Good afternoon everyone,
Could I submit partially finished work to a literary agent?
My second book is merely halfway completed but I have enough to give an agent a general idea of whats going on and where I'm intending on taking the story.
Thanks
Good afternoon everyone,
Could I submit partially finished work to a literary agent?
My second book is merely halfway completed but I have enough to give an agent a general idea of whats going on and where I'm intending on taking the story.
Thanks
BTW, Lorraine: How did your mutually-imposed deadlne with your friend work out?
Can we hope to benefit from more of your time and talent now?
@ David: How well do you work (read: write) under pressure (read: deadline panic)?
I ask because, back in secondary school, I would start my summer-holday homework after my family had gone to bed AND the 2 television stations had shut down for the night (THOSE were the days!), the night before autumn term began. I was always among the top 4 or 5 in my year, undisputed #1 in Maths. (But that's just because I'm a bleedin' genius...)
Lorraine is right: Agents might take months to even drag your 3-chapter+synopsis out of the slush pile... but you MIGHT get a request for the whole ms in 2 weeks. And the agent isn't going to want to wait another month for it. You MIGHT get away with "I read your kind request for my full ms on a sherpa's laptop in a tiny Himalayan village. I will be back at my desk - and my own computer - in 2 weeks, and the first thing I do will be to send you the ms."
Then hit the amphetamines.
(Any law officer reading this should be assured that this last sentence was written very much tongue-in-cheek.)
Hi, David,
No, not unless an agent specifically says they will accept such a thing. Check all websites for their rules and stick to them.
An agent who is interested wants the full mss immediately - not in 6 months. You cannot guarantee an end date - or even that you will finish the book.
Every agent has piles of would-be novels on his desk. Time really is money to him, and if he likes your work, and knows just the publisher who would take it on, he wants to be in a position to send it now. Next week that publisher may have signed up someone else, and have no interest in what you've finally submitted. Further, why would he look at your partial when he has ten full novels ready to go?
Another poster on this site sent off her mss, and it was months before the full thing was requested; but you can't work on that premise. In this matter, the agent makes the rules.
You could submit a partial work to a manuscript assessor, to see whether they thought it had any future, but I'd recommend you wait until you have typed The End before approaching an agent.
Um - write faster!
Lorraine