62 Comments

These are especially helpful points since I am attending a conference this coming Saturday and already booked an appointment with an agent. haha Timely, eh? Working on my proposal & pitch and striving to keep my answers about the reader more than about me. Thank you for posting this article.

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Hope your agent meeting goes really well! I'm debating on booking one myself for a conference in February and while I know I won't have a full manuscript ready, my hope is to have my proposal in good shape (for a memoir). I think it will be valuable to meet with an agent and expose myself to that kind of pitching for the first time, no matter the outcome. Good luck!!

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You are exactly right—it’s good practice no matter the outcome. The meeting was very nice.

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Very, very helpful for new writers! I will say that I met both of my agents (I'm still with #2) at conference pitches, and my first agent "almost" signed me when we met at the pitch. But that latter experience is likely unique. The benefits of meeting both were gauging our chemistry and having a great conversation.

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Straightforward and honest advice - the best kind. I heard another agent remind writers that they need us as much as we need them, so we shouldn't be fawning over agents but approaching them as a potential mutually beneficial business partner.

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It’s really such a two way street. It needs to be the right fit for both parties.

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Oct 17·edited Oct 17

Ah, Kate, you always brighten my day. I love your list of what you DON'T say: it gave me a good chuckle!

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Could you explain more why pitching at a conference isn't a good way to get through the slush pile to have your manuscript read? Wouldn't an agent be more likely to take a look at the first ten pages of a manuscript that were pitched professionally and persuasively at a conference rather than just via a query letter?

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author

Maybe! An agent might be more likely to quickly read sample pages after a successful pitch. But it just depends on the agent’s workflow. Do they have time to read that one query ahead of all the others or current client work? Are they rush-reading something else that week? This could happen as a result of an in-person pitch but I think it would vary widely agent to agent.

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Thanks so much for sharing this. It makes me feel a teensy bit better about the fact that I’m too introverted to even contemplate “pitching” an agent at a writers conference, which I’m too introverted to attend anyway.

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This was incredibly helpful! When I first heard about these 10 minute "speed dating" pitches, I was incredibly skeptical but I appreciate the advice on using it as an opportunity to ask an agent direct questions about the publishing industry.

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I appreciate your honesty insights and straightforward takeaways.

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I appreciate your non-nonsense advice and observations. I especially like your revelation that you’re not put off by a typo in a query letter. I’ve worked as a copy editor for several decades, and some of the best writers I know make occasional typos. In fact, some of those typos make it into traditionally published books that have presumably been edited and proofed multiple times.

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I always say that if the author and idea is really good I’d never pass just because of some grammatical error. Everyone makes mistakes!

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Thanks for sharing. I've forwarded to a friend who's getting ready to start that leg of her journey.

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Definitely resonates with my experience from the other side of the table.

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I appreciate when an agent isn’t hungover (or still inebriated) during a conference, when they don’t use the time I paid for to tell me about their difficult relationship with their mother, and when they actually get back to you after promising they would.

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author

YIKES! Sounds like you've had some adventures at conferences!

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Whoa. Did an agent really tell you about their difficult relationship with their mother?! That's wild.

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Really great post, thank you.

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As a writer, it was implied that those pitches that are accepted at a live pitch event were put at the top of the slush pile, which is why we pay to pitch. Is there any merit to that?

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