Writing Young Adult Fiction For Dummies

by Deborah Halverson

  The fine print: Legitimate contests post rules specifying the prizes. Make sure you read them and find their terms acceptable. Vanity presses may post fine print that buries the truth: the prize for winning is publication that you pay for. There are other items you should watch out for: Do you surrender first publication rights by entering? Can the contest holder publish your entry on its website? Are you promising anything you don’t want to promise merely by entering? Know what you’re getting into.

  Here are some great places to gather likely prospects for your submission list:

  Publication guides: Usually available in both print and electronic versions, these resources contain not only contact information for agents, editors, and publishers but also descriptions of everyone’s interests, specialties, and submission requirements. Examples of publication guides are Literary Market Place (LMP), Children’s Writer’s and Illustrator’s Market (CWIM), and the Society of Children’s Books Writers and Illustrators’ publication guide, which is provided in the SCBWI membership packet and available to active members online. You may find these guides on the reference shelves at your local library.

  Writers’ groups and online forums: Ask fellow writers for recommendations based on their experiences and research. Personal anecdotes are valuable in winnowing down your submission list to those agents and editors who share your literary sensibility.

  Spines and copyright pages: Check books similar to yours for publisher and imprint information, and then go to the publishers’ websites and study the imprint profiles and online catalogs.

  Imprints are like departments or teams within a publishing house that cater to specific demographic groups, genres, and the like. A children’s book publisher may have separate imprints for fantasy books, for historical fiction, and for paperback editions, for example. The editors in those imprints can acquire only the manuscripts that fall within those parameters. Each imprint has an editorial director who oversees the editors within the imprint and develops her own acquisitions. Sometimes an editorial director gets her own imprint to define (it may even be eponymous, or named after her), which allows her to choose the mission and personality of that imprint based on her tastes and vision.

  When submitting, consider each imprint independently of the others in the house. Although many houses discourage writers from submitting to two editors within the same imprint, you can submit to two or even all the imprints at a house (as long as they’re appropriate for your work).

  Acknowledgments and dedications: Writers tend to thank their behind-the-scenes crew in their acknowledgements — and in the process give you prime submission leads. You have an example of an agent or editor’s literary taste right in your hands! If a lead turns into a submission for you, mention that helpful book’s title in your query letter to demonstrate that you’ve done your homework. “I admire your book X and believe that my manuscript will be right for you” or “I enjoyed X and would love the chance to work with you.”

  Conferences or writers’ group meetings and retreats: Editors and agents speak, teach, participate in panels and do individual manuscript critiques at these events. Talk to editors and agents after their presentations or sit next to these people at lunch. That doesn’t mean stalk, pounce, hard-sell, or try to hand over your manuscript; they never take manuscripts on the spot, anyway.

  Your goal is to make a personal connection that you can refer to when you follow up via mail or e-mail as seems appropriate. One way to do that is to simply introduce yourself, thank the editor or agent for the presentation, and then say, “I believe my manuscript is the kind of book you like, and I’d like to submit it to you after the conference if that’s all right.” You’ll be in a position to say in your query letter, “I spoke with you at the conference. Here’s the manuscript I told you about.” You’ll no longer be just a name on a paper. Whenever possible, pay for one-on-one critiques so you can talk specifically about your manuscript. That’s the best connection you can make.

  Agents and editors often extend open submission invitations to all attendees at an event, for a limited time. The people offering the invitation tell you how to note the invitation on your submission.

  Most agencies and publishing houses allow you to submit your manuscript to just one of their editors or agents — yet another reason to select wisely. (Check their submission guidelines on their websites.) The idea here is that one person represents the interests of all, and if the one you submit to isn’t personally interested and chooses not to pass your manuscript along to another colleague, then it’s not right for the house or agency. The exception to this one-submission-only rule is personal contact. If you make a personal connection with an agent or editor at a conference, you can submit to him even if your manuscript has already been rejected by the agency or house. Accepted industry ethics require you to note in the query letter that colleague So-and-So already passed on the project because “she didn’t connect with it.” It’s best if you can offer a reason you think this new match is a good one, such as “but I think you’ll be intrigued because of your interest in baseball stories” or whatever. The point is to give the second agent a reason not to automatically dismiss your submission because his trusted colleague said no.

  Identifying the right editor for you

  To make a match that’ll culminate in a contract and ultimately a bound book with your name on the cover, you must submit to the right editor for both you and your project. That editor will spend one or two years working with your story, investing her time and her own career on its success in the marketplace (as well as your long-term success), and she’ll commit to that only if she connects with the manuscript at the outset and shares your vision for what it could be. That’s why there’s so much talk about “passion” and “connection” and “vision.”

  Simply addressing your submission to “The Editors” will land your package in the infamous slush pile — if you’re lucky. Slush pile is industry slang for unsolicited submissions that editors (or more likely their assistants) comb through once in a blue moon. These days, though, most submissions not addressed to a specific editor are simply returned or automatically recycled. Publishers don’t have the staff to deal with them. And why should they? Those authors haven’t researched the editors to determine whether a match is even a remote possibility. That lack of effort influences their perception of your professionalism and perhaps even your sincerity. With editorial bios and interviews easily accessible on the Internet, there’s no convincing excuse for not making that determination.

  Much like dating, publishing is about finding the right chemistry. Knowing editors’ interests increases your chances of making a match — and of doing so quickly. That means getting to know the person behind the title. Editors’ interests are evidenced in their acquisitions (the manuscripts they buy), in their publications, and in their explicitly stated wishes. Get online and search for the editors in your target imprints. Here’s what you’re looking for:

  Bios: Editors’ bios are sometimes published on their publishers’ website, and they’re usually available on blogs and websites of individual writers and groups. You can also find bios in industry publications when interviews or appearances are involved. Those bios list noteworthy books the editors have worked on and the authors they’ve worked with, giving you a sense of the editors’ literary sensibilities.

  Read the editor’s noteworthy books. Or at least check out the descriptions, reviews, and first pages through an online bookstore. If these books are important enough for the editors to highlight in their bios and interviews, the books are important to you as prime examples of the editors’ sensibilities and buying tendencies.

  Interviews: Read all the interviews you can find, which almost always include the direct question “What are you looking for?”

  Deals: Type the editors’ names into the Publishers Weekly website (www.publishersweekly.com) to see what they�
��ve been buying lately, or follow deal news with the free Publishers Lunch e-newsletter, which reports book deals each week (www.publishersmarketplace.com). You can pay for a more in-depth version called Publishers Lunch Deluxe or get direct access to searchable deals databases through a Publishers Marketplace membership.

  Appearances: See whether your target editors are speaking with writers’ groups in your area or acting as faculty at writers’ conferences. Editors commonly give speeches, teach sessions, participate in panels, and conduct manuscript critiques. Attend if you can. Editors usually state what they’re looking for in submissions and may extend submission invitations to attendees, and you may get a chance to meet the editors personally. When possible, pay for a manuscript critique for uninterrupted face-to-face time that’s dedicated to your work — if the manuscript and the editor are a match, book deal! If not, you’ll know and won’t waste your one-time imprint submission on that editor.

  Open calls: Keep your eyes peeled for “assistant editors” or for veteran editors who’ve recently switched publishing houses. These folks tend to be in active acquisition mode as they work to build their lists (sign up manuscripts to work on and writers to work with). You’ll find them making the rounds at conferences and other writers’ events and participating in Internet interviews to get their names out and their wish lists known. Sometimes they’ll even post notices in SCBWI’s Bulletin that they’re making an exception to the house “no unsolicited manuscripts” policy for a limited time.

  When you’ve identified a likely editor, double-check his or her current employer to confirm that your desired editor is still employed in that imprint. Editors tend to move around from house to house. If you have to, call the publisher’s operator. Don’t ask to speak with the editor, though. Queries via phone are intrusive no-no’s.

  After you identify and rank your editorial prospects, send out submissions in phases. Send to perhaps ten publishers and then wait. If you get a bite in the first round, huzzah! If not, you may be fortunate to have several editors forgo the form letters for actual comments about why they rejected your project. This gives you a chance to revise based on the feedback of experts in the trenches before you send the manuscript out in the second wave. If all you get is form letters, so be it. Proceed directly to the next round of submissions. Do this until you get a hit. Of course, you could submit to dozens at once, but if they all reject the submission citing the same general issue, those doors are now closed to a revised version in the future.

  Steel yourself. Submitting even to the right editor takes patience and fortitude, because getting a response may take up to six months. Solicited manuscripts, which agents submit, get reviewed far more quickly than unsolicited ones because editors want to maintain their good rapport with the agent so as to keep the hottest manuscripts coming. You may send a polite follow-up at 8 weeks and again at 4 months. More on that later, in “Packaging your sub-mission.”

  Deciding to work with an agent

  The desire for expediency is why some writers insist on having agents. Agents have well-established working relationships with editors, know who’s looking for what, and enjoy direct access to editors who are off-limits to writers because of policies that disallow unsolicited (or non-agented) submissions. Although you certainly don’t need an agent, many writers use them to land book deals and thereafter use agents as expert advisors. Of course, that means you have to do a round of agent submissions. Even expediency takes time.

  Knowing what an agent can do for you

  Agents are experts in both market trends and editor/house tastes, and agents’ primary role is to use that knowledge to match up a manuscript with the right editor, resulting in a book contract. Do you need an agent? No. But they’re great to have in your corner for three reasons:

  To get access to the right editor: An agent knows who wants what and how to reach them. In a perfect scenario, an agent spots your great manuscript about, say, a runaway slave in the Civil War, knows that Editor Ellen is looking for more historical fiction and has a particular yen for the Civil War era, calls up Editor Ellen to say, “I’ve got exactly what you’re looking for,” and gets the manuscript to the top of Ellen’s reading stack. No wasted mailings to editors who can’t stand historical fiction, saving time, money, and effort for all.

  To bypass those no-unsolicited-manuscripts policies: In a practical sense, agents act as prescreeners for editors, so editors know that a submission from an agent has a significantly higher probability of being their next acquisition. Editors give agent submissions priority, often fielding the initial contact as a phone call. The trust is high enough that editors even take part in agent-run auctions, wherein agents invite several houses to read and then bid on a manuscript at once, with the manuscript going to the highest bidder. Running an auction well takes a lot of skill, trust, and industry savvy.

  To be a partner: Literary agents are more than just salespeople. You want an advocate for your work, someone who believes in you and your talents, who will go to the mat for you and not only find the best money for you but also help you map out your long-term career and manage your rights. Your agent is your publishing partner.

  For all this, the agent gets a percentage of your earnings from both your advance (your upfront payment, due upon signing the contract) and the subsequent royalties (the percentage of money you make on each book sold; find more on rights and royalties in Chapter 17). This is why it’s in an agent’s interests to look for projects she thinks will sell from authors who’ll have long, productive futures in publishing. Your agent won’t make money until you do.

  Beware of interminable agency clauses in your author-agency agreement. Interminable agency clauses allow an agent to remain the “agent of record” for the full life of the copyright (which is the author’s lifetime plus 70 years) instead of just for the duration of any contracts that agency negotiates. That’s not right. Your agent should get a commission only for the life of your book’s contract with your publisher. If the contract with that publisher is terminated for some reason, the agent should get paid again only if he sells the rights for a new edition to a new publisher. Look out for language that lets an agent “remain Agent of Record in perpetuity” or “for the legal life of the Work” or that states an “Agent’s interest in the Work is irrevocable.”

  Because of the wait time involved in seeking agent representation, writers often submit their manuscripts to editors even as they submit to agents. That way, they’re working on both fronts at once. This, of course, requires researching both editors and agents. If you were to land an editor first, you could discontinue your hunt for an agent. However, if you see value in having an agent as a publishing partner and advisor, don’t stop your agent search when you land the book deal. In fact, you’ll probably find the search easier because you already have a book under contract and have demonstrated that your work is salable. Ask your editor about the agents she works with. If you land an agent first, be prepared to provide your new agent with a list of editors who’ve already considered your project. The agent won’t resubmit to them. Don’t worry that you’ve closed doors all over Publishing World by submitting to editors while trying to land an agent; the agent you finally sign with will know plenty of other editors at the houses you’ve already tried — and in other houses, too. It’s unlikely you’d exhaust all your editorial opportunities on your own.

  Identifying the right agent for you

  After you’ve compiled your list of prospective agents who represent MG/YA fiction in your genre, you narrow that list the same way you hone a list of editors: You research them. The Internet is a great resource for this. Keep the following items in mind as you do your research:

  Know what you want the agent to do. Many agents have editorial backgrounds and will help you shape your manuscript prior to submission. Do you want an agent like that? Or do you just want a strategist on your team, one who will take wha
t you give her and find the best place for it? Editorial experience is evident in agents’ bios, and their personal statements indicate whether they shape before submitting.

  Know what the Association of Authors’ Representatives (AAR) demands. The AAR is the primary professional organization for literary and dramatic agents. Its members agree to subscribe to a Canon of Ethics — and that’s a good thing for you. That canon was adopted to protect authors from dodgy agents who’d take advantage of hopefuls by charging them for editing and then refusing to take them on as clients — or even by charging them for editing and then agreeing to take them on as clients.

  If an agent agrees to take you on as a client, any editing he does is free, as part of the submission’s preparation. The agent may refer you to an editing service outside the agency, but he can’t require you to use that service, nor can he take payment (kickbacks) from the service.

  Never pay an agent to read your submission. That’s not considered ethical and is against AAR policy. Websites and blogs like Preditors & Editors (http://pred-ed.com) and Writer Beware (www.sfwa.org/for-authors/writer-beware/) specialize in outing predators who take advantage of hopeful authors.

  Know what others are saying. Do an online search for the agents’ names and read what folks are saying about them in writers’ forums. Read the comments that follow blogged interviews, because individual writers often share their anecdotes. Ask your writers’ groups for any personal knowledge they may have about your prospective agents.

  Know what agents say about themselves. Spend time on the agency website, study the agency’s policies, and review its client list. See whether the agents are active in industry groups and belong to the AAR. See who has published their clients’ work. Read the agents’ bios and their interviews on other websites and blogs to see whether you have what the agents are looking for and what they like to publish. This is your chance to get a feel for their personalities and literary sensibilities, to judge whether they’re indeed a good match for you. There are many great agents, but not all of them are great for you. Make the distinction.