Telephony

I read somewhere that it's a good idea to telephone the agencies you're considering approaching, before sending anything. Firstly to make sure that they're accepting submissions and that they deal in the sort of work you've written, but also to try to get extra information - like the name of the agent who deals with your type of book, or just general info that will help you tailor your submission to that agent's tastes. 'For just a 4 minute phone call you could find something out that makes the difference,' says the well meaning article. Well, seeing as I wanted to do everything properly and with the maximum change of success, on Friday I took a half day from work to try this out.

All I can say is that it probably works great, if you're good on the phone. As it was, my 4 minute phone calls were all over in under 30 seconds. Almost all the callees refused to give out any more information than was in their respective entries in The Writers & Artists Yearbook. One gave me the name of an agent working there (although as we never discussed what I was sending them, I don't know how suitable the agent will prove to be). One just told me that they weren't accepting submissions, so at least I've saved myself the trouble/cost of sending anything there. Another was just an answerphone. Oh, one word of advice to anyone trying this. If you're right handed, hold the phone in the left one. This means that if they do tell you something that's not in their WAYB entry then you can write it down, rather than assume you'll remember it. 'Click' goes phone, 'pop' goes all memory of the number of words the nice woman asked me to send in as a sample. I'm fairly sure it was either 3,000 words or 15,000. Sadly this is ever so slightly less useful than knowing nothing. The plan of course is to send in 3 chapters and subsequently deny all knowledge of any telephone calls.

Interestingly enough, I've seen details of agents who specifically say not to phone them. Best guess would be that this is because they're sick of people calling them for information and distracting them from their real job of breeding hamsters (why else would so many insist on paper submissions rather than email? Bedding!)

Oh well, not a great start but on the bright side, none of them got my name. At least that makes it unlikely that I've been blacklisted already :)

Next task: Put together packages to send to agents (synopsis, sample chapters, etc. What do you take me for? I'm not that annoyed at how things went.)