Simon Whaley’s Business of Writing: August 2024 - Half the Battle is Getting Started
Welcome to my August 2024 newsletter.
How is everyone? As I write this, I’ve just heard that my nephew has received his GCSE results and is a happy chap because he’s got more than he needs for his next stage in life. It only seems like yesterday when I was carrying him in a kiddy carrier on my back around the Shropshire Hills.
In some ways, I don’t like the pressure that’s put on youngsters these days with exam grades. They don’t define you. And I’m the bloke who ‘only’ got a Grade C (the lowest pass at the time) in Maths and English Language. Yep, that’s right. The bloke who writes for a living only just passed his English Language exam.
“Hi, Simon. Lovely to see you!”
The editor threw her arms around me and gave me a huge hug.
“I’ll be sending you the next Ask the Agent piece next week,” I replied. “It’s Laura Macdougall, from United Agents. We chatted about writing novels with LGBTQ+ characters and the LGBTQ+ genre in general.”
“Excellent!” She beamed. Then she wagged her finger in front of me. “I knew you’d get this column up and running. Half the battle is getting started. Once you have a few under your belt, approaching others becomes much easier.”
I smiled.
“Must dash! We have a train to catch,” and with that, she was gone.
I’d popped into the Swanwick Writers Summer School as a day delegate and hoped I’d bump into Writing Magazine’s editor while she was there. If you haven’t been to Swanwick (as it’s often called), do check it out. It’s five full days of workshops, talks, events, coaching sessions, and much, much more (including fancy dress discos, quiz nights, and singing round the fire pits).
As I went to grab a mug of tea and a sit down on one of the conference centre’s comfy sofas, those last words resonated in my mind. Half the battle is getting started.
I remember when the editor first emailed enquiring if I’d be interested in a new column. (I’m freelance, the word yes was out before I’d even thought about it.) When she said it involved interviewing literary agents, my first thought was: have I upset her? After all, literary agents are extremely busy people. Their priority and focus is to their authors, not to freelance writers wanting to ask them questions. Who’d have time to talk to little old me? Was she setting me up to fail?
I panicked about what I’d let myself in for. Anyone who’s tried securing a literary agent to represent them knows what a challenge that is. In my head, all I could see was this column collapsing before it had even started.
The first thing I did was go through all my contacts. That’s where I found John Jarrold, who represents Sci-Fi, Fantasy, and Horror authors. Now, that’s not a genre that I’m particularly interested in, but we met at a conference many years ago, and we’re connected on Facebook, and have commented on each other’s posts from time to time. Would he help?
Amazingly, the answer was Yes.
In case you haven’t come across them in Writing Magazine, the Ask The Agent column is not just a slot where I ask agents what they’re looking for (mainly because they often say, “I don’t know, but I’ll know when I see it,” so stringing that out to 850 words on a regular basis could be challenging). Instead, I focus on a genre they represent and explore that in more detail.
So, with John Jarrold covering Sci-Fi, Fantasy, and Horror, I began searching for agents representing children’s writing. I came across Skylark Literary Ltd, who run an annual competition for budding children’s writers. Time-wise their next competition launch was near to when the next Ask The Agent piece was scheduled for publication. Again, they agreed.
Once the first couple had been published, I began attaching copies of them to every approach I made to a potential literary agent subject. And looking back, I’m still surprised by how many agree to help out. (For your information, nobody has ever said No, but some requests go unanswered . . . but that’s fine, they’re immensely busy people.)
Of course, it helps that I mainly approach agents who are currently taking on clients, so it’s useful publicity for them.
But what I first thought was an impossible task has proved easier than I imagined. (I won’t say stress-free—there have been some close shaves with deadlines!) Now I’ve started, the column is going well, and recently one agent contacted me asking to be considered for the slot!
It’s the same for every writing project. Even this newsletter. When I sat down to write this, I had no idea what I was going to write. But once I got going, the idea formed.
It’s about breaking it down into smaller chunks. I didn’t sit down to write a column; I sat down to write the first piece. A column becomes tens of thousands of words. All I had to focus on to was getting 850 words completed.
It’s like when we sit down to write a novel. Nobody sits down to write a novel. Who writes a novel in one sitting? No. We make a start. We sit down to write a scene, or perhaps a first chapter.
Making the start is the important step.
What else have I learned from the Ask The Agent column?
If you don’t ask, you don’t get. I’ve interviewed some big-name agents. I used to think, I won’t bother them. They’ll be far too busy to talk to me. But then I thought I’d just ask, anyway. Just in case. And they said yes.
Making a start is important, but start as early as you can. With magazines, there’s a regular deadline. The earlier you make an initial approach, the better. There was one piece where I only had 24 hours to turn the piece around. Now, I’m ahead of myself. (In the next week or so, I’ll have the piece for the February 2025 issue in the bag.)
Literary agents are generous people. They’re generous with their time and their advice.
If you’d like to read the interviews that have been published so far, check out the links below. (I upload them to the Medium platform, which is behind a paywall, but as newsletter subscribers, these links will get you behind the paywall without having to pay.)
Travel Writing at the South Warwickshire Literary Festival - 21st September 2024
Not long now, until my travel writing workshop that I’m leading for the South Warwickshire Literary Festival this September. For more details of this and the other workshops, check out https://www.southwarwickshireliteraryfestival.com/programme
The Power of Failed Pitches
A couple of days ago, I published a piece on Medium where I explore the mindset that those pitches we often think of as failures are actually benefitting us. It seems to have resonated with over a thousand writers, so I thought you might find it interesting too! (Click here to read for free.)
Until next month, keeeeeeeeeep writing!
Best wishes,
Simon
Interesting stuff. I know exactly how it feels approaching literary agents. Having had a pretty decent career in non-fiction where I was in direct contact with editors and publishers and had quite a few occasions where they had approached me to commission work, I started querying my fiction in a fairly confident frame of mind.
Over-confident, as it turned out. Some agents didn’t reply at all, some sent what looked like a template email, but my dream agent sent a very positive reply. Still in the end it was ‘nearly but not quite’.
My decision to switch to self-publishing however was ultimately determined by the fact that I could get my books out on a faster schedule.
Still, I’m fascinated to learn more about what makes agents tick and I do have another project which I will submit sooner or later.
One question I would like to see them all tasked with is how they deal with unsuccessful submissions: form email or no email? I understand they don’t have time to craft individual responses to everyone but I see comments from a lot of aspiring writers who would really benefit from any clarity even if it’s ticking boxes on a checklist.