So this is my agent story

And so I have a literary agent. Being able to write that sentence is phenomenal. It’s taken me thirteen years to do it – although I admit I started quite young, and gave myself a head start. But still, thirteen years from that first letter I sent to an agent, to now, contract signed, done and dusted. I’m an author.

It’s taken me thousands of other sentences written over weeks and months and years to come to that; I’m an author. It’s almost surreal.

So this is my agent story – not covering thirteen years, but instead just the last two.

Lots of work and lots of words

The original idea for EREN came years ago, scribbled down in a notebook I still have somewhere in England. A few scenes, a rough idea of a creature in an attic, and nothing more than that. The story fizzled and died, but there was something there, some part of the story that stayed with me. In the meantime I wrote a couple of novels, got a degree, moved to Japan, and met a girl.

Life happened. The girl (my fianceé, then wife, as it happens) told me about NaNoWriMo – National Novel Writing Month. Every November you get together with other writers and try to bang out 50,000 words. In 2009 I wrote a novel called The Gentlemen Travellers. In 2010, I decided to revisit EREN.

Everything had to change, it turns out, for the story to work. Setting, voice, gender – the lot. But once I’d worked that out, I started writing. A year later (so, not a NaNoWriMo winner, then) I had a book, and sent it out to an agent. Surprisingly, she asked for the full. I was still in Japan then, and planning a wedding and move to the States, so times were busy – especially after the March 11 earthquake changed so many things  - but I sent it off and waited.

Waiting takes time. It was August when I heard back. Eight months. It was a no, but with some great insights and tips, which I was happy enough to get. I sent off the revised book to an agent in the UK. Waiting happened. Life happened. I heard back – another no, but with more suggestions. I knew it was good that agents were remembering the book, and offering editorial input, but clearly there was work to do still.

I rewrote and revised more, and selected another ten or so agents, some British, some American, and sent off the queries. I heard back from one British agent almost straight away – a full request. Clearly my query was working now. I heard back from another agent – a full request. Exciting times.

13^th March, 2012. While helping to run a panel discussion in NYC for work, I got two e-mails to my phone. The first agent was passing – again, more suggestions, more thoughts on the weak points, and an invitation to submit it in the future if I gave it an ‘overhaul.’ The second e-mail was shorter. Could she phone me to discuss the book?

You’ll find a lot of talk of writers boards about The Call (yes, with that capitalisation), when an agent offers you representation and your true career begins. But this didn’t feel like it to me. I was sensing that the book was decent, but flawed. But I was excited. Agents don’t call you up for nothing – she was already investing at least something in me. We agreed a time.

It’s a strange experience having someone praise your work whose opinion you really trust. She was a professional agent, and she had great things to say. And yes, she had some serious reservations. We spoke for maybe twenty minutes, half an hour, and she asked me if I’d be willing to work on a redraft if she sent me notes. I was over the moon. We hung up, and I sat down to appreciate what an opportunity this could be.

That evening the notes came through – some astute observations on specific points, some structural problems, some questions about red herrings and inconsistencies I hadn’t intended. I agreed to the rewrite, and away we went.

With an agent’s kind words to spur me on, I finally showed the book to my wife and in-laws. I needed objective criticism from someone who’d never read it before. My wife and sisters especially were amazing – they agreed with the agent, for one thing, but they pushed me on every little point that confused them. Why this word? This phrasing was awful. Why was she wearing ear muffs in summer? I’d got this story wrong. I’d misspelled this word. There was a typo on page 102…

I rewrote and added scenes and clarified points and changed the structure. Their corrections and questions never annoyed me. With so much at stake my pride could take the odd hit.

I spent a month on revisions – which is a short time. R&R requests often leave you with an open ended invitation. But with a trip to England coming up I felt the timing worked out, and I was happy with the new book. It felt solid and improved. I felt there was a chance – still small, far off, just a dot on the horizon – that I could land an agent. You have to remember the thirteen years bit to get my state of mind.

I sent it back again, on April 15^th – which is the start of the London Book Fair (the busiest time for agents in Britain) – a week after the agent moved house (gaining a backlog of queries)  - just as she’d got not one, but two manuscripts from her clients to review (time consuming work). She e-mailed me back, letting me know I would hear in a couple of weeks, and so the final wait began.

You can probably imagine how I spent the two weeks. I was clear from the start not to let my imagination run wild. I would not contact the agent before she contacted me and I would not get my hopes up. On that point I had to be firm. There was no commitment here on either side, and agents take on startlingly few clients a year, from thousands of submissions. The odds are bad even if your writing is good.

Instead I focussed on social media, and building my life as a writer, and my next book. When the first interest had come I’d started this blog and my Twitter account, to show any potential investors that I was serious and committed – that I considered writing my job just as much as anything else.

I kept an eye on the agent’s Twitter feed, of course. We tweeted a couple of times, just jokes and comments. She was busy. I was getting ready for a flight to London and forcing myself not to think about it.

I travelled to England with family, and then back to the US. Jetlag hit, and a sluggish return to work.

Then the reply came, the day after we got back. Could we talk on the phone? 4 o’clock was agreed. I spent the day feverishly ignoring the passing of time and Being Busy. We took the dog to the vet and I played honkytonk Phantom of the Opera on an old piano.

The agent phoned - Molly Ker Hawn, of The Bent Agency – and, well, offered representation. She was fantastic. She said nice things about the book and gave me room to think and wait. She mentioned a few publishers she was thinking of, and a few small edits to make. It was surreal suddenly having an agent. My agent. All I can say is – it was worth the wait.

A happy Simon signing the contract, being told to stop laughing so much by Patient Wife

I have an agent!

A quick, ecstatic post today. I am thrilled to announce officially that I have accepted representation from Molly Ker Hawn of The Bent Agency. Molly has already proved herself to be an insightful and hard working agent, and The Bent Agency itself has a sterling reputation. All I can say is, I feel like this major step brings me so much closer to being… y’know… an author.

I will post my ‘agent story’ in a couple of days – I know I always loved reading those when I was querying.

Ha, see that? ‘Was’. Can’t believe I have an agent…

But I do.

Kreativ Blogger Award / Super Race of Penguin Ducks

Chuffed to say that PLOTTYPUS has got its second blog award, via the wonderful route of blogger-pal Kelsey (who seems to be doing very well at this blogging / writing / being successful malarky!). Seems that to wear this badge with pride, I have to share ten interesting tidbits about me. Pretty sure I can do that! And so, on an unusual Thursday post, I present ...

Ten Very Interesting Factoids and Fantasies about Mr S. P. Clark

1. Last year I lived on three continents. Not at the same time, of course, but for various parts of the year. Japan / UK / USA, if you're interested. 
2. Following on from above - I speak Japanese. Does that count as interesting? Probably. It's a fun language. I'm especially good at Kindergarten level toilet humour. Seriously.
3. I do not like emery boards. I HATE them. I hate touching 'em, and being near m'wife when she's using one. Bleh. It's like a very, very lame version of kryptonite. 
4. I'm supposed to be allergic to milk. Not lactose, but the protein in cow milk. I mostly ignore this because I love pizza, though.
5. I'm pretty snazzy on a Diabolo. I learned one summer in France. I can make it go really high.
6. My favourite book is hard to say, but my favourite author is probably David Almond. Read him!
7. I play piano and drums and vio-. That's like a violin, but only half, 'cause I'm pretty bad. The piano is good though - I never learned to read music and just play by ear. One or two times hearing a tune is normally enough for me to copy it. I'm like a parrot! A piano parrot! A... piarot?
8. I used to be a member of the Labour Party. Then I realised I hated politicians and stopped. Sometimes they still call me, but I hide behind the sofa until they go away.
9. I have seen pretty much no movies. All the classics that people love = nope. My wife despairs, I'm pretty sure. I still hold that before the invention of colour, movies were only good for keeping away the plague or the Visigoths or whatever else existed back then. Colour movies, I'm willing to watch, even if they're still old. 
10. Lastly ... I think penguins and ducks are cool. My dream is that one day penguins and ducks will cross to create a super race of very waterproof, flying beauties who will taste delicious and look funny when they fall over. 

Hope this has been educational!

Wednesday's Inspiring Books

Some books you read as a child and they stay with you. Some books you see as a child but you don't pick them up. They're around, but always, somehow, not for you. You know the cover but you couldn't give the title. The colours and the size are familiar from all the times you've seen them around the house, but what are they actually about? Who knows. It's an adult book.

Strangely, the above applies, for me, to Terry Pratchett. My mother and sister were avid readers of his Discworld books for years before I was, and perhaps this is why I didn't pick them up. They were for older, better readers than me. The British covers especially are loud, eye catching and busy - and still somehow adult. Or at least daunting to Young Simon.

But one day, in France on holiday, I did pick one up. Maybe it was because it was out of place in a French campsite, and not around our house in England, and that made it suddenly approachable. The book was Guards! Guards! and it was the first of many I would read.

I'm sure a lot of the jokes went over my head. All the Latin puns, certainly, and even now if I re-read Pratchett books I find new in jokes and references. He's a master at that - at making one book seem like many, seem like something new every time you read it, 

It did influence me, I think, although it's not in the same, direct way as some of these other books. I'm not a funny writer. I like to think I'm a funny person, but my writing is more ... literary? I mean that only to distinguish it from Pratchett's genius, everyman books. I'm just not good enough to write like he does. What I have done, is read so many of his books that there has to be some small part of me he's got to. His writing is complicated and his plots are brilliant, ludicrous and satisfying, and his observations on justice, people, Right and Wrong, and everything else, are piercing in a way only a comedian can be. 

And when I first met the gal who's now my wife, I made a Terry Pratchett joke, and her heart was mine for ever. 'Nuff said!

Literary Journeys

A week without posts - woops. I've been away visiting family in England, and visiting England with family-in-law. It's always fun being a tourist in your own country and this trip seems to have been particularly good fodder for this blog. For why? For because of all the places I've been with literary links! 221b Baker Street, for example, or Dr Johnson's house, or The Eagle and Child pub, Oxford (of Inklings fame), or Christ Church College, also Oxford, with Alice in Wonderland characters in the stained glass (and also where various Harry Potter scenes were filmed. That's literary too, I guess...) Quite a lot, actually. Bath, where Jane Austen spent a lot of her time, was stunning.

It's all got me thinking (and do forgive this rambling post. I woke up in London this morning and I'm in New Jersey now. Jet lag may apply...) about what might be deemed literary tourism. That is, the trade that springs up around the physical world of a writer. Not just the house they lived in in the real world (think Beatrix Potter Museum or the Bronte Parsonage) - and not even the culture that can come from visiting places they made their own (here would be the Tolkien / Lewis pub et al) - but the fact that, as with Baker Street, and a host of other locations, they're famous for things that didn't really happen. In fact 221b wasn't even built yet when Sherlock Holmes was written. It's there now though. and has become a real tourist hot spot. It's fantastic, by the way, and I recommend a visit.

This is writing at its best. Making worlds that are so real they become real. Too much for the page but not enough for the imagination, people make them happen out here in the real hustle and bustle of life. There's a Harry Potter world theme park now, isn't there, in America? But you can bet if Rowling had been more specific on Hogwarts' location - or given the Durselys a real address - then that's where people would go. And that's brilliant. Stories should be enough to make us want to reach out and really be there - to see the view with our own eyes, to know what it smells like, so we can imagine a certain scene, visualise a certain character reacting...

It's a good aim, isn't it? I don't write about places so much, but if I ever do, and someone takes the time and effort to actually go there because of words I wrote, I can't imagine a bigger compliment.

And now I'm tired. Goodbye!