See on Scoop.it – Writing and reading fiction
This morning I was alerted to a big mistake lit agent Scott Eagan made, and then his humorous attempt to cover it up by deleting it, all documented nicely here at Passive Guy’s blog. (See, Scott? It’s important on the Internet to LINK to posts you reference.)
I was going to spend the morning excoriating the moron, but the commentors at Passive Voice have done an admirable job already, meaning I didn’t need to draw extra attention to the stupid things he said.
So instead I’m going to draw attention to the stupid things agent Steve Laube says in his post Goodbye to Traditional Publishing?
(Between the comments on Mandy de Geit’s blog post on her bad experience with an editor who was a rewriter –see below– and Konrath’s and Passive Guy’s vivisection of this agent’s post, the Internet is showing the power of righteous wrath once again. It makes me wonder about our capacity to change as individuals. If everyone is telling you you’re wrong, do you at least consider their point of view or do you double down? Can the offenders change, or is a persecution complex forever warm and cozy? Just wondering about our nature as a species this morning. Check out the links and make up your own mind. It’s all laid out very neatly. Also, RE: Agent Fail, please be sure to read Konrath’s original guest post that Eagan appears to comment upon (and then says he didn’t mean that one!) as I feel the ex-Harlequin author’s points are diluted and/or mischaracterized. ~ Chazz)
See on jakonrath.blogspot.fr
Filed under: publishing, agent fail, harlequin fail, Konrath, passive guy, publishing, Writers Resources
C h a z z W r i t e s . c o m 
Both were excellent responses to the agent posts. One thing I like about what Konrath said was “Something is always more than nothing.”
When I was querying for an agent a year or two ago, I was making nothing. When I stopped querying and published my own book, I started making something… not a lot, but something. 🙂
A while back I was thinking about my legacy. Call me morbid, but I talk quite a bit about death. If I continued to query (which takes away from writing time, not to mention how depressing it can be, which can sap motivation), there’s a good chance I would never have been published. I certainly would have written less, providing even few opportunities for publication.
There are A LOT of authors out there and even more books the authors write. However, very few authors find agents and even fewer are published by established publishing houses.
But as I was saying, I was thinking about my legacy. I didn’t acquire an agent, but I did learn about self-publishing and took that route. And because I went the route of self-publishing and own the rights to my books, if anything happens to me, I have something to leave to my husband (my children)… something which will pay out indefinitely. As long as I continue to publish, the amount will grow.
I have to say, it’s a wonderful feeling to know even after I’m gone, folks will have a month reminder that I did something… something which might not have happened if I’d stuck to the query game.
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