Today we’ll speak to John Willig, a literary agent and publishing consultant at Literary Services Inc. about the role of a literary agent and what he looks for in a manuscript.

1:00 - Could you start off by telling us a bit about your background and what you do?

• I'll soon be celebrating 30 years working as a literary agent.
• Prior to working as an agent, I was working in sales and marketing for publishing companies and then became an editor in academic publishing, then a senior editor in professional subscription publishing and then eventually an executive editor for business books with Prentice Hall, Simon & Schuster, and did that before taking the leap and starting my own firm.
• I try to emphasize to folks that you really become a part of publishing when you become a reader. I was very fortunate; my grandmother was a schoolteacher, my mother was a voracious reader. She used to come home from the library with stacks of books.

4:30 - So for the folks who are brand new to the publishing business, can you give us a high-level overview of what a literary agent does?

• When you look back in the early 20th century actually when the author-publisher relationship was pretty much an author going to a printer and it was a handshake about what was going to be printed and published.
• These folks who started as printers saying to those authors that we could add some value here to what you’re doing by editing the works, doing more as far as production and the printing of it and adding skills and then distributing and selling.
• So what then became and evolved from printers to our current-day publishers where we were adding all of this professional expertise to the process. But with that then came contracts so the handshake evolved to today to 15-20 page contracts.
• We wear quite a few hats; the hat of working the financials and the deals with publishers that turns to contracts, our responsibility to publishers and helping them in terms of filtering and vetting projects for them given all the volume in the marketplace.
• So we’re working too as content coaches for authors, helping them shape their proposals to what we feel is attractive to those publishers.
• I like to say that I have a nice couch in my office for my authors for when they need a little therapy to get through the process. That’s a big part of it too; being a cheerleader and when it’s needed, a little bit of tough love that comes with it.

9:11 - At what point should an author consider submitting to a literary agent and how do they go about finding one?

• That’s a great question. The submission, to a literary agent, is an option that writers have today. There’s the ‘traditional path’ of going to a publisher, there’s hybrid publishers, which you’re familiar with, that have a different financial model for writers, there’s self-publishing, there’s doing e-books; there’s more opportunities for writers today.
• I don’t make judgements that one size fits all. For some writers, it could be best for them to be self-publishing, it could be best for them to be working with a hybrid publisher. In all of those instances, though, Tanya, what I really emphasize is them having done their research and homework into the marketplace.
• When you’re submitting to a literary agent, we’re then going to be submitting to publishers, who will be investors in your work. Those investors are obviously looking for a return on their investment, so they want to know and they want to know pretty quickly, what’s the unique value you’re bringing to the marketplace?
• I’m always advocating that authors really put the time in to do the homework and the research, and that’s essentially when they’re ready to submit to a literary agent.

11:30 - Well said, and I think we can all acknowledge that there are good players and bad players in our industry, as with any industry. How does an author vet their agent? How do you know if you have a legit agent?

• That’s a great question today because as it is with so many businesses and industries, there’s been a bit of a rise in scammers out there. I always refer people to writer’s digest--their magazine. They do an agent round-up in the magazine. A lot of great writing tips too, when they have conferences around the country that agents attend.
• The agents that are attending conferences, that’s obviously a signal in terms of them being legitimate and respected in a certain industry. When you’re an agent and attending these conferences, that’s usually by invitation, and that’s a great signal for prospective authors.
• Writer’s Digest also has a guide to literary agents. My good friend Jeff Herman has a guide to literary agents which profiles the agencies and what they’re looking for, which is very important. Rick Frishman has a series of books and a group called Author 101, and I think there’s one volume on bestselling secrets from agents.
• One other that folks might not necessarily think about is, most writers are pretty gracious in their acknowledgements about who they’ve worked with, and many times that includes their agent. I would encourage folks to really read the acknowledgements of the books that are in their particular area.

15:35 - Great advice. Do I have to have a completed manuscript when I approach my agent?

• When you’re working in fiction, that has to be the case. The manuscript needs to be pristine. There’s treatment and there’s a synopsis. Folks take years in terms of honing their manuscript and having developmental editors, reviewers reviewing your manuscripts, so that’s a big part of it.
• Before you even get to that, in terms of the strategy, sometimes it’s worthwhile for those fiction writers to have published short stories in certain journals or magazines. It gives a bit of validation in terms of their credentials.
• You’re really, as far as the manuscript, it needs to be engaging throughout, but spend that time on that first sentence.. That is really important in the world of fiction.
• Nonfiction is a little different, what’s referred to as a synopsis and treatment in fiction is referred to as a book proposal in nonfiction. A book proposal has really become much more than a book proposal, it’s really the investment document that goes beyond an editor and beyond a description of a book to more of a business plan.
• There’s a lot of great guides on book proposals, but I try to give my clients and aspiring writers that it’s an investment tool for that company shared by folks inside that company, with publicity and marketing, so they have to view it beyond just describing a book.

19:30 - And while the proposal has to be complete in the time that you’re submitting to publishers, the nonfiction manuscript does not, is that correct?

• Not necessarily, and here’s where some of my colleagues differ a little bit. Again, because of that investor frame, I think any publisher is going to feel a whole lot better knowing that they have sample chapters and sometimes even beyond sample chapters, a draft of the manuscript.
• The sample chapters are critical because they 1) highlight you as a writer and captures your voice and again, in nonfiction, it’s so important today, but it also 2) in terms of all that you’re involved with as a writer, maybe you’re running a company, maybe you’re a marketing director, you’re doing lots of things besides writing. It signals to an agent and signals to a publisher that the work fits in with your priorities and your responsibilities, so I think having those chapters, I always view that as a positive aspect of it. When I submit to publishers, I like to have a proposal with sample chapters.

21:30 - When you are looking at prospective new projects to take on, what are you looking for as an agent? What really piques your interest when someone reaches out to you?

• I mentioned the unique value aspect of all of this, and that to me really has to come through. We all know how crowded the marketplace is today. That’s just in terms of books. When you look at the information landscape and all that people are receiving, whether it’s online or audio, podcasts, streaming, we’re all competing now in that world. Book publishers are too, so they want to know and they want to know pretty quickly that what you’re bringing to the marketplace is unique and is going to be of value to those readers.
• Once that’s established, then you’re looking at how is all of this aligned with an author’s everyday activities? To your earlier point about proposals, they’re reviewed by publicity people. What is it about your work that’s going to help the publisher sell the work in this new marketplace today? I’m looking at a few of those aspects, then you get to the actual writing and research involved in that work or proposal.
• But that’s part of working with an agent, and there’s hundreds of wonderful agents that are working in different topic areas, so they’re in it every day, they’re in contact with editors, and now they’ll push back and say, “you know, I really like your work and what you’re doing here, but you know what, your title sucks, or your subtitle is really not telling us the better place that you’re going to take me to with your works.” Again, that’s all a part of what we do as agents.

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About John

After graduating from Brown University, John’s first job was as a sales representative in academic publishing. He soon began work as a marketing manager and then editor for HarperCollins. As his interests moved to trade publishing, he became an executive editor at Prentice Hall for business books. While at P-Hall, John enjoyed working with such authors as Henry Mintzberg, Philip Kotler and Jim Collins and acquired Mr.Collins' first book Beyond Entrepreneurship. In 1991 he decided to become a literary agent to work more closely with writers. Throughout his career as an editor and agent, John has successfully negotiated over 750 publishing agreements.