33: Ask an Agent LIVE! (kinda), with guest agent Jen Rofé

7/26/2019

It's a Summertime Bonus Episode! ABLA Senior Agent Jen Rofé joins me to answer burning listener questions about queries, submission strategies, working with your agent, and so much more. Plus we talk about glass-blowing and Russian spies. (Obviously!)

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Show Notes:

* The Literaticast has a Patreon -- throw in a buck, and help keep the podcast going, plus the ongoing project to have all the episodes transcribed.

* Find me on Twitter -- Find Jen Rofé on Twitter

* Submission guidelines - here's how to query Jen Rofé!

* Some resources about what to ask on "The Call"

* Publishers Marketplace is a great resource for learning about who is selling what, and to whom.

Some of Jen's clients, and other books we discussed:

9 Comments

Peter Taylor link

7/26/2019 07:03:05 pm

Very many thanks, Jennifer and Jen – so much useful information! The eventual transcript for this and other podcasts will be much appreciated.

Have you tried a Google image search for ‘Hot artistic glass workshop USA’ or similar? You know you want to...

jennifer

7/29/2019 06:13:55 pm

ummm I have a weird feeling that I might get some UNEXPECTED images if I google that, so I'll refrain. LOL!

Peter Taylor link

7/29/2019 06:25:09 pm

Ha! I'd not thought there could be undesirable things on view. It's all clean on my browser - honest! There are a large number of glass-art workshops creators provide from about $60 a session and you make your own swirly paperweights, pendants...even blown creations. I wish there was one near me.

Yolanda Ridge link

7/29/2019 05:58:52 pm

Great podcast!! Is the book Jen recommended about the Food Network called "From Scratch: Inside the Food Network"?

jennifer

7/29/2019 06:13:06 pm

Yep! There's a link to it in the show notes, above. :-)

Yolanda link

7/29/2019 06:32:48 pm

Not sure how I missed that... summer brain! :) Thanks!!

Carol

8/6/2019 07:10:15 am

This podcast is a treasure trove of useful information for me, a new PB writer. I was surprised to learn that an author-only earns 1/3 of what publishers pay an author-illustrator. Can you explain some of that arithmetic? Thank you so much for the time you both invested in this interview.

Jennifer Laughran

8/6/2019 09:14:15 am

It's not set in stone obviously, but I think if you think about it it will make sense. Let's say the entire budget for an advance for a picture book is -- I don't know, let's make it easy and say that it is $30,000. *PLEASE NOTE THAT THIS IS A RANDOM NUMBER DO NOT TAKE THIS AS ANY SORT OF JUDGEMENT ABOUT WHAT ANYONE'S ADVANCE MIGHT BE*

The illustrator may take six months to a year, working for hours a day, to create 32-40 full color full size illustrations.

The author wrote 500 words. Carefully! And rewrote them several times!

The illustrator will probably get $25,000 -- MAYBE $20,000 if they are new.

The author will probably get $5,000 -- MAYBE $10,000 if they have a bit of clout.

If it was an author-illustrator, they'd get $30,000. Make sense?

Carol

8/6/2019 11:29:50 am

Jennifer, it sure does make sense. Now, if only I could write a picture book in less time than it takes an illustrator to create 40 illustrations! Have you ever polled your most accomplished, experienced picture book author-only clients about their typical development time? I wouldn't be surprised to hear that their writing time runs six months or more, working for hours a day. Less time than I need to spend, as I'm still learning the craft. But still... this is time consuming work. I don't mean to argue with your assessment; certainly you're speaking from experience with many, many deals. I'm just surprised to learn that the writing is understood to require so much less time investment than the illustration. Thank you for answering my question. And I truly appreciate the insights you share in your podcasts!

33: Ask an Agent LIVE! (kinda), with guest agent Jen Rofé

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