Do You Need A Literary Agent?

Writing can be a very fruitful and fulfilling endeavor. With concentrating on this creative arena for your career, you are not only able to share an integral part of yourself to the world, but you can also earn a living with it.

However, to earn from writing, you may find that it is not as easy as it may seem to get your book published. In fact, the process of convincing companies to publish your book as well as negotiating with agreements on how to market your book may be taxing on you as a writer.

And so, this is where the important role of a literary agent may come in. After all, you certainly do not want to waste all your creative efforts on doing the business work yourself.

What Is A Literary Agent?

A literary agent is someone who represents writers and their written works to publishers, producers and other companies. Basically, these agents assist you in selling your book and in dealing with contract negotiations. They do not get paid, but they get percentage of your royalties for the works that they helped you get published.

Agents can be very useful as buffers between you and your publisher, especially when it comes to coming into an agreement on how each party would want to package or market your work. As a writer, it is understandable that you would of course not want your original work to be butchered and changed as much, but it is a reality that most often publishers would want to do certain changes on your work in order to cater to its salability. Having an agent around to help settle things can make things much easier for everyone.

Why Should You Get An Agent?

As a writer, it certainly would not be your priority to have to sell your work because your concentration would mainly focus on the creative aspect of the whole deal. Therefore, it would really help you a lot to hire someone to do all the negotiating and business talks for your book to get published. At the same time, it could be very beneficial to hire an agent because he or she may have the connections that you do not, with which could possibly make the whole process faster.

An agent will be the one responsible to shop your manuscript around publishing firms and make use of his or her connections to get your work in the hands of a good editor. All the contracts, agreements and negotiations will be carried out without you having to do as much, which gives you more time to write more and focus on your art.

It would also be comforting on your part to have an agent by your side that will be concerned with your artistic welfare and your opinions on what you want to achieve. In a way, you would not have to feel as if people are just making money out of you because you know you are getting the protection that you need through the representation of a professional.

Getting a literary agent is practical in such a way that he or she can assist you in earning money from your work, at the same time, provide you with creative protection. They can help fight for your artistic decisions and help make sure that your original concept is not compromised.

What Should You Know Before Getting An Agent?

As good as it may sound to get a literary agent to represent you right at this very moment, do not be in too much of a hurry and make sure that you take note of a few things.

Make sure that you find out beforehand on who the good agents are for the type of genre that you write, and do your research on their information. If you narrowed down a few good ones that you think could represent you, send them your books first three chapters, a comprehensive synopsis, and a short letter asking them to represent you.

Keep in mind that most agents are just as swamped with manuscripts from many different writers like editors, and therefore, some of them may be very picky and hard to please. Do not be frustrated if you experience some difficulty at this stage. But there are a lot of agents out there, and in time, you will find an agent who will believe in your work and help you sell it.

Also be wary of scammers and make sure that the agents you choose are legitimate with the work that they do. Be warned that if you find agents advertising themselves too much, or giving out too good to be true offers, the chances are, that they may not be the real deal.

For you are a writer who is determined to get your work published, then getting a literary agent is one of the basic steps for you to achieve your goal. By doing so, you can earn a comrade in getting your stories across to people at the same time, help you make money from your art.

Doing the creative work in writing is one thing, and the business aspect of it is another. A good literary agent may help launch your career as a writer could certainly make things a whole lot easier for you when it comes to making business decisions. And so, if you want to become successful in your writing endeavors, it would certainly not hurt you to get a good agent.