| Back to Home > Bulletin Board > Media Issues > Topic: Are Agents and Editors Crabby by Nature... |
Topic: Are Agents and Editors Crabby by Nature...
| Author | Message |
| clairezulkey | Posted – 10/19/2006 4:56:53 PM | show profile | email poster Or do authors make them that way? Miss Snark, Evil Editor and Unsolicited advice on Gawker...if you read a lot of blogs from literary agents and editors, you might get the impression that the majority of authors are self-absorbed needy dimwits. Of course some of them may be. But are authors really getting more annoying or do some editors and agents need to find their happy place? Editors/Agents: Do the 'tough love' blogs tell it like it is, or is it exaggerated to make for better reading? Authors: Do you get the feeling that you're an imposition, or have you always felt you've been ond of the 'good ones' anyway? ------ Editor of MBToolBox |
| dribbledrive1 | Posted – 10/19/2006 5:27:22 PM | show profile A lot of is just that's fun to vent -- especially if you're anonymous. --Miss Snark, Evil Editor and Unsolicited advice on Gawker...if you read a lot of blogs from literary agents and editors, you might get the impression that the majority of authors are self-absorbed needy dimwits.-- |
| clairezulkey | Posted – 10/19/2006 6:35:28 PM | show profile | email poster oh, I have no doubt--and make no mistake about it, they are great resources and they're generous to share their advice--but I'm amazed that they never run out of material! ------ Editor of MBToolBox |
| argh | Posted – 10/20/2006 10:04:42 AM | show profile I can't speak to the crabbiness of agents, but I think editors are extremely crabby because they're generally overworked and, unless they're at the top of the foodchain and making 8X that of their assistant's salary, really underpaid. Also, even if your editor happens to be a genuinely nice person, she's probably surrounded by heinous, catty coworkers all day and thus rarely in a good mood at the office. There's a great big love fest when they sign you, maybe the politeness will continue through a first lunch meeting. But once you've turned in your manuscript and start asking, "When will I see edits?" and then as the weeks go by, "Um, you are editing this book, aren't you?" your phone calls become that to totally ignore. Also, the calls of your agent, which is probably putting your agent in a bad mood and so they're not returning your calls, so as not to look like an idiot in front of you. And once the book comes out, you are right to be worried and say, "So what are you doing for this? Is there ANYTHING more I can do for this book? Another book signing, perhaps?" And this is when your publicist laughs at you behind your back and doesn't return your calls, because book signings won't sell your book -- nothing will sell your book that they're willing to spend the money on, because they're all very busy trying to get more copies of some B-List celebrity's ghost-authored memoir/collection of humorous tidbits out the door since they paid half a million for it. Um, no I'm not bitter or anything. |
| clairezulkey | Posted – 10/20/2006 11:05:39 AM | show profile | email poster god, that sucks, argh. do you think your final feeling about the experience is relatively typical? because if that is the case, you wonder why the system operates the way it does if it's so aggravating for everyone involved. ------ Editor of MBToolBox |
| argh | Posted – 10/20/2006 12:36:13 PM | show profile I think my experience is probably a bit more on the bitter side than most, and perhaps I'm in a cranky mood as I type.... but I DO think there are problems with the system. I think there's some faulty logic at work -- like when a company is coming up short on revenue for the year and figure, "We'll need to put more books on the list so we can forecast more units sold and the budget won't look so bad!" It makes sense on one level -- having more products to sell means you can predict more products will be sold -- but books are not like widgits produced at a factory. So bad books that they figure are "sure fire" bestsellers by are bought and need to be produced with just a few weeks notice. This puts everyone in a bad mood and generally leads to poorer-quality books all around, not to mention fewer resources being devoted to those books that they didn't pay so much for and therefore, don't want to sell. |
| mkelly | Posted – 10/20/2006 2:02:59 PM | show profile I like to think I'm pretty crabby, yes. Now please buzz off and get back to work. |
| caitlinkelly | Posted – 10/21/2006 9:07:10 AM | show profile argh...that about sums it up! Your description is hilarious and rings far too true. One agent I know takes 1/100 of the authors flinging themselves at him, which might suggest that after reading the less-impressive 99 others, he's a little weary. I didn't find my book editor crabby, but, juggling a ton of other books, she was usually pretty unavailable. I didn't take it personally and expected it going in. I think if you don't, you're not paying attention to the industry and how it behaves with all but the the tiniest elite layer of those authors they expect/hope to make them the most money. And you do know, going in, which pile you sit in, or you should -- how many pages (any?) are you getting in their catalogue? What's their PR budget for your book? As someone quoted this week in the NYT said "It's Darwinian. Some books live and some books will die." The challenge is knowing that attitude exists and doing anything you can, for as long as it takes (i.e. years after pub. date) to keep your work selling and in print. If you feel your agent or editor(s) really don't respond to/ value you, why work with them? And do you really plan to call or email them multiple times a day? Once they've made the choice to work with you, the system stops dead without the writer. If someone is "crabby" with their writers, whatever their other stresses, they may be working with tone-deaf clients or not communicating clearly how they work -- and work with/for you -- most effectively. |
| macher99 | Posted – 10/24/2006 11:55:33 PM | show profile Editors are not crabby by nature. They're likely to snap at impatient writers who don't understand that theirs isn't the only book to be edited, and that editing isn't the only part of the editor's job. It's not that the majority of authors are self-absorbed needy dimwits. It's that the few who tend to be self-absorbed needy dimwits take up all of the editor's time and make the editor seriously consider the value of the writer to the house's list versus the cost of using that time and effort to work on several other books that are demanding attention or to find another writer of equal or better ability who will be easier to work with. If you consider the real-world ratio of submissions to acceptances, the likelihood that the equal or better writer exists is quite high. And depending upon how annoying and/or unreasonable the current writer is, the likelihood that the equal or better writer exists in the editor's mind may approach near certainty. |
| Mirage | Posted – 10/25/2006 12:27:53 AM | show profile Here's a thought... ...from a crabby editor. Why not e-mail instead of calling your editor a million times a day (yes, Caller ID allows us to see that it's you repeatedly calling and not leaving a message, hoping to get us on the line)? E-mail is far better for both parties; we might not be in a position to discuss your project right at the moment you are calling, but are probably more than willing to answer your questions later that day when we can think straight and devote the proper amount of time to you rather than just rushing you off the phone. P.S. -- Book signings are useless. They're often poorly attended, which makes the author feel bad, and result in very few sales for the time/energy spent. |
| Neo | Posted – 10/28/2006 10:02:57 AM | show profile I agree with macher99, Mirage, and arch all at once. We editors have many books on out plates in all stages of production every hour of every day. Sometimes it's just not the right time to be dealing with your book. As harsh as it may sound, in the grand scheme of things in that particular moment, it's not a priority. There. I said it. The editor crabbiness comes from all the catty women you have to work with, who make you want to lock yourself in your office and never come out--ever--as well as the impatient authors who call with attitude on their breath, who make you never want to pick up the phone--ever. The people whose phone calls I was happy to return were the sweet ones--the unassuming people. Those who could bring a smile to my face, were witty and good natured. Anyone with a superiority complex--and I'm talking from best-selling divas (and divos?) to first-time authors with no experience whatsoever, were all met with the same dread. However, I have to say I never meant to, and rarely, if ever, took my bad day out on a bad/mean/egocentric author. But don't push me. In additon, combative authors and agents who try to spin their tales of retaliation and play their "I know so-and-so" cards and "I'll go above your head" chips were free to do so. I was never sorry to see one of those people go. Ever. And if you want to know the real truth, those people who play those cards get bad reputations and are despised by everyone on the publisher's side--including the editorial director, publisher, and president. Your griping is a waste of the publisher's time. A professional works through his/her conflict with his/her editor. Going over someone's head just makes more work for the boss, and they don't appreciate you one bit--especially if the editor your maligning is a sweet as can be (most days) and highly productive. That's where all the phoniness in publishing comes in--people being nice to your face and loathing you behind your back, all because you called once--all it takes is one day--in a bad mood. |
| Metro Writer | Posted – 10/30/2006 6:02:58 PM | show profile It depends on your position. Dominic Dunne praises Tina Brown as one of the best editors ever because she is supportive and intuitive. Magazine publishers consider her too costly because the magazines she edited never made money. (But she put them on the map.) On a much lower level, I've dealt with the good, the bad, and the downright rude. They're just human, after all. The Connecticut Press Club (www.ctpressclub.com) will have a program called Agents and Beyond and the speakers (some of whom I've heard before) have interesting comments on editors. One feels they are too insular. Another says that the publishing industry has changed so much and reduced so many support staff members that editors are now really overworked. They're victims of their jobs, like most people in other fields. You just can't take anything personally. |
