ML Brown & Associates LLC Literary Blog

Research

July 25, 2007 on 3:51 am | In Writing Tips |

I do not know how many times as an agent I have stressed the importance of research. Not only does research allows you to gain information about the industry but also it gives you vital information. Many people get frustrated when I tell them something is wrong with their manuscript and once they fix it, they can resubmit it. Most of them think I am being unfair because I won’t tell them what’s wrong but firm belief is if I tell you how to do it you will never learn it because you will hold on to the information I give you instead of progressing as a author.  I think over time any author can take a story and make it strong and credible but you have to remember to take it through the editors so it’s nice and clean, make it marketable so any agent can look at it and go ahhh this fits into this market. When we can do that, it is easier for us to go oh let me call such and such because this book will be perfect for that house. However when we have to play the guessing game with your manuscript it takes away from our day making it difficult to do anything with your manuscript. So once again, I stress the importance of research. There are plenty of books out there to help you learn all of this stuff.

 

 

Stay tune in the coming weeks I am going to list a couple of websites that are helpful to readers and give great advice.