I mean, you can send them manuscripts, but you hunt for an agent at the same time. Don't give up on the agent hunt by a long shot.
And I must admit that I was kind of surprised by your comment about agents wanting a proven track record. I never once ran into that while hunting for an agent. The majority of the agents I've seen on panels at cons and talked to don't even know the short fiction market at all. They don't read it, don't look at it and couldn't tell you the name of the majority of the magazines.
It took me 60 queries on one book to land an agent. That isn't counting the 35 rejections on another novel. And it was mostly that I finally learned to write a decent query letter and that my writing reached a publishable level.
Don't give up on agents, Michael. They are the golden ticket in the Wonka bar. They open doors you can't even see.
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momijizukamori
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Date: 2008-12-11 08:55 pm (UTC)I mean, you can send them manuscripts, but you hunt for an agent at the same time. Don't give up on the agent hunt by a long shot.
And I must admit that I was kind of surprised by your comment about agents wanting a proven track record. I never once ran into that while hunting for an agent. The majority of the agents I've seen on panels at cons and talked to don't even know the short fiction market at all. They don't read it, don't look at it and couldn't tell you the name of the majority of the magazines.
It took me 60 queries on one book to land an agent. That isn't counting the 35 rejections on another novel. And it was mostly that I finally learned to write a decent query letter and that my writing reached a publishable level.
Don't give up on agents, Michael. They are the golden ticket in the Wonka bar. They open doors you can't even see.