Saturday, August 19, 2006

Cool Agents I Know

OK, well "know" might be a bit of a stretch. More like "Agents I've Been Rejected By Who Seem Cool on the Other End of the Mail/Email/Telephone." Here, in no particular order except for the first 2, are my Top 10.

1. Susan Ginsburg, Writers House. LOVE HER!!!!!!!!!!! Amazing woman - kind, encouraging (the fact that she loved my concept, though perhaps not all of the delivery, helped a bunch); wrote me a fantastic personal letter explaining all the reasons she was concerned about my plot. I'd query her again in a heartbeat.

2. Natasha Kern - Called me after 3 months from out of the blue to personally apologize for misplacing my partial and asked for the full. Tremendously pleasant and down to earth on the phone and also wrote a nice, personal letter when she finally said no.

3. Deidre Knight - Again, really nice and enthusiastic emails, even the final rejection one.

4. Pam Hopkins - Nice, personal letter of rejection even though she only read a partial.

5. Vivan Beck - Requested my full from my original email query; really quick response.

6. Roberta Brown - Nice, personal letter (printed on crazy confetti-colored paper...)

7. Susannah Taylor, Richard Henshaw Group - Nice, personal letter after she read my partial; apologized for taking so long.

8. Scott Eagan, Greyhaus Literary - Seems like a nice guy, included some helpful advice after reading and turning down my full.

9. Michelle Grajkowski, 3 Seas - Nice, personal letter after turning down my partial (surprising because their agency asks everyone to send in a partial with the query).

10. Kristin Nelson - She's turned down my query every time, but I love her blog and I love that she's so technologically savvy.

So, amid the reams of form rejection letters, some with spelling and grammar errors, some on half-sheets of paper ('cause I don't deserve a full sheet, obviously), and some that are just stamps or scrawls across my original query letter, those 10 were gems.

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Allie (I'll have to get used to calling you that :-) you are doing something sooo right to get this kind of attention from agents.

Vivian Beck does respond quickly by email and the Knight Agency did as well, but this was a few years ago.

Some of the others you mentioned sent me rejections on quarter, xeroxed sheets. They really ought to think about the message that sends. (sigh)

Any hoo, Allie. Keep up the good work and keep posting your blog!!