Wednesday, September 22, 2010

Don't Try To Be Tricky With Agents

We have all heard the phrase, honesty is the best policy. This idea is universal and works in the publishing industry. Don't trying to sneak something past the agents and the editors. You will get caught.

There are a lot of agents out there that are shocked that I keep a database of all submissions. I have been doing this from the beginning and frankly, I am thankful for it. I know who submits, what they submit, the genre, date it comes in and the date I answer. I also include my response. Now why would I do this? It assists me in knowing when someone is sending me the same project over and over again.

Yes, it happens. Now sometimes I know it is a matter of simply making an easy mistake. A writer forgets to write down who they send the project to and in the flurry of just sending it out to everyone (which they should never do anyway) they send it to the same person again. That is not so much of a problem. What I am dealing with here are the authors that change the name and the characters, maybe even change the genre an attempt to resubmit.

Look people, we might get a lot of submissions but we do remember. If you are someone trying so hard to get published that you simply make revisions, change the title and send it out again, the odds are you will be caught.

Now, if you do make huge revisions and it is a different story, tell us. Be up-front and honest and tell us this is a revision of an older submission. Maybe we look. Maybe we don't. The end though is that you are better off for it. Maybe we pass on the resubmission, but a later submission of a different project sounds good and we bite. We won't if you have been trying to slip one past us. If you have been honest, we might look.

Just remember, keep it all honest and on the table for everyone to see.

Scott

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