas, and I will open to them again in the future. But for now, I want to make sure my energy is balanced, and that the only clutter happening is from pumpkins.

A Spooky Submissions Update

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Why yes, I am one of those basic b-ahem-witches who loves this time of year. I do own a pair of very fuzzy Uggs, a large mug (curtesy of a client who just gets me), and buy 10 sweaters annually at the local thrift store while dreaming longingly about cashmere.

I also find it easier to read as the days grow shorter and the weather colder, actually read deeply. Which means making more decisions on my maybe pile. But this is also one of the busiest seasons for sending out submissions on my end. And this one has been busier than I anticipated, happily so. Add that to a whirlwind WorldCon, a work trip to London, and the little one starting pre-school not gracefully, my initial response time to queries has been much slower than usual. And although the feedback has been overwhelmingly yes for allowing full manuscripts in the initial sub, it does slow my process on the other end. Which means, for those of you who like the numbers, of the 3,000 subs that have come in since August, 400 of latest of those have not even been opened.

So I am closing to queries to catch up over the winter. I aim to respond to all initial queries by the end of November. However for those of you who I put aside for further consideration, I’m afraid my decisions will be delayed, perhaps for months, both because of time and space on my current list. As always feel free to check in, but don’t wait around (always try to look forward, don’t put your eggs in one basket in this industry), know that of the hundred or so that go past the initial phase, and even of the 20 or so that catch me enough to read the entire manuscript, I still can only reasonably sign another 2-5 more clients in the coming months.

And speaking of clients, I actually got to meet many of mine in person for the first time this year, some whom I have represented for almost a decade(!!). They were in attendance at Seattle WorldCon 2025, signing books, speaking on panels, and charming their readers. Amid the busy schedules, we managed to squeeze in a taco night. Pictured above left to right: Gracie Marsden, Kylie Lee Baker, Van Hoang, me, Yume Kitasei, DaVaun Sanders, and Veronica G. Henry. It was strange but wonderful to realize how well I know all of these amazing people, despite not having been in the same room together before. No awkwardness, just good vibes and fun chatter. The breadth of their work continues to astonish me, and I highly recommend checking out their books.

Until next time. Thank you for your patience and understanding as I dig through this next pile of subs!

Midsummer Musing: Overthinking Submission Form Strategies

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I love the way the heat of summer makes everything feel slower and deliciously lazy. I’ve even set up my office in the garage, leaving it open to the sounds of birds, bugs, wind, and the occasional lawn mower. Our homemade midsommar pole leans over me, almost wistfully. And surprisingly, I’m feeling more on top of work than usual. Perhaps it’s just getting the office out of the house, but I like to think it’s the warm silky vibes of working outdoors. In that spirit, I have closed to submissions for a bit to catch up. I received about 1,600 submissions over May and June and about 100 of those queries caught my eye enough to take another look. Of those, I will probably offer on 1-4 depending on the space I have on my list when I get to them.

I did change my submission requirements to include the full manuscript as an attachment, rather than just the opening sample pages. I haven’t decided if this system is more or less efficient than my old one, and do wonder which writers prefer. For context: previously if the query passed the first read, then I flicked down to the sample pages and responded faster to those submissions. But then I sat longer on the few projects that I may have wanted to read even more of, because I didn’t want to commit to asking for the full just yet. In contrast, with the new system the full is already attached, so although I can’t determine as quickly on the queries that pass the first read, I can respond faster to the ones sitting in the maybe pile, because I know writers aren’t expecting personal feedback on their full that was already attached. So more queries end up in the maybe pile, but I’m faster to respond to them as a whole. I’m definitely overthinking the process, but you probably would too after the thousandth submission.

Comment below if you have an opinion!

Skimming vs Deep Reading Submissions

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I quietly opened to queries ten days ago for the first time in over two years. I was closed for so long mainly because my clients were turning in multiple manuscripts regularly. It was averaging 30 manuscripts a year, which meant there was no time nor room in my head for deep-reading fulls in my submission pile. And the idea of opening up to queries was daunting, I’d been hearing from others how there’s been a surge in submissions since lockdown. But a few things aligned that pushed me forward. Most important, I caught up with my clients. On top of that my baby is now posed to enter toddlerhood, so the newborn days are a foggy memory. And lastly we revamped the website at the agency (check out the new Kimberley Cameron & Associates site, it is lovely, professional, and friendly in my totally biased opinion).

My cat Rainbow has a sixth sense for when I’m reading on my tablet.

Once I made the decision to seek new clients, I realized I was ready, keen even, to read subs. When over a hundred submissions rolled in that first weekend, I was surprised, but not overwhelmed, jumping in late at night, as the baby slept curled against me. I tweaked my submission form a few days later to find the quickest way to work through them thoughtfully, and plowed on in the odd hour I could find here or there. I skimmed through some fantastic pitches and lovely samples, all of them had potential, but only a few I set aside for further consideration. This is the easy part, the scanning, skimming, flicking through text. If this was all there was to it, writers would never have to wait long for a response.

But of course that’s not how it works. Many of you probably have partials or fulls that have been with an agent for months, even a year. Sure enough, five hundred submissions later, I’m slowing down. The maybe pile is growing. As eager as I am to find a new client or two, I’m not going to rush this part. Although I can enjoy a quick read, see potential in a few sentences, I’ve learned from experience that I have to truly sit with and deeply read a manuscript in order to absorb it, to have an editorial vision for it, to know if the connection I feel will be enough to champion it through the ups and downs. And that is a must before I take on that manuscript for representation. To find that vision, I have to be in that “Deep Reading” space. There’s a fantastic interview by Ezra Klein with literary scholar Maryanne Wolf on the difference between scanning and deep reading.

Both methods are valid, and indeed necessary when I’m considering submissions, but a deep read is the final step before I would offer representation, and it’s the most difficult to achieve. The research done by Wolf and others of the neuroscience behind the different ways we absorb information, is fascinating and enlightening and helped me further define how I want to work. It has also meant clarifying something I had already sensed, that I was going to take longer than ever to read and consider fulls for representation. But I have to be okay with that, and I hope after reading this, writers will choose to query me (or not) with this deeper understanding of my process.

Blog Post Image by Mary C. Moore

Examining the “I Just Didn’t Fall In Love” Rejection

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As I gear up to open to submissions for the new year, I’m once again faced with the task of whittling down the remaining fulls in my query inbox. I’d love to get down to zero, a fresh start to 2020. I have less than ten manuscripts to consider. Should be easy right?

Wrong.

As the pile of “maybes” gets smaller, the harder it is to make decisions on what to let go. There’s the young adult thriller I’ve had since spring, in which, although the plot is a mess, I’m in love with the narrative voice. The contemporary middle grade that’s been there since late summer, with the amazing concept and natural tension, but rough writing. The adult fantasy, just requested before shutting down my inbox, that is totally epic and totally up my alley, but perhaps not enough to break out in the smaller SFF market. The interesting women’s fiction from early fall, with the really cool author with lots of great experience and a huge platform, that doesn’t quite catch, but maybe could with some edits.

I can’t take on all of them. But there isn’t a good reason to reject them. So I start typing those dreaded words, “I just didn’t fall in love,” cringing because after months of considering a full manuscript, I know the author is going to be frustrated by this lame response. Sure I try to dress it up best I can, but the bottom line, is “it’s not you, it’s me.” I’ve gotten plenty of those types of responses from editors to know that wrapping it in a pretty ribbon of words isn’t going to make the seemingly arbitrary rejection any less baffling and/or disheartening.

How can I explain myself, and my cohort of literary agents across the country, for sending rejections we ourselves dread to receive?

So I emphasize once again, how in tune I must be with a manuscript and its author. My vision for what editorial the manuscript needs and who the target audience is should be crystal clear. Knowing those two factors, I can lay a path forward for myself and the author. My vision has to be strong, because that path will most definitely veer and fork and turn on itself. This business is a roller coaster at best and a human-eating monster at worst. As one of my favorite lit peeps Literary Agent DongWon Song pointed out in a recent Writing Excuses podcost:

Now, the thing is, publishing is a system that is designed to be extremely random. What makes a book work is highly unpredictable. What makes a book tank, also highly unpredictable. So when you’re thinking about this, there’s two things you need to keep in mind: always have a plan. But also be ready to throw that plan out the window at the drop of a hat. . . . You will go completely mad if you try to map the whole thing. So you pick your path, but then you’re ready to know, we can pivot wherever we need to. 

https://wetranscripts.dreamwidth.org/166134.html

So when I’m reading a particularly strong submission, I’m considering the biggest factor that will push me to make an offer: Is my vision for it strong and clear enough to survive through the inevitable roller coaster?

The writing may be excellent, the author may be fantastic, the story may be right up my alley, but could I take it the distance? If I give it more time, will my vision potentially solidify or should I let it go now?

The next time an agent hangs on to your manuscript for months and then all you get is a “I just didn’t fall in love” rejection, pat yourself on the back, you’re rising to the top of hundreds of thousands of submissions. It’s only a matter of time before you find someone who will “fall in love.”

And in the meantime, remember, it really wasn’t you, it was me.

Is Your Story Unique?

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Image courtesy of JD Hancock

Part of a literary agent’s job is, sadly, “crushing dreams.” With every rejection I send I know I am causing real pain to another person out there. Joey Franklin stated in his fantastic Poets & Writers article Submit That Manuscript! Why Sending Out Your Work Is So Important, “Neuroscientists have actually identified similarities between our response to rejection and our response to physical pain.” I was equally in total agreement and completely horrified. I’ve had reactions to rejections that lasted hours if not days. But I also send rejections on an almost daily basis. My submission karma is not looking good.

Franklin goes on to express why submitting is so important. It’s a part of the necessary evolution and development of your writing. You need your dreams crushed so you can pick them up again and make them stronger. Ignorance is bliss, but it won’t get you published (in most cases).

I was on a panel and a writer asked, “How can I balance picking out comparable titles yet staying true to my story because it’s too different, unique.”

I looked her straight in the eye and replied, “Trust me. Your story is not unique.”

Woah. I knew instantly it was a bit much, a knee-jerk response.

A good reminder that writers aren’t seeing what I’m seeing in my inbox, the constant refrain of: “My story doesn’t have any comparable works.” or “What I’ve written is beyond compare.” etc., ignoring the magnitude of what makes up the literary canon. The dozens of weirdly similar concepts being pitched. The two-thousand submissions in two months.

Luckily, and to my embarrassment, the agent next to me chimed in to ease the tension. She used a word which resonated with me and the room full of writers. Fresh.

Stories, by their nature, are repetitive:

But yours can be a fresh take.

Take a story about a superhero who saves the world. How many times have you read that one? I bet you’re rolling your eyes right now. Me too. So how did a movie with that same old story make over 200 million dollars world-wide opening weekend just this year? Because it was fresh. Wonder Woman was a superhero movie starring a female superhero, directed by another female. Gasp. (Sad that in 2017 this is considered fresh, but we’ll save that rant for another time. Throw in the argument that a female screenplay writer should have been involved, and my head might explode.)

So how do you know you are writing something fresh? By reading, reading, reading. Then writing, writing, writing. Then submitting, submitting, submitting. And all over again. Writing is an apprenticeship. The more you read, write, and submit, the more you learn. You learn to recognize the commonality of stories and writing. You begin to see the building blocks which all books are built on and the mythologies that have supported stories for a millennia. You come to understand what is universal truth versus lazy stereotypes. And your vision shows in your writing. You are able to take a story and make it your own, put a new spin on a tired tale. The more awareness of how wide and sweeping the literary world is, the better you can navigate it.

So perhaps your story is not unique. But it can be fresh.