AgentFest 2012 We attended the International Thriller Writers’ Association ThrillerFest in New York City again this year (11 to 14 July 2012). ITW is designed to serve the full spectrum interest in thrillers, including avid fans, aspiring writers, bloggers, and world famous best selling authors.
The program is divided into three parts: (i) CraftFest (intended to teach the craft of thriller writing); (ii) AgentFest (intended to bring together agents or publisher editors in search of new clients or manuscripts); and (iii) ThrillerFest (intended to address the current range of issues for thriller writers, including interviews with our famous members and presentation of awards at the Saturday night banquet..
Today, I would like to revisit my AgentFest experience. I am an aspiring thriller writer. I self-published one book in 2008, Riddle of Berlin, which has had positive reviews. My strategy was to experience the fiction publishing process. I have been writing technical books for many years, which have become standards in the international taxation field (hardly thrilling, but profitable). I found the experience of working with editors, promoters, book clubs, and so on to be exciting.
In the interim, I have invested my time trying to learn to write in an effective manner. As usualk, I have experienced ups and downs, but I am a persistent soul. ITW helped me find a world class editor, who has been patient in working through draft-after-draft. She said the length and detail of her initial comments would reflect her interest in the manuscript. There were 26 single spaced pages! The manuscript for Bite Me! is coming along.
I am pleased and by board of commentators gives me a thumbs up. I am now ready to find an agent. I have attended AgentFest three times. A writer gets 3 minutes with each agent. There were about 65 agents present this year and about 200 writers. So everyone gets plenty of time to pitch.
My first AgentFest, was interesting, educational, and eye-opening. My pitch needed to be refined to about 3 sentences hooking a agent’s interest. Its like the cover flap of a book trying to hook a reader to purchase. I also needed to be calm, as I am with clients.
The second experience in 2011, was much better. About 10 agents expressed interest in my story, asking me to send a synopsis and about 4-5 chapters. I did not follow-up as I was working with my editor and wanted to be sure the work was the best I could make it before sending anything anyplace.
In 2012, I had a fine time and was pleased. I revisited the agents who asked for the story in 2011, each of whom said “when the editor (who they all seemed to know) is ready, please send it along.” I also spoke to a prominent agent who was interested enough to asked that I send the chapters the editor had approved along immediately. The editor is now reading what I believe to be ready. We’ll see, then I’ll send it to this agent as we complete the manuscript.
ITW does a wonderful service for writers and agents in bringing us together. If you are looking for an agent, come to AgentFest in 2013. I hope not to be in line with you, but if I am we can commiserate.
Resources:
ITW
Thrillerfest
Agentfest
Warms, Cym
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