Should I let my mom or dad be my literary agent or not?

[Brother Sum]

Finding a literary agent or publisher was harder than I expected, being turned down by all of them so far. I already have an editor and I am thinking about going into self-publishing. I suddenly got a thought about having one of my parents be my literary agent. Is that right or wrong? And would that be a good step? Christopher Paolini was young for his age to have written books. My editor is going to help me soon and then I would not know how to go further. Any suggestions, would love to know!

[Mauser Gew 98]

No that would not be a good idea I think you feel the same that's why you are asking this question

[cathrl69]

You don't need a literary agent to self-publish. There are no quality controls on it for them to help you with.

If you're being rejected, why don't you ask them to beta-read for you instead?

There's absolutely no point them setting up as a "literary agent" to help you with commercial publishers. Commercial publishers deal with literary agents because they know that work which has come through them has been quality controlled. They know this because they know them, they've worked with them, they've seen other books which they have offered...your parents have none of these things.

[Steven J Pemberton]

I think you're confused about what a literary agent does, and why most publishers (certainly all of the large ones) require an author to have one.

There are far more books being written than publishers are willing to publish, and most of them are... let me be generous and say, not as good as the authors think they are. The agent's job in the first instance is to filter out all the not-so-good books and forward the best ones on to whichever publisher he thinks would be most likely to accept them. If a publisher offers to publish your book, the agent acts as your representative in negotiations with the publisher, because he has much more experience of negotiation than you.

In theory, anybody can be your agent. In practice, there's an established community of them, and publishers are reluctant to deal with anyone from outside it. An established agent can phone an editor at Random House or Scholastic and say, "I've got this fantastic new manuscript by this writer called Brother Sum," tell him a bit about it, and the editor will say, "Sure, send it over," and reply with a decision that afternoon - or within a few days, anyway. He does that because he knows the agent and knows which bestselling books he's represented over the last few years, and how much those books earned for the publisher. If your mum or dad tries that, assuming they can get past the receptionist and the editor's secretary, the editor will say, "Who the frak are you?" and hang up.

You don't need an agent to self-publish, because the companies that offer self-publishing will print whatever the author pays them to print. Before you go down that route, ask yourself why all the agents and publishers rejected you. A lot of good books were rejected many times, but so were a much greater number of bad books. Statistically speaking, your book is more likely to fall into the latter category - especially if you're young enough that you still rely on your parents.

I'd wait and see what your editor says. If he recommends a lot of changes, the chances are your book wasn't good enough to get published. Write another one that's better to begin with. If he doesn't recommend a lot of changes, maybe the agents thought your book was good, but didn't think they could sell it (which happens more than you might think). In that case, maybe self-publishing is a viable option - but go for one of the companies that don't have any upfront costs. The ones that expect you to pay in advance are generally a scam.

[Mike P]

God bless you. If you got parents who want to help you then start with them. Why not???? A good family is worth its weight in gold so sure ask your parents to be literary agents!!!

[Joss]

There's a reason why this won't work. You see, there's more to being a literary agent then just calling yoruself one. Your parents have zero experience in publishing and being a literary agent. Those types of people are called Scammers (the ones who just want your money and don't make an effort to find you a publisher) or plain incompetent (because they don't know what they're donig). Writers are warned against going with those types of agents.

What kind of publishing experience or literary agent experience do your parents have? Literary agents have connections in publishing. This means they personally know the editors they're submitting work to and know exactly what type of manuscript the editor is looking for. A few times a year, agents will travel to NYC to meet with editors and talk about publishing and what type of book the editor is looking for. You're not going to get this close with an editor just by calling yourself a literary agent. What kind of publishing connections do your parents have? If your parents don't know any editors personally, then how will they send any manuscripts to them? Most legitimate agents know editors on a personal level and send these editors manuscripts to the editors personal or professional email and you're not going to get an editors personal email on some website.


You're getting the wrong message from all your rejections. All of the rejections are telling you that either your work is inappropriate for the person you're submitting to (make sure they rep what you write), they're telling you your book doesn't interest them, or they're telling you that your book isn't ready for publishing right now. It's easy to rule out the first one by reading submission guidelines before you submit. The second one is easy if you're getting requests for the full manuscript. The third one is what many amateur writers run into - their work isn't quite ready. They might need to continue honing their writing skill or rewrite and revise some more or start filling some plot holes. And sometimes you get rejected because what you wrote isn't original.

I'll try to help you out here. Are you being rejected based on your qeury letter? If so, then it's time to rewrite it beacuse it's not getting the job done. Make sure you write a proper, enticing query letter. It's a hard thing to do, so keep revising. Send it out to 5-7 agents. If all reject it, consider revising and sending out the new, better version. Keep doing that until you get bites. And, those bites might never come if your query shows that your work is unoriginal or shows possible flaws in your mansucript.

If you're being rejected on sample pages then there's a problem with your opening. If you're whole manuscript is being read and rejected then you'll need to take a full look at your manuscript.

And, remember that just because you've written a novel does not mean it's good enough to be published. Sometimes it's better to stash it away and write something much better. Or you can always self-publish it or make it free online.

And, regarding Paolini, his parents owned a publishing company so they edited and helped him market his book. He had a lot of help with his novel, and even now, as an adult, he admits that he was a naive, inexperienced writer back then and made mistakes that he wouldn't make today as a more knowledgeable and experienced writer. There's an article online that I read recently about Paolini's ride in publishing from the beginning to the end where he published the last book in his series. It might be worth seeking out and reading. You can probably find a link from Paolini's twitter

So, the solution to your problem isn't to get your mom and dad to be your literary agent, that's not going ot help you find an publisher. You have to realize that the same reason the agents are rejecting you will be the same reasons an editor rejects you. There are also publishers that take unagented manuscripts, so you don't need an agent to submit to them. THe reason why the large publishers (and many smaller ones) require a literary agent is becasue the literary agent culls through all the bad stuff and sends the publisher only the stuff worth considering. Most people writing novels aren't good enough to get published. Dem are the breaks.