Agent Interview: Michael Bourret...

Michael Bourret, an agent with Dystel & Goderich Literary Management, is interested in a wide range of books, from middle grade and young adult fiction, to arts and entertainment, to serious nonfiction. His clients include the National Book Award Finalist Sara Zarr, author of Story of a Girl; Ellen Klages, Scott O'Dell award winner for The Green Glass Sea; Doug Lansky, author of the hilarious Signspotting and its sequel; Anne Rockwell, the acclaimed author/illustrator; and Bernadette Rossetti-Shustak, whose I Love You Through and Through has sold hundreds of thousands of copies.

You’re open to unsolicited submissions, correct? Are there common mistakes you see in submissions from writers, things that drive you crazy?

I am, indeed, open to unsolicited submissions. Simple mistakes are misaddressing the query, which happens all the time; misspelling the agent’s name; sending the query to more than one agent at the agency (most agencies have a policy that you can only send to one agent within the group); addressing an e-mail “Dear agent,” which tells me you’re sending it to everyone and his brother; sending an e-mail to yourself and BCC’ing the agents, because again, I know you’re sending it to everyone in town; other than that, the only real crime is a boring query letter--make your book sound as unique as it is!

What are the chances that you’d actually find an author in your slush pile? That you’d find an author at a conference? (Do you have any upcoming conferences?)

The chances are good! Sara Zarr, Lisa McMann, Heather Brewer, and Joe Fenton (a great author/illustrator you don’t know yet but will shortly) all came through slush. Suzanne Selfors and Jill Alexander (another one you won’t know yet but will next year) both came through conferences. I don’t have any conferences in the next few months, but I’ll be at the Desert Nights, Rising Stars Conference at ASU, and I hope to be at the New York SCBWI conference.

In your SCBWI presentation on building a career over the long haul, you said that ultimately an author’s goal should be to become a “brand.” Is there anything a newer author can do to set that in motion, or is it simply the result of publishing a number of books that catch on with readers?

The key, I think, is to establish yourself as a writer of something. I think it’s tough to establish a brand when you’re jumping from one category to another or from one genre to another. You want to give readers what they expect while still satisfying your own muse. It’s a balancing act, but being an author and having a career as an author are two different things.

YA memoirs and middle grade are two areas you’ve said you’re interested in. Are you simply not getting many of these manuscripts or are you not getting good ones? Is there anything else you’re looking for but not getting?

I very rarely see YA memoir, so that's one I’d really just like to see more of. It’s such a great category in adult books, and Tweaked has proven that it can work well for teens. I actually think some adult memoirs, like Smashed, for instance, would work really well in a teen-specific edition. As for middle grade, I just think it’s a tough category to write for, and I’m so picky about it. All I can say is, keep it coming!

Do you have any quirks as an agent—have you ever been on an agent panel and heard all the other agents agree on something that you don’t?

Oh, I have so many quirks, but probably not as an agent. I do disagree with people on panels sometimes, and sometimes vociferously, but not because I’m quirky, just because we all have different ways of doing things and different preferences. That, and I’m one opinionated sun-of-a-gun. That’s a trait that runs through both sides of my family.

Tell me about the DGLM blog.

The DGLM blog is something that we’re really proud of--it’s something we do to give back to the writing community. We pride ourselves on being open and honest about the process, about teaching writers how this process works so that it isn’t some big mystery. The better educated the writer about the business, the better they are as a client. That’s our way of thinking.

Anything to add in the way of advice for unpublished or unagented writers?

Be patient, do your homework, and be open to new things!

Debut Author of the Month: Laurel Snyder...

This month's debut author Laurel Snyder's first two books have release dates just a few months apart. Her picture book Inside the Slidy Diner is an October release from Tricycle, and her mid-grade Up and Down the Scratchy Mountains is coming in October from Random House. Both books were slush piles submissions. Here she explains her almost simulteanous first books; talks about finding her agent, waiting tables, and writing poetry; and offers advice to those seeking publication.

How did you end up with your first books being published so close together?

Oh, it's a funny situation, but for a good reason! Basically, both books were pulled from slush, about a year apart. Tricycle accepted Slidy a year ahead of Random House contacting me about Scratchy. So then Slidy was due to come out last fall, in time for Halloween (it's a spooky kind of book) and Scratchy was supposed to follow about a year later. But the artist working on Slidy threw herself into it like you wouldn't believe. The pages are very involved, hand painted with with collage elements, and some crazy details. There are recurring images like a mouse you have to hunt for on each page, and all sorts of little jokes... it's wonderful, a work of art (that I really can't take credit for at all). So it took a long time, and at first I think the press wanted to speed her up. But when they saw what she was doing, they decided to let her take her time so she could maintain that level of complexity, and they gave her another year!

Please tell me and my readers a little about both of your first books.

Inside the Slidy Diner is a picture book about a little girl named Edie who lives in a macabre sort of diner where the lady fingers really are! Watch out for the Wigglepedes!

Up and Down the Scratchy Mountains is a lower middle grade novel, an old-fashioned fairy tale set in a place called "The Bewilderness"—about a milkmaid named Lucy and a prince named Wynston. When Wynston has to pick a queen, and Lucy is deemed too common for the job, Lucy runs away in search of her mother. So of course Wynston chases after her, and they have all sorts of silly adventures. It has wonderful pictures by Greg Call, and a lot of silly songs. There's a sniffly prairie dog named Cat, a sweet but ornery cow, and some cautionary tales about living life too rigidly.

You started out submitting on your own, but you have an agent now. How did you find her?

When you get pulled from the slush at Random House, it suddenly becomes easier to find an agent! I queried about 30 of them in one whirlwind weekend, got offers from several great folks, and was lucky enough to be able to choose. I'm very very very happy with my amazing agent, Tina Wexler. I picked Tina because she didn't scare me. She talked to me like a person, laughed a lot, and felt immediately like a friend. One of the best decisions I ever made. But I was rejected by a lot of people before that all happened (some of whom sleazily offered to rep me after the book was in committee, but I'll never say who!).

Tell me about getting your first BFYR contract.

They never tell you how long it'll take to get the actual contract, do they? The formal offer came one day while I was teaching comp at a community college in Atlanta, and I actually got the message as I was dashing from school to pick up my son at his babysitter. I must have looked like a crazy lady, screaming my face off in the gridlock traffic all the way home. But the contract came about four decades later, in the heaviest envelope ever, and I just signed where I was supposed to, and sent it back. Maybe that's dumb but I figure that's why I have an agent.

How must inspiration did Slidy Diner draw from your experience waiting tables in several greasy spoons?

It really is a kind of encoded memoir of those years. I guess its a lesson in how anything can be interesting, and how we need to collect details wherever we go. Show Don't Tell, and all that. Rotten grill grease, tattooed waitresses, and sad patrons who sleep in their oatmeal don't sound like things you'd put in a children's book, but somehow it worked. I should say, for the record, that I love waiting tables, and plan to do it again when my kids are a little older. The Hamburg Inn, where I worked in Iowa City, was a second home to me. For me, living in a world of non-writers is important, so I have something to write about.

How have SCBWI, the Iowa Writers' Workshop, and the Class of 2k8 each helped to shape your writing career?

I could write a whole book about the Workshop. I really have a love/hate relationship with that world. I love poetry, and I love Iowa City, and I cannot imagine my life without some of the friends I made in those years. But the climate of that MFA program made me a little nutso. Not the program itself, but the weird competitive stuff that happens among the students. It made me so crazy I stopped trying to keep up and dove into children's books, my touchstones, and that's really how I began writing for kids. So I have to thank them for that! Also, although I didn't share with anyone else, my teacher Marvin Bell was very supportive of Scratchy Mountains. I'll never forget that!

Once I found myself writing for kids, I didn't feel like I could show anyone at the Workshop the things I was working on. And that's where the SCBWI came in. It provided, along with the Verla Kay Blueboards and the CWIM, a community and a set of instructions for how to think about publishing. I don't know how I would have ever found a home for my work without SCBWI. I don't actively participate in the physical world, but as a virtual community it was critical for me.

2k8 is awesome, but that happened very late in the game. I was already into several other books by the time I joined 2k8, and it's a nice way to meet people and get the word out, but I don't feel it had any effect on my publishing career, per se. Though another class member from Iowa, Sarah Prineas, was an early reader for my second novel (Any Which Wall, 2009) and she's become a good friend, so that's wonderful!

You have a lot of experience writing material for adult readers, having published in Salon, Utne Reader, The Iowa Review and others. What led you to write for children?

Children's books are some of the best, most innovative books in the world. I read them myself, and I find that there's a spark of magic in them. I just love them. I'd say that 80 percent of the most important books in my life are things I read before I was 12. I hate the division between children's books and the literary institutions. I just don't think the divide makes sense. Also, writing for kids feels almost political to me. Helping to shape the future--not writing political books and offering "messages," but providing the right stimulus for kids. Giving them something to chew on.

You've said that writing children's books is not as lucrative as you thought it would be when you were in fourth grade. Since (so far) writing for young readers has not helped you buy a mansion or become a gajillionaire, what keeps you interested?

Well, it's a lot more lucrative than poetry!

No, seriously, one benefit to beginning as a poet is that poets don't write to earn. They write to write. I don't think about money or the market when I write. As a result, I have written some books you will never see, like a morbid picture book called, The Boy Who Caught His Death. I always assumed I'd write, and make my money some other way--whether teaching, waitressing, or writing schlock for hire.

You have a book release party coming up and have a string of promotional events on the horizon. What's your plan for engaging your audience?

Oh, I don't know that I have a plan. I just think meeting kids and seeing them excited about books is the most exiting thing in the world. I want to believe that if I work hard, I'll write good books, and that if I write good books, they will find their way into people's hands. It has been explained to me, in so many words, that I'm not a "bestseller" kind of author. I can live with that. It's a great gift to me that I can write the books I most want to write, and I have an editor and an agent who will help them reach people. Especially since more copies have already been pre-ordered than were even printed when I published my book of poems. Poetry really does make you appreciate having a wider readership of any kind. Based on anything I've ever experienced, both of my books have already been successful.

What's your advice for those working toward publication?

I think the trick is a very careful balance--between writing hard without thinking about selling, and then selling hard (by which I mean hunting for a book deal) without thinking about the possibility of failure. I do believe that a good writer who plugs away will someday publish. You can only fail if you set quantitative expectations like, "I'll publish before I'm 30" or "I'll send this to 51 agents and then quit." I do think you have to listen to your most honest readers and friends, and if one books isn't working, try another. But you can't quit. I have about 30 "dead" picture book manuscripts in a drawer and Scratchy Mountains went through draft after draft before it was accepted. In fact, you can go to my blog and see a rejection letter from the very editor who acquired it! I figure if I can have two books pulled from slush by two different editors, it still happens a good bit.

Random House 'Morality Clause' Only in UK ...

I just found a post that sheds some light on the Random House morality clause issue which I mentioned recently. According to GalleyCat, the purported morality clause is present only in UK Random House contracts. According to an agent questioned about the issue,"there's a lot of strange language that goes into UK contracts that has little bearing on the American market."

So US Random House authors...have a good time.

Up for Discussion: Critique Groups...

Today on Jane Friedman's There Are No Rules blog, she posted the following:

This morning, we pitched a book on writing and critique groups. While anecdotal evidence tells us that most writers do participate in some form of critiquing (whether as part of a formal group or not), we don't have hard evidence. So the sales people tabled the project until we could return with information that substantiated our claims. They also disputed whether writers would spend their money on a book about writing groups and critiquing, even if they are an active writing group member.

So we're putting together a survey that will soon go out to Writer's Digest newsletter subscribers, to see what data we can collect. I'd love to hear from readers of this blog as well, if you know of any information/data that would be useful to us. (And if you have a blog, perhaps you can post on this topic and gather feedback too!) Ultimately, I'd love to create a groundswell of discussion that will convince our sales team that this idea deserves realization as a physical book.

I'd love to know your opinion on this issue.

• Are you in a critique group?
• Would you or your group consider buying a book about writing groups and critiquing?
• Do you think such a book is needed?
  

I know a lot of you out there have critiques groups or critique partners. Maybe some of you are interested in joining or forming a group. Please weigh in our our discussion--comment here or on Jane's blog.

Random House Says Authors Must Behave?...

Check out this post on BoingBoing that claims Random House contracts contain a morality clause saying it will take action (up to termination of contract) if authors behave in ways that can damage their reputations and thereby hurt the sales a their books.

I have never seen Random House's contract so I can neither confirm or deny that this is the case. Anyone?

Lots of interesting discussion going on in the comments section of this post (big red pens, badly behaving writers like Lewis Carroll and Shel Silverstein, republican fundraisers, economic considerations, some anti-antisemitism from Roald Dahl...)

The First Books Publishers Lowdown...

This week I've been happily perusing a formidable stack of emails from debut authors (still deciding on who to interview for First Books), and now it's time for my annual lowdown--my unscientific findings regarding which publishers are friendliest to new writers based on the 75-ish emails I received.

This year, the following publishers/imprints were sited by more than one debut author:

• Delacorte (consistently debut author friendly)
  
• Dial
• Feiwel & Friends
• Farrar, Straus & Giroux
• Greenwillow
• Henry Holt
• Houghton
  
• Hyperion
• Little Brown
• Putnam
• Razorbill
• Simon & Schuster
• Scholastic
• Viking
• Walker

And this year's Most-Friendly-to-New-Writers Crown goes to (for the second year in a row):

• HarperCollins (publishing five of the debut authors I heard from)

This year's batch of first-timers are overwhelmingly YA authors--just about half. The other half is rounded out by slightly more middle grade authors than picture book authors and illustrators.

And only a handful of the new writers who emailed me mentioned having agents. I did not ask, however--I am sure more than five of you have agents. Don't you like your agents, new writers? I kid--I know you do! If you didn't think to mention them to me, I'm sure you remembered them in your acknowledgments and you'll thank them when you win awards. (Please don't Chad Lowe your agent.)

Upcoming Market Books Bookstore Events...

To celebrate the recent release of the 2009 editions of our Market Books, I, along with editors Robert Brewer and Chuck Sambuchino, will be appearing at two local bookstores to discuss writing and publishing with aspiring authors. Here's the scoop:

• Wednesday August 20 (tomorrow) at 7 p.m. we'll be at Joseph-Beth Booksellers in Rookwood Pavilion.

• Wednesday Aug 27 at 7 p.m. we'll be at Books & Co. @ The Greene.

Robert, Chuck and I (with the help of our three assistants) produce 10 Market Books annually, including CWIM, Novel & Short Story Writer's Market, Poet's Market, Writer's Market, Guide to Literary Agents, and the upcoming brand new Screenwriter's & Playwrights Market. We can answer any writing- or publishing-related question you throw our way covering any genre, fiction or nonfiction, children's or adult, agent and queries, etc. (Don't we sound smart!)

If you live in the Cincinnati or Dayton area, we'd love to meet you. (We'll have free beer and free cupcakes. Just kidding. Come anyway.)

Enter Chuck's 'Worst Storyline Ever' Contest...

My editor pal Chuck Sambuchino just posted the first-ever contest on his Guide to Literary Agent's Blog.

If you think you've got what it takes to enter the "Worst Storyline Ever" contest, visit Chuck's blog for contest rules.

Here's the scoop on the prizes to get you interested:

First prize (the grand prize) consists of a query letter critique from Chuck, a follow-up phone call to discuss the query critique, and a plan of action for seeing your work published, along with copies of both the 2009 Guide to Literary Agents and the 2009 Writer's Market (and public praise from Chuck on his blog).

Two runners-up will win their choice of a free copy of either the 2009 Guide to Literary Agents or the 2009 Writer's Market.

First Books Update...

I'm still going through all my emails from debut authors. I'll be in touch with some of you soon, hopefully next week.

Thanks to everyone who gave me info on their first books--and thanks for being patient. There are a lot of you, which is awesome, but it makes my job harder. (And I'm busy busy busy.)

I Made The Lisa Yee Blog...

Click here to see Lisa Yee's continuing coverage of Peepy's conference adventures, including one involving me. (Peepy is fun at parties.)

Note: One scene depicts violence against an editor. Parental discretion is advised.

PW Fall Children's Announcements Issue Available...

For some odd reason I decided to go through my inbox this morning (it's tall, scary, and often avalanches onto my office floor), and lo and behold I found this:


It's the Publishers Weekly fall 2008 children's books issue, featuring listings of 2000+ new titles. Flipping through the ads is like viewing mini catalogs from pretty much every children's publisher that matters. The cover price is $12 so head to your newsstand, or check out the info on the PW website.

Check Out Stephanie Meyer on Good Morning America...

Toward the end, she talks about Writer's Market.

If only she would have said Children's Writer's & Illustrator's Market...but that's quite a mouthful to get out on live TV.

My Last SCBWI Conference Post...


Wrapping things up...


Speakers Who Made Me Cry:

• Bruce Coville on the first day in his opening speech
  
• Yuyi Morales during her Golden Kite acceptance speech and during the SCBWI Success Stories panel
• Sara Pennypacker during her Golden Kite acceptance speech (for the second year in a row)
• The tribute to Sue Alexander
• Susan Patron in her conference-closing address

(Note: No one has yet to beat readergirlz's Justina Chen Headley who made me tear up a dozen times during one breakout session in 2006.)


Hours of Sleep I Got During My Five Nights in LA:

• Twenty-eight
  

Things I Really Dug About My Conference Experience:

• The first person I ran into was my oldest conference pal, illustrator Kevan Atteberry
  
• Gretchen Hirsch introducing herself as Stephanie Meyer at the faculty dinner
  
• The steel cut oatmeal at the Breeze, and seeing Arturo the long-time host who always remembers my name
• The Literary Ladybugs
• “Reading Is Power” red rubber bracelets (with graphics that could possibly be interpreted as “Dreidel Equals Muscles”)
• Steve Malk’s party at Equator Books in Venice, even though I left before Nicholas Brendan got there
• Hundreds of people eating Dove ice cream bars outside the ballroom
• Being saved from technical difficulties by audience members
• Riding in Aaron Hartzler’s pickup truck
• Yoga class and dinner with Martha Brockenbrough from Washington (who has a daughter named Alice which I find brilliant)
  
• My one celebrity siting: Jami Gertz (best role: Muffy Tepperman in "Square Pegs")
• Having my photo taken by Sonya Sones
• Getting my photo taken with Lisa Yee’s Peepy
  
• Micheal Stearns' chart that explains the entire publishing industry using a few overlapping circles
• Autographing and cupcakes
• Scoring an SCBWI hoodie
• Chatting with everyone at the wrap party at Lin Oliver's house (even though the food wasn't super vegetarian-friendly)
  
• Discovering that Paula Yoo loves Skyline Chili, the official favorite food of the Nati
  
• Being on the faculty
• Lin Oliver ending the conference in a fit of giggles after announcing someone lost a shoe ornament
  

Things I Didn’t Dig About the Conference:

• The 2009 CWIM didn’t show up for the bookstore
• The gaping hole in the lobby bar that used to be filled by Darlene the (former) Century Plaza cocktail waitress
  
• The X Bar (especially because they stopped serving the awesome onion rings they used to have on the menu)
• The oddly bright red veggie burger I ate a few bites of at Houston's in the mall (my dinner companions, however, were stellar)
  
• Leaving--and the hell that is LAX. (I apologize to the woman at the Delta check-in counter with whom I had some angry words. Next time you wait on four people who came up after me because they can't figure out how to use the kiosk and you make me stand there for 10 minutes in that hot crowed space when I haven't gotten much sleep I'll try to be a little more patient.)

The End of the Conference: Autograph Party Photos...

After half a chocolate cupcake and half a yellow cupcake, I got some shots of the autograph party (which I didn't have to participate in because the 2009 CWIM didn't make it to the bookstore which in a way was OK because I feel a little silly signing books).


Susan Patron, Sara Pennypacker, and Ann Whitford Paul look happy about autographing.


Washingtonians Holly Cupala (who is holding one of the roses from the gorgeous bouquet her husband sent in celebration of her very recent two-book deal!) with RA Jolie Stekly and her stack of books.


The awesome Paula Yoo listens to a conference-goer as she prepares to sign her first novel, Good Enough.


Authors Katherine Applegate and Jay Asher--both of whom I interviewed for Insider Reports in the 2009 CWIM.


Rachel Cohn happily passes one of her novels off to a conference goer (note the red "Reading Is Power" bracelet) while Bruce Coville concentrates on signing.


Marla Frazee and her line of autograph seekers. (I wonder if her hand got tired.)


SCBWI RAs/authors Esther Hershenhorn (Illinois) and Ellen Hopkins (Nevada).


Down the row: Linda Zuckerman, Paula Yoo, Lisa Yee, Mark Teague, and Adam Rex (who you can sort of see).

Lisa Yee: On Revision...

It was standing room only for Lisa Yee's session on revision. Lisa started out by talking about her first version of her novel Millicent Min, Girl Genius which she said was "episodic and weird." In her next version, 11-year-old Millicent was in college, but editor Arhtur Levine suggested Lisa explore a version in which the main character interacts with kids her own age. She continued to revise--and what was constant through each revision was her character.

There was a show of hands to see who loved revision and who hated it. Those who love revision, Lisa said, often love is so much that they can't stop themselves. Those who hate it can't get started.

Lisa, who is currently revising a work-in-progress from first person point of view to third persion, said she she can fall so much in love with her writing that she doesn't want to cut any of it. But when you look at your work, she says, ask yourself, "If I had to cut my story by 20%, what would I cut? She said that generally her first three chapters can be thrown away.

One tip she gave was taking your document and making a copy of it, changing the font, adjusting the margins just slightly, and making it look like something someone else wrote--this can help you look at your story in a different way. She also suggested reading your manuscript out loud as you revise to hear words in a different manner than reading it silently. Also circle what you think is really great in your story and that becomes your standard to adhere to.

For revise-a-holics, she suggests setting deadlines for yourself, or have your writers group set them. This way you can force yourself to write to a deadline and write on a schedule.

Finally, she recommended everyone check out the radio program Bookworm on KCRW featuring an interview with Tobias Wolf (there are two--try the fiction one) in which he talks about his writing process--he just keeps cutting.