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WRITER BEWARE'S
THUMBS DOWN AGENCY LIST
Page
updated: 6/17/08
Except for
graphic, copyright
© 2006-2009 Victoria Strauss and A.C. Crispin. May not be
reproduced without permission.
Below, in alphabetical order,
is a list of the
currently active
literary agencies about which Writer Beware has received the largest
number of complaints over the years, or which, based on documentation
we've collected, we consider to pose the most significant hazard for
writers. All have two or more of the following abusive practices:
1. Fee-charging--including
reading fees, marketing or administrative
fees, retainers, processing fees, and other forms of upfront or
flat-rate charges that are made as a condition of representation.
2. Paid editing or publishing
referrals--including placing clients with vanity publishers,
promoting their own
paid editing services to clients (a conflict of interest), sending
clients/potential clients to
an outside editing service that pays kickbacks for referrals. Several
of these agencies are no more than fronts for editing services.
3. Conflicts of interest--several
agencies are under common ownership with editing services or
vanity publishers, which are recommended to clients without disclosing
the connection.
4. No or minimal track records--many
of these agencies have never made
a single sale to a commercial publisher. In Writer Beware's opinion,
none has a significant recent
track record.
5. Nonstandard author-agent
contract terms--including perpetual agency
clauses, claiming commissions on clients’ future works even if the
agency had no hand in selling them, billing clients for normal business
overhead such as travel and entertainment.
6. Unprofessional practices--such
as sending form letters or postcards with
boxes for editors to check off and return to indicate interest,
"bundled" queries (several queries in the same envelope), "blitz" or
shotgun submissions (submissions to a dozen or more publishers
simultaneously, often without careful targeting), “packaging” a
submission with
unnecessary extras such as author photos, cover mockups, or sample
illustrations.
7. Misrepresentation of skill or
experience--including representing themselves as competent to
sell manuscripts despite poor or nonexistent track records, lying about
sales, and claming placements with vanity publishers as
legitimate commercial sales.
While the 20 agencies listed
here account for the bulk of the
complaints we receive, they're just the tip of the iceberg.
Writer
Beware has files on nearly 400
questionable agencies, and we learn
about a new one every few weeks.
We do update the list from time to time, as questionable agencies
sometimes change their names or clone themselves Be sure to check back
regularly.
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