Would writing a stand alone novel be good before writing a series?

[Steve Harrison]

My agent (trying to sell the first book of a YA SF series) tells me a series has far greater appeal to publishers than a stand alone novel. After several months of no bites, I'm beginning to wonder...

 

[Bagpuss]

My agent (trying to sell the first book of a YA SF series) tells me a series has far greater appeal to publishers than a stand alone novel. After several months of no bites, I'm beginning to wonder...

How does your contract with your agent stand?

By this I mean that do you pay your agent a fixed fee for selling your book or do you pay your agent a percentage for the lifetime of your book series?

 

[Jo Zebedee]

My agent (trying to sell the first book of a YA SF series) tells me a series has far greater appeal to publishers than a stand alone novel. After several months of no bites, I'm beginning to wonder...

I would be too. But it depends how they have couched it: with series potential is fine. On the other note, a surprising amount of agented novels don't sell - have a plan b in mind and bring a towel

How does your contract with your agent stand?

By this I mean that do you pay your agent a fixed fee for selling your book or do you pay your agent a percentage for the lifetime of your book series?

Most agents - for anyone reading this thread - take a standard 15%, 20% foreign rights. Anything else and be very wary of signing up....

 

[Steve Harrison]

How does your contract with your agent stand?

By this I mean that do you pay your agent a fixed fee for selling your book or do you pay your agent a percentage for the lifetime of your book series?

As Jo Zebedee says, if he sells the book to a publisher he will get a percentage of the royalties. Not sure how all that works, but hope to find out. I sold my only other published novel direct to a publisher.

 

[Bagpuss]

Most agents - for anyone reading this thread - take a standard 15%, 20% foreign rights. Anything else and be very wary of signing up....

Yes, but you miss my point.

My point is not the percentage of your earnings that you are paying to your agent (and I would ask the question - you are paying your agent 15% of your earnings for doing what, exactly?) but the term you are signing to your agent for.

Agency contracts (certainly the ones I've seen) state that the agent will take 15% of your earnings on a book until the copyright on that book expires. The copyright on a book expires somewhere in the region of 70 years after you die. So, you are planning on doing what?? Paying 15% of your earnings on the book to your agent for the rest of your life! Really, you want to do that? Or have you negotiated a fixed fee for your agent on the sale of your book. Normally - not.

@Steve Harrison the royalties from the book are your income as a writer - so, by taking a percentage of the royalties, then your agent is taking a percentage of your income rather than a percentage of the book sales. You're not sure how it all works out? It is in your best interest to know. It is also in your best interests to audit the royalty statements your agent sends you, although a right to audit your agent and/or publisher is probably not written into your contract.

 

[Steve Harrison]

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Yes, but you miss my point.

My point is not the percentage of your earnings that you are paying to your agent (and I would ask the question - you are paying your agent 15% of your earnings for doing what, exactly?) but the term you are signing to your agent for.

Agency contracts (certainly the ones I've seen) state that the agent will take 15% of your earnings on a book until the copyright on that book expires. The copyright on a book expires somewhere in the region of 70 years after you die. So, you are planning on doing what?? Paying 15% of your earnings on the book to your agent for the rest of your life! Really, you want to do that? Or have you negotiated a fixed fee for your agent on the sale of your book. Normally - not.

@Steve Harrison the royalties from the book are your income as a writer - so, by taking a percentage of the royalties, then your agent is taking a percentage of your income rather than a percentage of the book sales. You're not sure how it all works out? It is in your best interest to know. It is also in your best interests to audit the royalty statements your agent sends you, although a right to audit your agent and/or publisher is probably not written into your contract.

I expect my agent - if he is successful - to negotiate a lucrative contract with a major publisher that makes both me and him happy. I have an entertainment lawyer ready in the wings for when and if a contract comes my way, so while it will be a new experience I am not particularly worried about it. I was paranoid when I got my first publishing contract, but after that very positive experience I know that if you perform your due diligence, it all works out.

I don't see an agent has someone who is taking some of my income, I see him as someone who will negotiate a deal in which my income - after his cut - is much higher than it would have been without his assistance.

This is all moot at the moment, as he has not been able to place the book and has almost run out of major publishers to contact here in Australia. But I'm pretty relaxed about the whole thing these days, so it's all good.

 

[Jo Zebedee]

Yes, but you miss my point.

My point is not the percentage of your earnings that you are paying to your agent (and I would ask the question - you are paying your agent 15% of your earnings for doing what, exactly?) but the term you are signing to your agent for.

Agency contracts (certainly the ones I've seen) state that the agent will take 15% of your earnings on a book until the copyright on that book expires. The copyright on a book expires somewhere in the region of 70 years after you die. So, you are planning on doing what?? Paying 15% of your earnings on the book to your agent for the rest of your life! Really, you want to do that? Or have you negotiated a fixed fee for your agent on the sale of your book. Normally - not.

@Steve Harrison the royalties from the book are your income as a writer - so, by taking a percentage of the royalties, then your agent is taking a percentage of your income rather than a percentage of the book sales. You're not sure how it all works out? It is in your best interest to know. It is also in your best interests to audit the royalty statements your agent sends you, although a right to audit your agent and/or publisher is probably not written into your contract.

Most agents will get you a better deal than you would alone - and then take 15% of it. Of course, if you don't want to lose 15% of your earnings, you don't have to use an agent.

An agent represents you for a book (and may choose to represent future books) and, yes, they will continue to take that 15%* (although since few debut books earn out their advance it might be a moot point). And they will take it on anything you have contracted with them for.

As to the right to audit accounts - this is in every publishing contract I have signed so I assume is standard. It's certainly a clause I check for before signing. The cost of the audit will fall on me, however, should there be no wrongdoing.

As you say, it is important to know what you are getting into. And whether or not an author chooses to lose that 15% is entirely up to them - but it is unlikely an unagented author will get the same level on a book than an agent will**

*although, as with anything, there are exceptions. When I parted company with my agent they agreed to revert the contract and return the 15% to me.

** assuming they sell it in the first place, of course. But that's a whole other thread.

 

[Serendipity]

Most agents will get you a better deal than you would alone - and then take 15% of it. Of course, if you don't want to lose 15% of your earnings, you don't have to use an agent.

An agent represents you for a book (and may choose to represent future books) and, yes, they will continue to take that 15%* (although since few debut books earn out their advance it might be a moot point). And they will take it on anything you have contracted with them for.

As to the right to audit accounts - this is in every publishing contract I have signed so I assume is standard. It's certainly a clause I check for before signing. The cost of the audit will fall on me, however, should there be no wrongdoing.

As you say, it is important to know what you are getting into. And whether or not an author chooses to lose that 15% is entirely up to them - but it is unlikely an unagented author will get the same level on a book than an agent will**

*although, as with anything, there are exceptions. When I parted company with my agent they agreed to revert the contract and return the 15% to me.

** assuming they sell it in the first place, of course. But that's a whole other thread.

Some of the most sought after publishers only accept submissions from agents. So if you think your novel is genuinely super-duper*, then the agent route is really the only option.

* Of course every piece of writing is special to the author - but if you have other evidence that you think your novel is good that won't be biased by say family and friends trying to be nice to you - then it is likely to be a good piece of work.

 

[DelActivisto]

I would suggest figuring out what you're comfortable with doing, and then going a little outside that. Staying inside your comfort zone won't get a person anywhere. So if a trilogy is significantly outside your comfort zone, there's nothing wrong with starting off with singles. That way you get lots of practice with story arc, climax, and resolution, and can get to marketing and publishing sooner.

But I'm not taking that advice. I'm going very far outside my comfort zone and starting a trilogy as my first project.