It’s not them. It’s you.

Friday email – Friday 13 December 

Subject: It’s not them. It’s you. 

  

Hmm. We’re getting close to Christmas and this email has a bit of a bah, humbug tone – but I’m also writing on Friday the 13^th, so I think I can get away with a little cheer-spoiling, so long as I don’t err again soon. 

And –  

I saw a blog post recently, from a guy in the fitness niche. He’d been asked about why someone wasn’t losing weight, even though they were controlling their diet and exercising properly and doing everything right. 

And he just said, BS. It’s not possible that you’re doing everything right – over a period of weeks and months – and not achieving the desired outcome. Like: you’d actually have to break laws of physics if you eat (say) 1800 calories a day and spend (say) 2200 calories a day, and then not (over time) notice weight loss. 

That’s not the way our blogosphere normally goes. On the whole, telling customers or readers or users that they’re completely wrong isn’t a brilliant way to attract customers / readers / users. 

But, OK, sometimes people are wrong and it helps to say so. 

In our niche, the myth I most often hear is some variant of: 

“I know my book is fine [because of Made-up Reason X], but agents don’t want it because they only give book deals to friends / they can’t handle conservative viewpoints / they only want books by pretty blonde thirty-somethings / they only want books with violence / or whatever else.” 

All assertions of that kind are basically false. 

Agents want books they can sell. They want books that they can plausibly sell to Big 5 publishers, or to the kind of independents that can compete financially with those guys. 

It IS true that agents will be dubious about taking on niche literary fiction. There are excellent, tiny imprints that do a great job with more demanding, niche, or experimental novels. But “great job” in this context does not mean “generating huge amounts of moolah”, and agents working with this kind of fiction are essentially doing it pro bono. 

It’s also true that agents may well be dubious about working with digital-first publishers. Those guys can create huge sales, but they don’t always, and advances are small. If an agent thinks that a digital-first imprint is your most likely destination, they may say yes anyway, but they will be thoughtful. 

And there are niches – certain sorts of fantasy or science fiction, for example – where self-pub is so dominant that Big 5 publishers don’t really compete. 

So yes, there are examples of good, saleable books being rejected by agents. But that doesn’t mean there’s a conspiracy. It just means you’re knocking on the wrong door: you’re a fisherman trying to sell your catch to a cheesemonger. If you want an agent, you have to make sure that agents basically want your type of thing in the first place. 

But that’s not mostly what I hear. Mostly, I hear authors who have written, let’s say, a standard issue crime novel complaining about being rejected by agents. 

And if you’ve written a crime novel, and you can’t place it with agents, then EITHER: 

You haven’t yet tried enough literary agents (10-15, let’s say) 

OR 

Your book isn’t good enough. 

Assuming an even basic level of professionalism in your approach to agents, then one of those two answers WILL apply to you. 

And the commonest, commonest, commonest reason for being rejected by agents? 

Your book isn’t good enough. 

It’s not them, it’s you. 

We’re not really supposed to say that in the blogosphere. It’s not the most supportive, friendly thing to say. But it’s true. And, actually, it IS the most supportive thing – because it’s the only message that will really alleviate your issue. 

At Jericho Writers, we do of course have a ton of services aimed at helping you make your book better. (The gold-standard service? It’s manuscript assessment, of course – or the Ultimate Novel Writing Course if your book is still a work-in-progress. Call or email us if you want honest advice, tailored to you and your exact needs.) 

However, the paid-for service part of things comes second. 

The first part lies with you. You need to recognise that your book may not yet be strong enough to sell, and that fixing this issue lies in your hands. 

Honestly? If I could choose between working with a gifted but feedback-resistant writer and a less gifted, but feedback-responsive one, I’d choose the latter every time. 

Write a book. Write it better. Edit it harder. Market it professionally. And don’t complain about agents! 

Good luck, and I promise I’ll be less mood-spoily next week. 

***  

FEEDBACK FRIDAY:   

Let’s use FF this week to just consider all any questions you have about literary agents. If you have experience of submitting, then share it, even if you don’t especially have questions arising from that. Let’s just share experience, unearth your questions, and see if we can help each other. Log in to Townhouse, then post your thoughts here whenever you’re ready. 

*** 

The missus is reading the kids a (somewhat edited) version of The Sons of Adam, my third novel from way back. It’s a historical romp, set mostly in the oil industry of the 1920s and 30s, but flanked by world wars at either end of the book. The kids are loving it, especially the war stuff. Tucking the kids in one night, I literally couldn’t find two of them, and was blundering around in the dark trying to find them. 

Then two blond heads poked up from a little crawl space in between the end of one bed and the wall. ‘We’ve built a dug-out, and we’re going to sleep here.’ Honestly, the kids are small but the space they’d made for themselves was tiny. 

They spent the whole night there and refortified their den in the morning. But – the power of fiction, eh? The loveliness of imaginative play. 

I was thrilled. 

Til soon 

Harry 

PS: If you’d like 1-2-1 feedback from a literary agent on your submission package, we can help with that, too! We’ve just released a batch of sessions spanning January to April 2025. Find out more about what’s on offer and how to book here. 

PPS: On a similar note – if the word of traditional publishing bewitches but also baffles you, why not consider our Path To Publication course? In eight weeks, our expert tutor Kate Harrison will teach you everything you need to know about the inner workings of the publishing industry