News
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Agency diary mentions in the Independent
15 Nov 2011
The agency ghosts’s Halloween lunch on 31st October made The Independent
The Independent on Sunday then ran a story on 13th November on agency submissions.
Literary editors receive some strange messages – PRs misaddressing emails to the wrong newspaper, out-of-work writers demanding reviewing work with menaces, or authors wanting us to read their self-published conspiracy theories that no publisher will touch because they are “afraid of the truth” – but they’re nothing, it seems, compared to the postbag of a literary agent. Andrew Lownie has been in touch, directing me to the website of his agency, which specialises in history and biography (not poetry and short stories, aspiring writers please note) and has a list of handy tips for authors wishing to submit their masterpieces. Among the tips are many we agree with, including: “My rule is that the longer the parcel takes to open, the quicker it is to discard. Anything with too much sellotape and staples suggests a mad person.” Here at IoS Towers, the longer a book takes to unwrap, the less interesting it inevitably is. Another is: “Address the agent correctly.” He’s right: for a person who claims to be a writer or reviewer, for whom spelling and attention to detail are quite important, getting the addressees name right is particularly important. Mr Lownie tells us that he has recently been addressed as: Hello dear Andrew; Dear Mr Townie; Hello Angel; Dear Mr. Dolby; Top of the day to you; and Do your current interests include ferociously paced, commercial Tartan Noir? His correspondents have signed off, variously: In His Holy Name; PLEAS CONTACT ME FOR FUTURE TALK; Artistically Yours; If there’s a zombie apocalypse, good luck!; and i need to get published man. hope to hear from you guys. Peace. If you have recently sent a submission to the agency including one of the above, then sorry, but it doesn’t look like you’re going to be published any time soon. Please, though, don’t call us.
Good to know the website is being read.
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Agency authors are nos 6 & 7 in non-fiction paperback bestseller list
15 Nov 2011
Cathy Glass and Casey Watson remain in the top ten this week respectively at no 6 and no 7.
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The Night the Angels Came is no 1 in Kindle Non Fiction
15 Nov 2011
Congratulations to Cathy Glass whose The Night the Angels Came is no 1 in Kindle Non Fiction
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Insider account of British Army published
10 Nov 2011
Irreverent military gossip website, the Army Rumour Service - ARRSE for short - has been entertaining the defence community for over a decade. Now the forum has its own spin-off book, described as an insider’s guide to the British Army and published today. Author Major Des Astor told British Forces News what readers could expect.
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Agency books are no 4 and 5 in Amazon history best sellers of 2011
10 Nov 2011
Congratulations to Frank Ledwidge and Roger Crowley who are respectively no 4 and 5 in Amazon’s history best sellers of 2011
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Cathy Glass's amazing Amazon 5* reviews
10 Nov 2011
Cathy Glass’s current best seller The Night the Angels Came, published a few weeks ago, has fifty 5 * Amazon reviews and one rogue 1 4* which must surely be a record. Her first book Damaged has eighty one 5* reviews but eleven 4, two 3 and one 2*.
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Two agency titles in Amazon's top 50 books of the year
09 Nov 2011
Congratulations to Frank Ledwidge and Roger Crowley whose Losing Small Wars and City of Fortune have both made Amazon’s top (ie favourite) 50 books of the year.
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Agency titles no 5 & no 6 in best-seller lists
08 Nov 2011
Congratulations to Cathy Glass whose The Night The Angels Came is Number 5 in the paperback charts this week and Casey Watson whose The Boy No One Loved is Number 6.
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Recent Foreign Rights Sales
07 Nov 2011
Alan Baker’s Dyatlov Pass to Russia.
Nessa Carey’s The Epigenetics Revolution to Russia.
Polish rights in Roger Crowley’s Constantinople and Empires of the Sea.
Alicia Eaton’s NLP: Fix Your Life to Russia.
David Haviland’s Why You Should Store Your Farts in a Jar to Indonesia.
US rights in Robert Hutchinson’s Young Henry to St Martin’s Press.
Geoffrey Roberts’s Stalin’s General to Russia, Poland and Estonia.
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Shirley Williams authorised biography sold
07 Nov 2011
Mark Peel’s authorised life of the politician Shirley Williams has been sold to Biteback for publication next year.
