How To Get A Literary Agent

Magic. That is the key. Also, fairy circles.

I joke.

But, reading actual books on how to get an actual literary agent for your BOOK is key. I spent a lot of time and energy reading articles online on how to write the best query to an agent and synopsis and seeing how much blood from my first born is needed. What I found was none of that worked.

I decided I would buy a book. The one that changed me was Get A Literary Agent by Chuck Sambuchino.

It was written in 2015, but the information is still valid. However, I did not stop there. Chuck's book was just the gateway book to more. I read other books and compared all the information. I did more research online and compared that. But all the information I looked up after reading his book just confirmed what I read in his book.

What happened was, I went from rejections and ghosting, to "send me your pages", "that sounds like a great story". Now, I haven't been represented YET, but I am closer to it than I was before and it's thanks to reading actual books that tell you more about how to query agents than a random blog with the same information. The information on the sites was good, but it wasn't enough to understand the why and they usually didn't give examples. Chuck's book gave examples for fiction and non-fiction.

And as many people like to believe, they are the 'exception to the rule'. We are not. Not until we have proven that we can make these people money by working with us, we are not the exception to any of the rules. We have to know how to follow the rules before we can break them or bend them.

Read Chuck's book. I promise you will learn something. If you can't afford it, check out the local library. They can order them from other library's and there are even apps that you can get ebooks rented and read those and you don't have to leave the house. Usually, you do need a local library card to access those books on the apps, but it is all still free. (Libby and Hoopla, just to name two off the top of my head.) Web search for other free library apps. Resources are there for you for free. Use them.

Few things:

• Yes, you need to follow the query guidelines

• Yes, you need a synopsis

• Yes, synopsis and blurbs are different

• No, you don't give away the ending in a query

• Yes, you give away the plot/ending in a synopsis

• Again, No you are not the exception to the rule (yet)

• Yes, you NEED a logline

• Yes, have LOGLINE, SYNOPSIS, QUERY ready

I want to lay it all out for you, but I would probably just end up writing a book about it and there are already plenty of great ones out there. You can start with Chuck. Or not.

Good luck.