Category: Editors & Agents

Kevan Lyon Opens Her Own Agency

No sooner do I post an interview with agent Kevan Lyon on my Articles page than she opens her own agency! From Publishers Lunch:

Agents Jill Marsal and Kevan Lyon have left the Sandra Dijkstra Agency to form the Marsal Lyon Literary Agency. Marsal was at the Dijkstra agency for eight years and practiced as an attorney representing authors prior to that. Lyon spent four years at Dijkstra and worked in the wholesale and distribution side of the publishing business for over 17 years before becoming an agent.

Being the resourceful sort that I am, however, I’ve already been in contact with Ms. Lyon and will update the interview this weekend. I’ll post here next week when it’s up.

New Interview with Agent Kevan Lyon

I have a treat for you today. I recently interviewed agent Kevan Lyon of Sandra Dijkstra Literary Agency for my Articles page. The interview is up now and will remain on the main Articles page for a few months, after which it will go into Archives.

Meanwhile, my interview with Silhouette Special Edition author Mary J. Forbes about Fogwalking is now in Archives along with interviews with agent Elaine Spencer, women’s fiction author Debrah Williamson, and a whole smattering of Girl Talk columns with Jamie Sobrato.

Sara Megibow Dons Her Agenting Hat

Assistant to agent Kristin Nelson, Sara Megibow of The Nelson Literary Agency is now looking for her own clients. From the agency’s January newsletter:

In terms of genre, the Nelson Agency still reps romance (everything but inspirational and category), science fiction and fantasy, young adult, middle grade, chick lit, commercial and literary fiction and some memoir. Personally, I love super sexy and intelligent romances. In the sf/fantasy world, I am looking for the story and characters to be as compelling as the world. In terms of YA and MG, I am excited to see more projects set in the real world (as opposed to vampires or werewolves, although, of course, those are still okay). Finally, I am itching for some fabulous historical fiction (like MISTRESS OF THE ART OF DEATH) or multicultural fiction both for younger readers and the adult market.

There you have it. Submissions Guidelines can be found on their website.

Sourcebooks Pitch Opportunity!

Here’s a great opportunity for unagented writers. On Thursday, January 29th—three days from now—Sourcebooks editor Deb Werksman is accepting 50-word pitches on the Casablanca Authors Blog. Ms. Werksman, along with the Sourcebooks publicist and Casablanca blog authors, will decide on the winner (I hope I got that right), who then gets to submit her/his full manuscript for Ms. Werksman’s consideration with a guaranteed reply within 3-4 weeks.

Believe me, a guaranteed reply in such a short time span is something you want.

You have from one minute after noon January 29th until noon January 30th to post your pitch to the Comments trail of Ms. Werksman’s blog on Casablanca Authors, appearing January 29th. Please note, do NOT post your pitches to THIS blog. You can leave me a note thanking me for telling you about this opportunity (I’d love that), but I can not accept pitches for the contest. If you submit your pitch here, I’ll just have to delete it. And, no, I won’t forward it to Ms. Werksman, either.

Go to the Casablanca Authors blog on January 29th to post your pitches. In fact, there’s a great blog post over there right now that tells you all about the contest rules. Click here to read it.

Please note that Ms. Werksman only wants blurbs for completed manuscripts:

Please enter pitches ONLY for finished, polished manuscripts that are at least 90,000 words in length. No works in progress please.

That’s a direct quote from the Casa Authors blog. So don’t submit a pitch if you’ve finished a manuscript but it’s not the absolute best it can be. Polish that sucker and wait for another opportunity. It does you no good to send in a blurb for non-polished work, because the winner’s name will be announced on the Casa Authors blog February 14th and the winner will then only have until the 16th to submit her/his full manuscript. If your work isn’t polished, it’s not likely you’ll receive an offer of publication, which just wastes everyone’s time.

Details of the Break Up the Winter Doldrums contest are on the Casablanca Authors blog. If you want to enter, please check them out, in case I didn’t get something straight here.

Over and out.

Agents Who Write

I accidentally found out while surfing the web a few months ago that agent Lucienne Diver is also a writer (in case you’re wondering, the link leads to her writer’s website, not her agenting website). (Want her agenting website, too? Sheesh! Okay, okay!). She’s represented by Kristin Nelson, has a couple of short stories and a novel with Five Star published under the name, Kit Daniels. Her first novel as Lucienne Diver, VAMPED, releases this year.

I already knew that agent Roberta Brown publishes as Kate Angell, and Deidre Knight publishes as, well, herself. I know there are other agents out there who are also published writers, but their names escape me at the moment.

Some authors are dead-set against having an agent who writes. I confess I used to think that way, too. Now, my concern is much more along the lines of how would OUR author/agent relationship work and thrive regardless of whether the agent is also a writer or not? Personally, I would not discount an agent who writes, but I know there’s another viewpoint. If anyone cares to extoll the pros of NOT signing with an agent who writes, I’m all ears. Is having an agent who writes an advantage, a disadvantage, or…it depends?

BookEnds Pitch Critiques

Okay, I said I was going on Blogiday, but I’ve accomplished a ton of Christmas stuff the last couple of days, so I have a moment to pass along the news that Jessica Faust of BookEnds, LLC is taking pitches to critique while she’s on holiday. Here’s the post and a blippy from it:

To participate, you’ll need to submit your one-paragraph pitch in the comments section of this post. I will not consider pitches posted in other posts or those e-mailed to me and I certainly won’t take pitches from any query letters I receive. Over the course of the next two weeks I’m going to randomly select and critique (on the blog) as many as I can. Since I’m officially on vacation over the course of these two weeks the posts will truly be random. In other words, I’m going to do whatever I want. I’ll post them whenever I want and I’ll critique anywhere from three to three hundred, depending on my mood.

Pretty nifty, huh?

I’m not participating, but whenever I have a spare moment I’ll be hopping over there to have a gander at the pitches and Jessica’s comments. It’s always a great learning experience and reminds me just how subjective this business is.

Cheerio!