212 LITERARY AGENTS

Yes, that's correct - if you look at the sidebar here you'll find links to two hundred and twelve literary agents' websites:

114 U.S. based literary agents
and
98 U.K. based literary agents.

Not a bad start if you're actively looking for an agent.

To help your quest you may want to check out Noah Lukeman's book How to Land (and keep) a Literary Agent.

You can download the first 20 pages of the book here before making up your mind to buy it.

While you're at it you could also download Mr Lukeman's very useful FREE e-book How to Write a Great Query Letter here.

And, of course, you could go to Mr Lukeman's agency's website - you'll note that he is not currently seeking new clients. And, you could go here and sign up to Mr Lukeman's very useful monthly email newsletter.

You can check out what I think of Noah Lukeman's The First Five Pages and The Art of Punctuation here and here.

That should keep you busy - though focussed on the task of finding an agent - for a while. Good luck.

I'm aware some visitors to the blog may not realise that the links to literary agents' websites are near the bottom of the sidebar, below Writers' Forums and above Useful Downloads.

If you look in the sidebar you'll also find links to 51 literary agents' blogs - ranging from the very current and very active Nathan Bransford to the archived, though very useful, Miss Snark.

DARLEY ANDERSON - Literary, Film & TV Agency

If you scroll through the sidebar you'll come across an extensive, growing list of UK literary agents. And, if you scroll through the list you'll come across a link to Darley Anderson.

As you'll read, Darley Anderson represents Lee Child and Martina Cole among many other high flying authors.

Last week I came across an illuminating interview with Mr Anderson on Mr. Edit's website. If you're looking to pitch Darley Anderson it will be well worth your time to read this interview before you do; there's some really good, useful stuff in there.

You may also notice I've created another sidebar category: Editors' Websites, wherein I've placed a link to Mr. Edit.

MYRMIDON BOOKS

The post 10 U.K. Publishers who accept submissions from writers continues to prove popular with visitors to the blog.

As a follow up I posted links to interviews with Will Atkin, the managing editor at Macmillan New Writing, and a link to a guest blog post by Emma Barnes at Snowbooks.



One of the publishers on the original list of ten is Myrmidon. Last week I stumbled across this very illuminating interview with Edward Handyside, publishing director at Myrmidon, over on Gary Reynolds's Concept Sci-Fi online magazine.

If you're thinking of submitting work to Myrmidon I strongly recommend you read this interview before you do. Interesting, invaluable stuff.

POTENTIALLY USEFUL ORGANIS/ZATIONS

If you scroll down the sidebar you'll see I've put up two new link categories: Potentially Useful Organizations U.K. and Potentially Useful Organisations U.S..

This is where you'll find links to organisations such as the Association of Authors' Agents (U.K.) and the Association of Authors' Representatives (U.S).

The list will grow over time.



So, why potentially? Just to be straight, I'm not inferring anything negative about the listed organisations; they probably do a fantastic job for their members. However, I couldn't hand on heart tell you from experience if such is the case or not. I do not belong to any organisation.

I've just told a lie - I am a member/soc un soci of the Ateneu Barcelonès. If you go HERE HERE, HERE and HERE you'll see why.

I'm also an active member of a Barcelona English Writers' Group which meets every Thursday at 7.15pm at Bar Acústic, Carrer València 367, if you're interested.

I did try three times to join the National Union of Journalists. But they wouldn't have me.

Before attending college I used to edit an underground rag and contribute to others. The papers worked with N.G.A. printers and NATSOPA print operatives and were keen to regularize their contributors' position and prevent trouble. No way with the N.U.J..

Before attending college I took off for Afghanistan via Pakistan, with the intention of reporting on events over there. Despite encouraging words from staffers at the Guardian, they could not handle any material filed by a non-N.U.J. member. My application was refused again.

When doing my first degree in creative writing I found that the college owned the copyright on ALL creative work produced by students, including writing. Don't think this a problem? Well, you try selling photographs featured in your final-year exhibition only to find that the photographs you think you've sold have been retained by the college authorities for their collection.

I was outraged to find that the same rule applied to creative writing, i.e. any work we students sold to publications, and all revenue generated, could be rightfully claimed by the college.

The National Union of Students (bless 'em) were not interested. And our local students' union (affiliated to the Federation of Conservative Students) were beavering away trying their damndest to break the mandatory link to the N.U.S..

"We're not having this," I railed, and contacted the N.U.J. Basically they told me to piss off. They would only accept student members if said students were signed up to one of two officially approved journalism courses, or who were indentured to a newspaper and attending day-release or block-release educational courses.

The Society of Authors weren't much help either.

I was brought up within a very strong trades union background. My grandfather was, for many years, the treasurer of a branch of the Transport & General Workers' Union; my mother was a member of the Labour Party and a clerical workers' union; my step-father was a shop-steward for the Electrical Engineers' and Plumbing Trades Union, and I had been a proud member of the National Union of Railwaymen (sexist or what?). One of my proudest possessions is a Northumberland Union of Mineworkers badge given me by Ronnie Campbell M.P. as thanks for my efforts during the Coal Strike.

But I'm not bitter. I still believe solidarity, direct action and mutual aid is the way to go. And, if my command of spoken vernacular Spanish were better, I would likely join the C.G.T. or C.N.T.

Looking back it's difficult to believe, contrary to all Thatcher's spiteful rhetoric, how feeble, how moribund, how reactionary, and how very uninterested in social and environmental struggles the U.K. trades unions were at the time. Hardly the cauldrons of social revolution the Tories made them out to be.

I'm not bitter, I'm just a déclassé element who has become wary of joining any organisation which purports to promote and/or defend my interests.

I'd be keen to hear your experiences of being a member of, or trying to join, a writers', agents' or publishers' organisation.

p.s. And don't start me off on Equity!

ROGET'S THESAURUS - An Oxford Rival?

Oxford University Press has announced it intends to publish what it claims as the world's largest thesaurus in the autumn, fall, dusk or sunset of the year.

Forty four years in the making, this new thesaurus will contain 800,000 meanings and provide a chronological history of words.


I've seen it reported, though not able to confirm, that the suggested retail price will be 150 nicker, quid, pounds, libras, beer tokens, spondulicks, units of a failed experiment.

The announcement prompted a flurry of stuff - check out this and this at the BBC website and/or this post over on HarperStudio's blog.

As you'll see, if you follow the links above, the BBC Magazine feature gives a sample entry from this new tome, followed with a selection of comments.

It's perhaps unfair, and maybe churlish, to form judgement on the basis of a single sample entry - but, if the 150 quid retail price is correct, then punters' expectations are going to be very high. However, I read the entry on trousers and very quickly, without thinking too hard at all, came up with 9 words describing trousers that are not mentioned in the entry.

Having read the comments I can see that I'm not the only person who straightaway thought of 'kecks'. And then there's 'duds'; a very common expression when and where I grew up. And then there's 'duns', less common, and I suspect a twist on 'dunnies', a shortened form of dungareees.

I was very surprised that the entry did not mention 'trewsers' (which I first came across when working in Lancaster City Museum in a hand-written note between the pages of a ship's log dated 1809) and 'troosers' which I'm fairly sure I came across in Sterne's Tristram Shandy. (But then I did a word search here and couldn't find it.)

And then there are 'strides' and 'slacks'. How can anyone assemble a thesaurus entry for trousers and not include 'strides'?

So, roll over Roget? No, don't think so, not for 150 smackers. I'll be sticking with a combination of a battered Penguin edition of Roget's and Merriam-Webster's New Book of Word Histories for a while yet.

What do you think? Will you be ordering OUP's Thesaurus?

A Dictionary of ART & ARTISTS by Peter and Linda Murray

I really like art. I enjoy visiting galleries. I enjoy experiencing art.

I enjoy a good chinwag about art. I enjoy hanging out with artists and visiting their studios to talk about projects in progress.

I enjoy watching well-made TV documentaries about art and artists.

I can't draw but I can paint large surfaces -- walls and murals -- and I can paint miniatures. And I've made objects and sculptures.

When at college I situated my creative writing desk in a sculpture studio.

I've come to understand the fundamental relationship between poetry, sculpture and dance and architecture.

Some of my very best friends, like Stephen, are serious, accomplished artists.

I enjoy reading about art, though I don't do enough of it.
Thinking about it I really should get my act together and write about art.

In my novel After Goya I describe two fictitious miniature paintings by Goya and two miniatures created as pastiches of Goya. I gave the passages to Xavier Peralta, the book's designer, to read. I was taken aback and pleased by his response. He at first refused to believe the Goyas I'd painstakingly described do not exist.

Such would not have been possible had I not come across Peter and Linda Murray's
A Dictionary of Art & Artists right back in the early 70s.

Ironically A Dictionary of Art & Artists does not contain any illustrations, so, as you flick through the book, unless you have an exhibition catalogue or other images to hand, you are required to imagine the works or techniques being referenced -- good exercise for developing creative writing visualisation muscles.

And who can read an entry (chosen at random) like this:

FRANCIS, Sam (b.1923), is a Californian Tachiste painter. He served in the US Air Force 1943-45, and, after a long spell in hospital, became an abstract painter in 1947. In 1950 he went to Paris, joining the circle of American painters around RIOPELLE. He has painted murals for the Kunsthalle, Basle (1956-8) and, on a visit to Japan in 1957, for a School of Flower Arrangment there. His technique of dribbling paint differs from the more 'calligraphic' style used by many Americans. There are paintings by him in London (Tate) and New York (MoMA)

and not imagine all sorts of potential story threads?

A sharp-eyed art historian or contemporary art commentator will note I need a new edition -- Sam Francis died in 1994.

A Dictionary of Art & Artists is an invaluable first reference and an excellent source of inspiration for creative writers.

And, if the above entry made you curious, here's an image of one of Sam Francis's works:

(Click on the image to view a larger version.)

EDUCATIONAL TV

Came across this YouTube video over at CompletelyNovel - made me smile, made me chuckle.

It conveniently answers many questions about the publishing process we're often too timid to ask.

SYNOPSES or Four Free Downloads and a Book

If we're serious about selling a novel to an editor or agent there comes a point when we have to buckle down and write the damn synopsis.


What is a synopsis? Is it an outline?


"No." According to the UK Crime Writers' Association. "A synopsis gives a narrative overview of the story's progression from beginning to end..."

Whereas:

"An outline gives a breakdown of the story scene by scene, chapter by chapter, character interplay by character interplay from beginning to end. It is a blueprint constructed by the writer for their own use before they actually begin to write the book."

Not so, according to well-known New York literary agent Donald Maass, "...in publishing terms outline really means synopsis." So he says in his The Career Novelist - A Literary Agent Offers Strategies for Success (available as a FREE download - click here).

According to Maass, "...the best outlines are more than plot summaries. They are novels in miniature." Maass also suggests five pages is too short and fifty pages too long.

Back in the days before I had access to the web - and too much, often conflicting, information on synopses - I bought a copy of André Jute's Writing Proposals & Synopses That Sell.

It's an entertaining and useful read. Jute writes in chatty, knowledgeable, punchy style - covering synopses for novels, telivision [sic. p.177], film and radio, as well as non-fiction proposals. Jute supplies an extensive and varied range of working examples to amply illustrate his advice and strategies. Interestingly Jute advocates using snatches of dialogue from your work within the synopsis - other guides I've read are resolutely set against this idea.

Much of the front end of the book - Position and Power in Publishing - usefully discusses how and by whom our synopses will likely be received. Well worth a look at. You can buy the book via the Clueless, Ink UK Amazon store here.

In his How to Write a Great Query Letter - Insider Tips & Techniques for Success (available as a FREE download - click here then click on 'query' in the title bar) Noah Lukeman (SEE this post and this post) advises having ready two one-page synopses, one single-spaced the other double-spaced, an extended synopsis, between 2 and 5 pages in length, and, just in case, a chapter outline - essential for a non-fiction proposal.

So, who should we trust? Lukeman or Maas? A single page? 2-5 pages? Or somewhere between 5 and 50 pages?

Setting aside the predilections of New York agents two sources I have found to be very useful when it comes to the nuts'n'bolts of drafting a synopsis are:

• The Synopsis - Don't Sweat It - put together for the U.K. Crime Writers' Association by Mike Jecks, Kay Mitchell and Edwin Thomas to help entrants to the C.W.A.'s Debut Dagger award. Go here and scroll down the page.

• Writing the Tight Synopsis by Chicago crime writer Beth Anderson. (click here) Originally given as a talk at writers' conferences, pages 4-6 of this 6 page document constitute the most useful, practical step-by-step guide to the dreaded task of drafting a convincing synopsis I've yet come across.

Should you need to refer to the above at some point in the future I've put links to the downloads in a new sidebar category: Useful Downloads.

How do you set about the task of drafting a synopsis? Do you do it before you start drafting the work, or afterwards? Any tips? Any links to useful resources on this, the slipperiest of topics?

ANOTHER 10 plus U.S. PUBLISHERS WHO WILL ACCEPT SUBMISSIONS FROM WRITERS

I know I promised you I'd put up a list of Australian publishers who will accept submissions from writers this week. I will.

However, it's been a bit of a crazy week, and I'm still working on that list.

In the meantime here's a list of more U.S. publishers who will look at your work:

• Absey & Co.

• Baen - only Science Fiction & Fantasy. But if you write SF you'd know that already.
  

• Coffee House Press

• Dalkey Archive Press

• Glass House Press - espionage, mystery, and psychological/paranormal thriller genres.

• Kirk House - be a bit careful here.

• MacAdam/Cage - though be mindful they have submission windows.

• Brown Ink Books - keep in mind that their next submission period is Fall 2009.

• Small Anchor Press - love these guys, you will too. I've decided I want a book crafted, printed and published by them.

And, to finish up, you'll find the submission guidelines to another 5 imprints here.

Don't forget, before you set to with packing up your brilliant MS read these guidelines first:

• The links posted here will take you straight to the appropriate page on the publisher's website detailing their submissions policy and instructions.
  

PLEASE read these carefully and do as asked.

• While on any site browse around a bit and familiarise yourself with the publisher's list, seek out their blog (if they have one) and gather clues on their current acquisitions policy.

• If the publisher has a newsletter, and seem as though they could be a possible home for your work at some point in the future, then sign up.

PLEASE, don't just smash, grab and send; give careful thought to your query and show consideration.

You know the drill - but if you don't, don't send, otherwise a few more doors may close.

WRITERS' FORUMS

We all need a break during the day now and then. And, for some of us, having a break during a working day means hanging out on a writers' forum.

Why?
What do we hope to find?

Do we go there with the expectation of joining, or more boldly, initiating erudite discussion on the real grit of the nuts'n'bolts manouevres in the dark that is creating fiction and narrative non-fiction? Or, do we simply want to shoot the breeze with fellow dunces? Or, maybe expound on a pet theory? Or, maybe just remind the world that we're still here, plugging away?

Maybe we just want to connect.

Whatever your initial motivation there are dozens of sites out there where you can hang out, sound off, pick up tips, learn more than you ever wanted to know about a fellow writer's obsessions, and throw your still tiny voice around like confetti in a gale.

Here are a few writers' forums you may want to check out:

• Absolute Write - Very much a U.S. site. Though it welcomes furriners, it's made pretty darn clear the regulars don't tolerate no Brit affectation when it comes to spelling, syntax and grammar; no way, now how, not today and not tomorrow.

• Authonomy - Be mindful this is a competitive slushpile set-up. Possibly the most international of the forums I've visited.

• Backspace - The Writer's Place (Thanks to Mags for the tip).

• The Book Shed - By written application only.

• The Red Room - Well worth checking out.

• The Write Idea - Very polite, but useful, by comparison with other sites.

• Writers Dock - Though you may want to check this out before you commit yourself.

• Writers Net - Basic and straightforward.

• Writers Wrule - Set up recently, welcomed a cohort of writers (including the racist) who departed Authonomy because of the Starcraft Caper.

• YouWriteOn - Another competitive slushpile set-up. A shadow of what it once was.

There are, of course, many, many more general writing forums out there. And then there are more focussed forums. I'll keep an eye out and report back as and when I come across them.

In the meantime please let me know your favourite forum and I'll put up a link.

HAPPY HOLIDAYS!

If everything has gone to plan I'll be in Italy today.

Back to Barcelona on Tuesday, April 14th.

Wherever you find yourself this Easter weekend here's wishing you a happy holiday.

A SUMMARY

Before we all get sorted for the holiday weekend I thought to post a summary of the links you'll find here if you take the time to nosey about in the sidebar:

• 99 U.K. Literary agents' websites

• 50 U.S. Literary agents' websites

• 46 Literary agents' blogs

• 21 blogs by editors of various descriptions

• 23 U.K. publishers' blogs

• 40 U.S. publishers' blogs

• 2 Canadian publishers' blogs

• 3 Irish publishers' blogs

• 15 Blogs about independent and self-publishing

• 4 Outstanding examples of writers' blogs

• 13 Blogs by writers of general contemporary fiction

• 6 Childrens and young adult writers' blogs

• 10 Crime writers' blogs

• 5 Historical writers'blogs

• 1 Blog by a narrative non-fiction writer

• 7 Blogs by Romance writers.

• 12 Blogs by writers of Science-fiction and Fantasy

• 7 Thriller writers' blogs

• 2 Travel writers' blogs

• 3 Poets' blogs

• 5 Expert review and critique websites

• 12 Peer review and critique websites

• 18 Literary festivals.

And the lists grow longer every week.

Please, if you know of any online resources which you regard as being essential reading for emerging writers then please pass them on. Or, drop a note in a comments box offering to write a post about a resource you would recommend.

Have a good Easter weekend.

SNOWBOOKS

In an earlier post about U.K. publishers who will accept submissions from writers I listed Snowbooks. Here's a link to Snowbooks' submission guidelines.

I check into Snowbooks' blog most weekdays, as I have for the past two years or more.


It's a chatty, friendly, open blog which doesn't fall prey to simply plugging their stable of writers.

I've explored lots of little diverting byways on the net I would never have discovered - steampunk sites, techie sites, and John Cusack's interview with Naomi Klein, for example - through following Rob Jones's and Emma Barnes's posts and links.

Emma Barnes comes across as a friendly, honest and open workaholic who spends a lot of time designing and refining business systems, always with the intention of increasing efficiency and selling more books more effectively.

Emma freely shares a lot of her knowledge with her peers in the publishing industry.
And, very commendably, has opened up access to Snowbooks' monthly sales figures for anyone who is interested and who applies for a password.

Rob Jones (aka as writer Robert Finn) is more the thinker-at-large, opining on topics as diverse as techie gadgetry, exploitation in the Third World, vegetarianism, Dr. Who, screenwriting and Joss Wheedon.

Snowbooks' efforts have been recognised with a clutch of industry awards.

Their stable of writers is a rich, diverse mix of contemporary fiction, non-fiction and a couple of volumes by luminaries such as Virginia Woolf and E.M. Forster.

Yesterday I followed Emma's link to Strictly Writing where she posts an honest assessment of why Snowbooks rejects work , even work they believe to be 'outstanding'. Emma says, "If you have written a novel which is destined in the future to win the Booker, chances are that we at Snowbooks will reject you. We have an editorial policy driven primarily by our own entirely subjective tastes, combined with a forecast of what we think we can sell."

Emma also says, "We've turned down books in the past which fit our editorial plans perfectly but the author seemed to be the sort of person we'd rather not work with."

Interesting, invaluable stuff. Well worth checking out.

ANOTHER MACMILLAN NEW WRITING UPDATE

My original post about Macmillan New Writing stirred a lot of interest.

This led to another post picking up on comments Will Atkins, MNW's commissioning editor, left on a thread on the forum over at Authonomy, HarpernotCollins' online slushpile.


In the original post I referred you to Macmillan New Writers' blog.

Well, if you did check it out (Whaddya mean, 'I've got no time for that nonsense'?) and bookmarked it as you should have done, you'll have seen an interview with Will Atkins orchestrated and conducted by two of MNW's authors, David Isaak and Tim Stretton.

I have never read such a revealing insight into the thinking behind a contemporary imprint.

There's no flim-flam, no self-aggrandizing twaddle, just straight honest answers to plainly wrought questions.

Go there. Read it. Consider your options.

And, while you're making up your mind whether Macmillan New Writing is for you or not, go buy some of their writers' books. Read them. Enjoy them. Then reflect on the care that's gone into producing them.