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124 Kate Evans | Literary Agent
651 Plays2 years ago
Literary agent, Kate Evans is on the podcast telling us all about her career in publishing, PFD's old publishing arm and how she tackles submissions.
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Transcript
Introduction & Hosts' Humor
00:00:00
Speaker
So our podcast is called Right and Wrong.
00:00:01
Speaker
Are these your notes?
00:00:03
Speaker
Are these your notes about what we're going to say?
00:00:06
Speaker
Anything is a short answer.
00:00:08
Speaker
So how many novels did you not finish?
00:00:10
Speaker
Oh my God, so many.
00:00:13
Speaker
It was perfect.
00:00:14
Speaker
What's she talking about?
00:00:15
Speaker
This is not a good question.
00:00:17
Speaker
Ooh, a spicy question.
00:00:19
Speaker
I love it.
Publishing Secret: Write a Good Book
00:00:21
Speaker
This is it, guys.
00:00:21
Speaker
The big secret to getting published is you have to write a good book.
Meet Kate Evans: Literary Agent
00:00:27
Speaker
here first hello and welcome back to the right and wrong podcast it's been a few episodes since i had a literary agent on the show but that stops here as i'm delighted to be joined by pfd's kate evans hi kate hi thank you for having me thanks so much for coming and in the in the midst of london book fair yeah it's actually a lovely excuse to disappear to a quiet room for an hour and talk to you um it's chaotic
00:00:57
Speaker
I mean, for agents generally, it must be all of the fairs that London, Bologna, all of that must be kind of wild.
London Book Fair Dynamics
00:01:03
Speaker
Yeah.
00:01:03
Speaker
I mean, PFD is sort of somewhat unusual in that we have a really big foreign rights team and amazing foreign rights team.
00:01:10
Speaker
So for them, it's sort of months of chaos.
00:01:15
Speaker
And as a result, it's a lot calmer for us.
00:01:18
Speaker
So we're kind of
00:01:19
Speaker
It's a lot of fun being a primary agent during London Book Fair.
00:01:23
Speaker
They kind of take the brunt of the work.
00:01:27
Speaker
Yeah, it's the lead up.
00:01:28
Speaker
It's kind of, you know, lots of books go out in the few weeks in the lead up too.
00:01:32
Speaker
But I think everyone loves the chaos.
00:01:35
Speaker
We just love to talk about how mad it is, but it's a lot of fun.
00:01:38
Speaker
Yeah, that's the same with all big industry events, I think.
00:01:41
Speaker
Yeah.
Role of Book Fairs for Agents
00:01:42
Speaker
But what is it that as an agent at a big book fair, what is it that you guys are sort of looking for or like kind of seeking out?
00:01:50
Speaker
I mean, for us, and again, like every company does it different, every agency does it differently.
00:01:56
Speaker
But for me and for most of the other primary agents at BFD, it's mostly just an opportunity to see lots of people who aren't in town usually.
00:02:05
Speaker
So whether it's publishers who are doing foreign editions of our books, like I have an event tonight where one of my books that I think is going to be in 12 territories, all her publishers are going to be there.
00:02:16
Speaker
And you just don't get that many opportunities to have everyone in one place.
00:02:19
Speaker
So things like that.
00:02:21
Speaker
There's always a lot of, you know, catching up with people you see all the time anyway, but it's just with the kind of intensity of the fair.
00:02:26
Speaker
And then obviously there's just a huge amount of business being done around those times.
00:02:30
Speaker
You know, you sell a lot of books in the lead up to the fair or try to in hope that you can do as many international deals as possible.
00:02:38
Speaker
afterwards.
00:02:39
Speaker
But really it's just, you know, that concentration of people kind of who are present.
00:02:44
Speaker
I think it obviously used to be a much more, you know, long before my time and before the internet, I think, you know, it was physically people walking around printed manuscripts and now we don't strictly need it, but I think nothing can replace that kind of face-to-face excitement.
00:03:01
Speaker
Yeah, true.
00:03:02
Speaker
You're never going to have all these people from across the world and gathered together in other situations really.
00:03:07
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:03:08
Speaker
And I think you never really know what surprising connections will come out of it.
00:03:13
Speaker
You know, what, obviously, it's our job to know what people are looking for.
00:03:17
Speaker
But sometimes a conversation that just happens from being in the same room leads to the fact that you had no idea that somebody had...
00:03:23
Speaker
this extremely intense interest in insert topic here that you happen to have an author working on a book on.
00:03:29
Speaker
And it's just that ability to ignite sort of genuine interest in a project that comes from, you know, just shared curiosity is something that's so wonderful about everyone being in one place.
00:03:42
Speaker
Okay.
00:03:42
Speaker
Well, it sounds cool.
00:03:43
Speaker
It sounds exciting.
00:03:44
Speaker
But I mean, I'm sure you'll all be very tired and exhausted by the end of it.
00:03:49
Speaker
Let's get back to you and Peters, Fraser and Dunlop.
Kate Evans' Career Path
00:03:53
Speaker
You've been there since, is it 2014?
00:03:56
Speaker
It's 2014.
00:03:57
Speaker
I've been there forever and I've done, I think, every job in the building.
00:04:02
Speaker
It's been a zigzaggy path.
00:04:04
Speaker
But yeah, I've been there for almost nine years now.
00:04:07
Speaker
Is that where your publishing career began?
00:04:10
Speaker
No, so my publishing career, so you might be able to hear I'm Australian.
00:04:13
Speaker
So my first publishing job was at Hachette Australia in Sydney.
00:04:17
Speaker
So I stumbled into publishing basically.
00:04:20
Speaker
I mean, which every...
00:04:23
Speaker
everyone hates it when I say that but um I worked I was working in magazines I worked at Marie Claire in Australia um and I thought that's what I wanted to do but it was 2012 magazine industry was crumbling everyone was getting fired um and I was a sort of features assistant and I was increasingly sort of looking around and thinking there's no one's job I want you know um writing a lot of 500 word pieces about kale and um
00:04:49
Speaker
Then a job came up as a maternity cover for a publicist at Hachette Australia.
00:04:53
Speaker
And I thought, oh, I can do that.
00:04:55
Speaker
You know, I'd done a bit of PR as I think everyone who's kind of working in media has at some point done, you know, a bit of PR work.
00:05:03
Speaker
And then,
00:05:05
Speaker
Did it for what was supposed to be nine months and two years later I was still there.
00:05:07
Speaker
I just absolutely loved it and sort of walked into the building and thought it was everything I loved about magazines was there and everything I found frustrating about it wasn't.
00:05:15
Speaker
You got to just be surrounded by fascinating people.
00:05:19
Speaker
So then did that for ages, loved the industry, but wanted to be closer to the start of the process.
00:05:25
Speaker
I think partially because, I mean, maybe I have a God complex, maybe I need to control everything.
00:05:31
Speaker
But I think I loved the part of publicity that was sort of,
00:05:35
Speaker
finding out what was interesting about a book, finding that hook and saying like, why should people care?
00:05:40
Speaker
But I wanted to work on the books themselves.
00:05:45
Speaker
So agenting is sort of the dream job in that regard.
00:05:48
Speaker
You know, you have that sort of negotiating, figuring out what's interesting, that dynamism that is, you know, so central to publicity, but you are literally, you know, building the books from the ground up.
00:05:59
Speaker
Yes.
00:06:01
Speaker
So left, wanted in the desert for a bit,
00:06:05
Speaker
did the Columbia publishing course in New York, thought I'd stay in New York, and then made a snap decision to move to London, which was supposed to be, again, very brief, wasn't, took a temp job at PFD that was supposed to be three months, and gave myself a one-month sort of cutoff to make them hire me permanently.
00:06:23
Speaker
And they did in their estates department, which is looking up, they didn't have a job for me, and they very kindly sort of invented one.
00:06:29
Speaker
Um,
00:06:30
Speaker
And so I was finding estates for us to take on.
00:06:35
Speaker
I did that for a few months and then moved across to work on, they were just setting up a digital publishing
Digital Publishing at PFD
00:06:42
Speaker
arm.
00:06:42
Speaker
So like PFT actually had a publisher.
00:06:44
Speaker
And I guess because I was young, they were like, do you want to do this?
00:06:50
Speaker
And so I worked with
00:06:52
Speaker
Then a person who was a very senior agent setting that up.
00:06:55
Speaker
And then I was supposed to be sort of a kind of junior associate on that.
00:07:00
Speaker
And then he left like three months later.
00:07:03
Speaker
And then it was just me.
00:07:05
Speaker
And then over the next... Was that Agora?
00:07:07
Speaker
Yeah.
00:07:07
Speaker
So it became Agora.
00:07:08
Speaker
It started out as Ipso.
00:07:10
Speaker
So it was very much, I don't know how much of this is interesting, but I will just talk you through it.
00:07:14
Speaker
You can cut it.
00:07:15
Speaker
It was, it was, it started out as Ipso books and the theory then was, again, it was 2014.
00:07:22
Speaker
So self-publishing was still booming.
00:07:24
Speaker
And a lot of agencies were looking at their backlists and saying, we have all of these amazing books that were published at a time that publishers were publishing a lot more books from one author.
00:07:34
Speaker
You know, there might be a crime writer who was publishing three books a year in the 60s.
00:07:38
Speaker
And now maybe vintage might have three of them in print.
00:07:42
Speaker
And so
00:07:43
Speaker
there are fans out there who want to read every single one.
00:07:45
Speaker
And so a lot of agencies were having these discussions about like, how do we support our backlist using this kind of booming part of the industry?
00:07:53
Speaker
So we were setting up a publishing arm that was supposed to be about bringing those things back into print in a way that was sort of
00:08:01
Speaker
sustainable, but it morphed quite quickly.
00:08:04
Speaker
So that was supposed to be this quite sleepy operation of just kind of keeping things available for those people that wanted them.
00:08:10
Speaker
But then we started taking on front list authors and we grew and the team became bigger and rebranded as Agora.
00:08:18
Speaker
And then I was doing that with the team until 2020 when the
00:08:24
Speaker
I had been agenting kind of on the side, sort of accidentally.
00:08:27
Speaker
I'd been taking people on, usually journalists, because that was my sort of background, and selling their books.
Transition to Full-Time Agenting
00:08:35
Speaker
I'd had a couple of really great books that I'd done while doing that.
00:08:40
Speaker
And Agora was growing, and my agenting list was growing.
00:08:43
Speaker
So they sort of sat me down and said, look, you need to pick a lane, because this is very much...
00:08:48
Speaker
you know, three and a half jobs at this point and we'd love you to age in full time, but it's up to you.
00:08:52
Speaker
And I said, yes, that's always what I wanted to do.
00:08:54
Speaker
So great.
00:08:55
Speaker
I, you know, had my, I cried and bid farewell to my baby in the form of Agora and moved across to the books department in March, 2020, which was a really fun time to, to, um, go from having a really strong team around you doing something you know how to do to like a brand new world.
00:09:12
Speaker
Um, and that's my story.
00:09:14
Speaker
So you've, so like you've been fully focused on being a literary agent for about three years now.
00:09:19
Speaker
Three years now.
00:09:20
Speaker
Yeah.
00:09:21
Speaker
Okay.
00:09:22
Speaker
And unfortunately, Agora has wound down.
00:09:24
Speaker
Agora has wound down.
00:09:25
Speaker
So they, due to some very kind of, I mean, they're not, it's not boring.
00:09:29
Speaker
It's very interesting, but boring for the purposes of this podcast changes in the business.
00:09:34
Speaker
It, it just didn't make sense anymore.
00:09:37
Speaker
Um, so PFT has generally focused is now we used to do lots of different things and we're now kind of
00:09:43
Speaker
you know, focused on what we've been doing for a hundred years next year, which is agenting.
00:09:47
Speaker
So the agency is very focused on that now, but that all happened after I left.
00:09:52
Speaker
So sadly I wasn't involved in the wind down.
00:09:55
Speaker
Um, but,
00:09:56
Speaker
Sam Race, who was my successor, you know, handled all of that.
00:10:00
Speaker
And I think they've launched some amazing frontlist authors who've now gone on to other publishers.
00:10:05
Speaker
So I think it did what it was doing incredibly successfully.
00:10:09
Speaker
And the agency continues to represent a lot of those authors.
00:10:12
Speaker
Yes, indeed.
00:10:13
Speaker
My friend Melissa Welleva was originally with Agora and now still with Lucy Irvine over at PFD.
00:10:20
Speaker
And her new book just got published like a few days ago.
00:10:23
Speaker
I think it's a really interesting thing.
00:10:24
Speaker
And I think that's something that
00:10:26
Speaker
my kind of, as I said, zigzaggy, you know, path to agenting, I think has made me really interested in is like, what,
00:10:35
Speaker
you know, what are these sort of unusual ways in and when are they helpful and when are they harmful?
00:10:40
Speaker
And I think there are a lot of quite predatory sort of, you know, services out there that, you know, you might get a book out, but is it about developing you as a writer and is it about developing your career?
00:10:53
Speaker
And I think what Agora set out to do and I think did very well was about saying like, what are all the things that frustrate us as agents and how can we fix that for our authors?
00:11:04
Speaker
And I think,
00:11:05
Speaker
you know, yeah, people like Melissa who've kind of then gone on to have, you know, a more traditional path, sort of a testament to its success.
00:11:13
Speaker
Yeah.
00:11:14
Speaker
Yeah, I definitely think so.
00:11:15
Speaker
So speaking of how zigzaggy your path was, you always had your sights on being a literary agent when you moved to the UK and joined PFT.
00:11:26
Speaker
Yeah.
00:11:27
Speaker
I did, yeah.
00:11:28
Speaker
I discovered, so I'm from Brisbane in Australia where there kind of is no media.
00:11:34
Speaker
I discovered that literary agents were a thing because of a Marion Keys novel when I was about 13.
00:11:40
Speaker
The other side of the story, there's a character who's a literary agent.
00:11:43
Speaker
I think her name is Jojo and I think it, I was like, well, that, that sounds like the best job in the world.
00:11:48
Speaker
But then- I think you're the second agent to have discovered literary agency through Marion Keys.
00:11:53
Speaker
Yeah.
00:11:54
Speaker
Honestly, I think if I'm the second that's admitted it, I think I'm probably the hundred.
00:11:58
Speaker
On this podcast at least, yeah.
00:12:00
Speaker
And yeah, so when I moved to London, um...
00:12:04
Speaker
And, you know, when I was in New York, that was what I was going to do when I was there.
00:12:08
Speaker
And I'd sort of been interviewing and was surrounded by lots of, you know, was now meeting literary agents.
00:12:12
Speaker
I was like, yes, confirmed.
00:12:13
Speaker
It's not just Marion Keys being a genius.
00:12:15
Speaker
It is also an amazing job.
00:12:17
Speaker
And then moved to London.
00:12:18
Speaker
And I was suddenly surrounded by all these people who their parents worked in publishing or their parents were authors or, you know, they kind of have done their first.
00:12:25
Speaker
internship at Bloomsbury at 16 or whatever.
00:12:29
Speaker
And they would like, they always knew they wanted to be agents or they always knew they wanted to work in editorial.
00:12:32
Speaker
And it'd be really straightforward.
00:12:34
Speaker
I think every time I meet people who have done other things, I think it brings a really, I think it's, I think it's just good for you as an agent.
00:12:44
Speaker
Cause you know, it is your job to sort of be gathering all of these things from the wider world and then trying to make it into something book shaped.
00:12:51
Speaker
And I think understanding that,
00:12:54
Speaker
all those forces, what people are interested in, how other forms of media work.
00:12:58
Speaker
Um, and, you know, similarly on the working on the digital side, like when you're doing stuff that's direct to consumer like that, you can't hide, you know, you can't hide behind hype.
00:13:08
Speaker
Amazon reviewers are absolutely brutal.
00:13:10
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:13:12
Speaker
And now TikTok, like TikTok won't hold back at reviewing books and things like that.
00:13:16
Speaker
Exactly.
00:13:17
Speaker
The internet's a scary place.
00:13:19
Speaker
Yeah.
Kate's Client Focus
00:13:20
Speaker
So before we get into submissions, because it's always a very interesting thing to talk about with agents and it's something I know my listeners love to sort of hear about is before we get into that, probably for a bit of context, could you tell us just a little bit about the sort of clients and books that you represent?
00:13:39
Speaker
course so my list is incredibly broad um this bit always takes me a while I do fiction and non-fiction um which is great I get to kind of you know pick and choose on the non-fiction side um really really broad so I always I basically sum it up as books that say something about the way we live so whether it's sort of really kind of um deep smart thinking books like had a book come out
00:14:05
Speaker
couple of weeks ago called The Long View by Richard Fisher who's a BBC journalist talking about it's like a radical reimagining of how we see time and it's like gorgeous and lyrically written and you know he did a fellowship at MIT to research it and there's sort of that end of the spectrum then I do
00:14:21
Speaker
quite a lot of memoir.
00:14:23
Speaker
So yeah, I worked with Sophie Barracina on The Mother Project or Norwell Roberts, who was the Met's first black police officer on his story.
00:14:31
Speaker
And, you know, people with kind of amazing real life stories.
00:14:34
Speaker
I just sold an amazing book, which has been announced called Chutzpah, which is about a ultra Orthodox Jewish woman who has come out as gay, but is refusing to leave the community and is actually living within an ultra Orthodox community as a lesbian woman.
00:14:50
Speaker
So I just, I love a fascinating real life story through to a lot of kind of experts in their field.
00:14:55
Speaker
So I represent some neuroscientists, therapists, stuff like that.
00:14:58
Speaker
And then cookery and food because I'm lifestyle, because I'm greedy and I just like love beautiful things.
00:15:05
Speaker
So that's, and then that's probably less interesting to listeners, but that's a big chunk of my list.
00:15:08
Speaker
And then on the fiction side,
00:15:10
Speaker
Again, it's very broad.
00:15:12
Speaker
Most of my authors are in that sort of accessible literary space.
00:15:17
Speaker
So I love a book with, you know, beautiful writing, really insightful takes on characters, but it has to have a plot.
00:15:25
Speaker
I have a couple of authors who wrote a much, much more literary end, like an amazing book.
00:15:29
Speaker
sort of poet named Sonali Brassad, who's written this experimental novella, which is coming out next year.
00:15:35
Speaker
But most of my authors are in that really plotty, but, you know, make you cry and, you know, kind of want to underline bits of the book area.
00:15:44
Speaker
That's my sort of, yeah, heartland.
00:15:46
Speaker
Okay.
00:15:47
Speaker
So whilst it is esoteric, are there any genres that you don't represent?
00:15:51
Speaker
Yeah, I don't do high fantasy just because even when I suspect it's good, I don't know.
00:15:58
Speaker
I think that you have to know your kind of limits as an agent.
00:16:01
Speaker
I like things that have elements of that, but I don't do YA and children's.
00:16:07
Speaker
Again, I just can't tell.
00:16:11
Speaker
We have an amazing children's department who handle that.
00:16:14
Speaker
And so those are my only kind of hard no's.
00:16:18
Speaker
Everything else I'm open to, but when it does be more genre-y, it tends to be using genre in an interesting way.
00:16:25
Speaker
So I have a book coming out this year, and I'm not saying crime is genre, but I have a book coming out in June called Speak of the Devil, which is ostensibly like super, super, super crime-y.
00:16:36
Speaker
It opens with a severed head and seven women standing around it, all of them
00:16:40
Speaker
have a good reason to have done it.
00:16:41
Speaker
All of them claim they didn't.
00:16:43
Speaker
But the reason I was drawn to that book wasn't the plot and the crime aspects.
00:16:47
Speaker
It was the fact that it is this incredible exploration of sort of coercive control and abusive relationships and these amazing women who have been through hell with the man who's now dead.
00:16:59
Speaker
So I love it when authors use genre devices to do quite literary things.
00:17:04
Speaker
Like I don't know if anyone ever would have bought the book
00:17:08
Speaker
if there wasn't the severed head and now it's being published all around the world.
00:17:11
Speaker
So I think, um, I'm very interested in people that kind of blend, but yeah, those are the only genres I just don't do.
00:17:19
Speaker
Okay.
00:17:19
Speaker
So it's just high fantasy, uh, children's kind of stuff.
00:17:22
Speaker
Yeah, that's it.
00:17:23
Speaker
Okay.
00:17:24
Speaker
But lower fantasy, like something that has a fantastical element.
00:17:27
Speaker
Love it.
00:17:28
Speaker
Love it.
Genres Kate Doesn't Represent
00:17:29
Speaker
Um, it's as within, and I'm sure everyone you have on here says the same thing, which is that,
00:17:35
Speaker
You can talk about what you do and what you want forever.
00:17:39
Speaker
And then someone can be like, great, I've done exactly that.
00:17:42
Speaker
And you can be like, I don't get it.
00:17:43
Speaker
I'm sorry.
00:17:44
Speaker
And I think that's one of the great cruelties of publishing, right?
00:17:48
Speaker
But fantastical elements, I really love.
00:17:50
Speaker
Speculative elements, I really love.
00:17:52
Speaker
Interestingly, I love things with a historical setting, but purely pure historical fiction, that kind of
00:17:59
Speaker
stuff that, you know, is hugely popular that I think I get a bit frustrated with it.
00:18:05
Speaker
I kind of think it has historical fiction points and everyone sounds the same.
00:18:08
Speaker
I don't do, but I do love something that is set in another time and place.
00:18:13
Speaker
It's just that I want it to sort of have the same visceral feelings and problems and everything that we'd have if it was modern, just with the kind of interest of another person.
00:18:24
Speaker
Okay.
00:18:25
Speaker
Okay.
00:18:25
Speaker
I think that's a pretty good summary.
00:18:27
Speaker
So let's dive into submissions themselves.
00:18:29
Speaker
And something I always ask agents when they're on podcasts, well, a submission at PFD is first three chapters, synopsis, cover letter for fiction, and then for nonfiction, detailed proposal.
00:18:42
Speaker
Yes.
00:18:43
Speaker
So as someone who represents both, you might have a couple of answers here.
00:18:47
Speaker
But when you open up a submission, what order do you go through each part?
00:18:52
Speaker
And what are you looking for within that?
00:18:54
Speaker
Yeah, it's such a good question, isn't it?
00:18:56
Speaker
Everyone has such a different process.
00:19:00
Speaker
Covering letter, A, because it's usually in the body of the email, and B, I want there to be a pitch in the email.
00:19:08
Speaker
I think some people understandably attach letters
00:19:11
Speaker
it's kind of a letter and it tends to be quite long.
00:19:13
Speaker
I want that pitch to be really short.
00:19:16
Speaker
Okay.
00:19:16
Speaker
You know, just like essentially the hook.
00:19:20
Speaker
And that's the main thing you're looking for in a cover letter is just the pitch.
00:19:23
Speaker
And then what is it?
00:19:24
Speaker
Yeah.
00:19:24
Speaker
Just kind of, you know, and I think I really feel for people because everybody says you've got to have,
00:19:29
Speaker
comp titles and you you do but almost no one gets them right because you because you why would you it's so hard you know like and I think you know that I think you know every I would say you know 70% of submissions I get say you know for fans of Meg Mason Soren Bliss which is absolutely fine it's a brilliant book and to be fair that is exactly where what the sort of thing I'm looking for right but
00:19:54
Speaker
it needs to be more niche than that.
00:19:56
Speaker
So I think I just kind of disregard comparison titles because I'm sort of like, it's probably not quite right.
00:20:03
Speaker
So if that interests me, I then skip the synopsis entirely because they're so hard to write that I never want to judge anyone for writing a terrible synopsis and open the first three chapters.
00:20:15
Speaker
And I just read that.
00:20:17
Speaker
Okay.
00:20:18
Speaker
Because the writing is sort of everything, right?
00:20:19
Speaker
Like you kind of can fix plot holes, but if the writing isn't there, then...
00:20:23
Speaker
The voice is, the thing I've learned from speaking to lots of agents and asking these similar questions is that the voice is usually the focal point of the whole kind of thing.
00:20:34
Speaker
Do you, whilst you've skipped over the synopsis, if you read the first three chapters, do you go back to the synopsis or you just go straight for the request?
00:20:42
Speaker
I mean, I go back to it, but then I usually read like a bit of it and I get so frustrated and I sort of think the person that wrote this beautiful first three chapters has written this terrible synopsis and that's not their fault.
00:20:53
Speaker
So then I just request it.
00:20:55
Speaker
Yeah.
00:20:55
Speaker
Usually if I've read that first three, it's this really difficult thing, right?
00:20:59
Speaker
Because you try to be really good with your submissions and, you know, do them in blocks and make sure everything's, but ultimately if something comes in and it grabs my attention, I mean, the last-
00:21:09
Speaker
novel I signed, I read the entire thing lent against a chair in my office.
00:21:15
Speaker
There's a sofa in my office.
00:21:17
Speaker
I kept being like, oh, just one more page, one more page.
00:21:20
Speaker
I read cover to cover, not just the first three chapters, the entire book that way, because it just gripped me.
00:21:26
Speaker
Then I called the author immediately and was like, I want this.
00:21:29
Speaker
Realistically, most things that I've signed have done that, even if they fall apart, even if the plot falls apart.
00:21:35
Speaker
If I'm not
00:21:37
Speaker
I'm going to read this thing like eight times, you know, minimum.
00:21:40
Speaker
So if I'm not thinking about it, if I'm not desperate to get back to it, it's, you know, there's always a bit of a, if you haven't signed a novel in a while, you could kind of start talking yourself into stuff and being like, well, it's a good idea.
00:21:52
Speaker
You know, maybe I could edit it into, but I think that thrill has to be there.
00:21:57
Speaker
And I don't want to get too bogged down in whether people have done a million, you know, courses about how to write a good synopsis.
00:22:04
Speaker
I want to know whether this is a book I want to read.
00:22:06
Speaker
Yeah.
00:22:07
Speaker
Yeah.
00:22:07
Speaker
Well, I'm really hoping that soon AI or ChatGPT or something will be able to just write synopsis for us.
00:22:13
Speaker
Yeah, honestly.
00:22:14
Speaker
That'd be great.
00:22:14
Speaker
I feel like sometimes when I'm really stuck on a subtitle for a nonfiction book, I'll have a little ChatGPT session.
00:22:23
Speaker
Like, I just, it's just, you know, it's not great, but it does help you kind of rule some stuff out and get to the point.
00:22:32
Speaker
So yeah, maybe synopsis are next.
00:22:33
Speaker
Yeah.
00:22:34
Speaker
It helps just kind of bounce.
00:22:35
Speaker
It's almost like your own little like idea bouncing machine, isn't it?
00:22:38
Speaker
Exactly.
00:22:39
Speaker
Oh, that's interesting.
00:22:40
Speaker
I would never use that, but it sends me in a new direction.
00:22:43
Speaker
Um, so getting back to submissions, uh, do you have any pet peeves that sort of went, that often pop up sort of like every now and again, and that kind of puts you in a bad stead with
Submission Pet Peeves
00:22:55
Speaker
the submission?
00:22:55
Speaker
Yes, I should.
00:22:56
Speaker
Yes, I do.
00:22:57
Speaker
I shouldn't be so eager to answer that question, but yes, uh, dear sir,
00:23:04
Speaker
horrible.
00:23:04
Speaker
And I mean, for many reasons, A, you were expecting me to take my time to read this book and everything else and you don't know my name.
00:23:12
Speaker
Equally, don't call me Katie.
00:23:15
Speaker
Your name's in the email.
00:23:16
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:23:18
Speaker
But then that's petty, but it's just a big, surprisingly frequent one.
00:23:22
Speaker
My biggest pet peeve is people who say that their novel defies categorization.
00:23:29
Speaker
They say,
00:23:30
Speaker
This has never been a novel like this before.
00:23:32
Speaker
So I can't tell you where on the shelf it sits because it's so original.
00:23:38
Speaker
And I think I understand the desire to do that.
00:23:43
Speaker
Yeah.
00:23:44
Speaker
But first of all, it's literally never true.
00:23:48
Speaker
And secondly, if you, if I think it's, it's difficult because I don't want to sound like, you know, an evil villainous agent, but,
00:24:00
Speaker
you were choosing to seek traditional publishing.
00:24:03
Speaker
You were choosing to seek, you know, a major publisher.
00:24:06
Speaker
Your book is a beautiful work of art that's very personal to you.
00:24:10
Speaker
It's also a product.
00:24:11
Speaker
And if you will not sort of see it that way, usually if people say, oh, it defies description, it cannot be put anywhere, it just means that it's a bit of a mess or that they don't actually know what their book is.
00:24:26
Speaker
And I think, you know, what you want is, you know, in a dream world, you want a book to be unlike anything you've ever read because the characters take you somewhere else, unlike anything you've ever read because the writing is so, you know, sparkly and unique.
00:24:37
Speaker
But in terms of what the book is, we want things to be sort of recognisable in some way, you know, like there's a reason that most stories follow a similar structure and it's that, you know, that's storytelling, that's what human beings enjoy.
00:24:50
Speaker
So sometimes people are like, you know, it's a,
00:24:52
Speaker
it's an intergalactic adventure.
00:24:53
Speaker
That's also a comedy.
00:24:55
Speaker
That's also a crime, you know, and they've kind of just pulled buzzwords from every big successful book over the last few years.
00:25:02
Speaker
And I'm like, there's no care and love in this at all.
00:25:06
Speaker
Yeah.
00:25:06
Speaker
So don't say that basically really try hard to find where your book does sit on a shelf because if,
00:25:12
Speaker
If I can't see where it sits on a shelf, I can't represent it.
00:25:16
Speaker
And even if I, even if you convince me to do it, I'm not going to be able to get a publisher to do it.
00:25:22
Speaker
Yeah, that's it.
00:25:23
Speaker
Right.
00:25:23
Speaker
Because I mean, if you, if you took it on, you would have to then sit down and say, right, but I need to categorize this because I have to pitch it to a publisher and they're not going to, it won't fly that this doesn't fit in any category.
00:25:36
Speaker
They need things to fit within certain structures for like scheduling and like who they're putting it next to and when they're running and things like that.
00:25:43
Speaker
Completely.
00:25:44
Speaker
I think that's the thing that a lot of people when seeking an agent don't understand is that seeking an agent is like you get an agent that's wonderful and you should be just as excited about
Importance of Book Categorization
00:25:53
Speaker
that as you are.
00:25:53
Speaker
But then that's the beginning of the process.
00:25:55
Speaker
You know, then we have to sell it and then selling it is really just the beginning of the process.
00:26:00
Speaker
Then it's, you know, they're pitching an editor falling in love with your book.
00:26:04
Speaker
A lot of really amazing books have gone to eight acquisitions meetings and not ended up with an offer.
00:26:09
Speaker
And I think that's often because they can't figure out where they sit in the market.
00:26:14
Speaker
And so really doing your homework on that front.
00:26:16
Speaker
And that doesn't mean that you have to make a cookie cutter book.
00:26:19
Speaker
It just means like, how do you package that up in a way?
00:26:22
Speaker
Because also it reflects what your hopes are.
00:26:25
Speaker
So like, you know, if I love a book, I want to also ensure that I can give that author what they want
00:26:32
Speaker
what they're seeking.
00:26:33
Speaker
You know, an agent author relationship is a partnership and it has to be right for them.
00:26:39
Speaker
So if an author sees themselves as a really sort of experimental novelist who is reinventing the form and that book is reading as a, you know, really straightforward commercial fiction book, if, unless we can get on the same page about what they want to achieve, that could be a very difficult editing process.
00:26:59
Speaker
Yes.
00:27:00
Speaker
Yeah.
00:27:01
Speaker
I guess the other thing is, if someone sends you a cover letter, and it says there's no other book like this, I would, my thought would immediately be like, okay, so this is a sort of experimental abstract literary fiction then.
00:27:13
Speaker
Because that's the only thing it could be, right?
00:27:16
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:27:18
Speaker
That's what I think you would think if you hadn't read it.
00:27:21
Speaker
Yeah.
00:27:21
Speaker
You'd go, well, this must be this then.
00:27:24
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:27:25
Speaker
It has to be.
00:27:26
Speaker
It's just often – it says to me you don't read enough.
00:27:30
Speaker
Yeah.
00:27:32
Speaker
Yeah.
00:27:32
Speaker
So just I think reading slash spending a borderline inappropriate amount of time lurking in a bookstore is a really important part of submitting.
00:27:42
Speaker
Yeah.
00:27:42
Speaker
Yeah.
00:27:43
Speaker
Yeah.
00:27:44
Speaker
I, it, it's a common piece of advice that, um, lots of people, well, lots of agents and editors will say is once you've, you know, once you've got your story, once you've got your manuscript, your book, go to a bookshop and just genuinely think like, where would you, which shelf would you want to see it in?
00:27:59
Speaker
And like, where would you, I mean, you don't really get to choose cause it's based on where your surname lands, but you know, it's worth thinking about where, you know, which authors would you, would you be honored to be kind of beside and sit next to and things like that?
00:28:11
Speaker
Yeah, I agree.
00:28:12
Speaker
I think that is exactly, where do you want to be?
00:28:15
Speaker
Because there are things, there are quite, sometimes quite small things that end up, that can be tweaked depending on sort of, you know, where it is.
00:28:23
Speaker
And I think one of the most heartbreaking passes to get from editors is,
00:28:29
Speaker
I love this book.
00:28:30
Speaker
Absolutely love it.
00:28:31
Speaker
But it's, for me, it's falling between X and X and I need it to be one or the other.
00:28:37
Speaker
And, you know, sometimes you persevere and you find the publisher that does see a way forward to kind of break it out in between those categories.
00:28:44
Speaker
But if, if that's not what you want, you know, if you, if you are angling for, for sort of a more specific route, don't do yourself out of, out of it by not looking into it properly.
00:28:56
Speaker
Yeah, because it's also worth, I've had editors on the podcast too, and it's worth remembering that.
00:29:00
Speaker
So you as an agent will pitch into a publisher, it's going to be hard not to put it in a category, but then the editor, who's the person who you're essentially pitching to at the publisher, then has to pitch that to the marketing team.
00:29:13
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:29:13
Speaker
And the marketing team will not stand for this doesn't have a category.
00:29:18
Speaker
Yeah.
00:29:19
Speaker
And even more than marketing is sales because, you know, they have to go and stand in, you know, in front of Waterstones or whoever and say, you know, we essentially promise this is going to sell.
00:29:33
Speaker
And I think the thing that's really difficult is that they don't all always have time to read.
00:29:40
Speaker
So sometimes an editor is in an acquisitions meeting pitching a book to a room full of people that could be the most beautiful book in the world.
00:29:48
Speaker
But she hasn't managed to convince all those people to read the book ahead of the meeting.
00:29:52
Speaker
So all they're going off is, you know, a bit of it that they've read and kind of assurances of this is like this.
00:30:01
Speaker
So, yeah, it's really, it's, we tend to take more, agents take more risks because honestly we'll fall in love with something.
00:30:08
Speaker
We don't need to get anyone's approval, right?
00:30:09
Speaker
Like I'll just, you know, but if you don't want that to be the end of the road, then, yeah.
00:30:16
Speaker
Yeah.
00:30:17
Speaker
I mean, I think there's a lot of great advice and I hope people listening will have, will have, uh, find something interesting within that discussion.
00:30:24
Speaker
Cause there was a lot of great stuff there before we get onto the final question.
00:30:29
Speaker
Um, always go to ask agents, have you ever wanted to write anything yourself?
Respect for Writers & Personal Writing
00:30:35
Speaker
So yeah, obviously get asked that all the time.
00:30:37
Speaker
Currently, no.
00:30:39
Speaker
I love writing and I think, you know, what's that overused Dorothy Parker quote?
00:30:43
Speaker
I hate writing.
00:30:44
Speaker
I love having written.
00:30:45
Speaker
Like I love the feeling of looking at something I've written and going, oh, that's sparkly.
00:30:51
Speaker
But I haven't had, nothing has come to me that has made me want, I know how hard it is because I look at
00:30:57
Speaker
like I was doing it all day and that does not appeal I think um somebody gave me it was a editor in New York once gave me like amazing advice she was a writer as well and when she was much younger she was she was accepted into Iowa Writers Workshop and she went to the workshop and she was sitting there and she sort of had I think she had a publishing job I think she was maybe an editorial assistant and then she went to
00:31:21
Speaker
Iowa and she was like so prestigious you know I'm so happy I'm here but she just found herself sitting there and then the only bit that she enjoyed of it was the workshops it was like giving feedback and she said some people she was like giving me advice where she was like if you want to write don't work in publishing because it's the same energy and I think a lot of people have disproved that lately like I mean I have a client who's also an agent and
00:31:43
Speaker
is an amazing author and amazing agent.
00:31:45
Speaker
So I definitely don't think it's universally true, but I think there is, you know, she was talking about the kind of collaborative and generative creative energy and the fact that some people get more of like get their energy from
00:32:00
Speaker
generating from getting words down on a page and some people really get that creative kick from seeing what's there and shaping it um and i think i just absolutely love working with other people's sort of raw material it just doesn't tire me out like you know when you know that something is the right thing for you to be doing is that you can just like do it all day and sometimes i'll get off a call with a client and realize we've been talking for two and a half hours about like
00:32:27
Speaker
would this character do this?
00:32:29
Speaker
And I think, yeah, when, until either that stops being fun or the desire to write something becomes so overwhelming that I can't ignore it, I don't think it's going to happen because it's so hard, the whole process.
00:32:47
Speaker
So I really respect writers so much for putting themselves out there the way they have to, because it's an extremely vulnerable act.
00:32:53
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, it totally is.
00:32:55
Speaker
And there's definitely a distinction between, even if you're not, you know, what you work editorially with your clients, like most agents do, even if you're not doing, if you're just sort of like a writer and you're critiquing someone else's work, there's an energy that, like if I read one of my friend's manuscripts and I'll come at it with a different energy because I'm critiquing it.
00:33:15
Speaker
Yes.
00:33:16
Speaker
It is an entirely different approach.
00:33:19
Speaker
It just feels different, but there's something also really fulfilling about it.
00:33:23
Speaker
Yeah, completely.
00:33:24
Speaker
I think it's just so satisfying kind of getting something, particularly when
00:33:32
Speaker
I sometimes sign things.
00:33:33
Speaker
I'm like, I will sign books at a rougher stage than some agents will.
00:33:38
Speaker
I sometimes take people on, on a partial or because they've written something I think is incredibly compelling.
00:33:43
Speaker
And I know they will write an amazing novel.
00:33:45
Speaker
Like I have a few clients like that.
00:33:47
Speaker
So I'm often working from, from incredibly raw, a raw place with them.
00:33:53
Speaker
And I just love that I've got the space to do that, you know?
00:33:55
Speaker
And I think, I think if I was writing myself, I might not have,
00:34:01
Speaker
just the sheer level of patience I have for other people's work.
00:34:05
Speaker
Yeah, I know what you mean.
00:34:06
Speaker
Cause you can get, it's easier to get frustrated at yourself and then things and like that.
00:34:11
Speaker
But that's, that's, that's, that's a great insight.
00:34:14
Speaker
Maybe one day you'll write something, but at the moment you're, you're, you're happy where you are.
00:34:18
Speaker
Yeah, thrilled where I am.
00:34:20
Speaker
It's a dream job.
00:34:22
Speaker
Amazing.
00:34:22
Speaker
So that brings us to what is the last question and often dreaded question.
Desert Island Book Choice
00:34:29
Speaker
Kate, if you were on a desert island with a single book, which book would it be?
00:34:36
Speaker
I used to ask this when I was hiring people.
00:34:38
Speaker
This is like one of my standard questions.
00:34:39
Speaker
That's a good one.
00:34:41
Speaker
And everyone does dread it.
00:34:42
Speaker
But my answer is going to get me, people always roll their eyes at it.
00:34:47
Speaker
but it's Bridget Jones's diary by building.
00:34:52
Speaker
I reread it a lot anyway.
00:34:56
Speaker
I actually think she's a genius and anyone who hasn't actually read the original book should, because it is like in terms of characterization and,
00:35:05
Speaker
I think it's like second to none.
00:35:07
Speaker
And I really, yeah.
00:35:09
Speaker
I think the reason I would do that over, I have favorite books, right?
00:35:13
Speaker
Like if people ask me what my favorite book is, I always say Secret History, like I have, but there's some books that are just for rereading.
00:35:20
Speaker
And that is one of them.
00:35:21
Speaker
It's just like, if I was stuck on a desert island as a sort of relentless extrovert who loves going out, I think tapping into a world where everyone is just
00:35:33
Speaker
always three wines deep with their friends is where I'd want to be.
00:35:38
Speaker
But I think the reason that I can reread it as much as I have, and I mean, honestly, my copy of that book is in a state, it's actually in my office.
00:35:47
Speaker
And it is like the cover of which was once white is now like a deep gray.
00:35:51
Speaker
Yeah.
00:35:53
Speaker
is that it's just, I mean, you know, obviously it is based on another classic story, but it is just, it has everything.
00:36:00
Speaker
It has love, it has friendship, it has really, really sharp observation.
00:36:05
Speaker
And I think a book that's that easy to read, but also makes you cry, but it's also that like sharp, is rare.
00:36:13
Speaker
And that's why I keep reading it.
00:36:14
Speaker
Yeah.
00:36:16
Speaker
Well, that's a great choice.
00:36:17
Speaker
I mean, when you built up to it, I thought you were going to say Jane Austen, but you surprised me with Bridget Jones then.
00:36:23
Speaker
Just the 90s remake.
00:36:29
Speaker
Yeah, no, I do love Jane Austen, but I just, it's never, I'm not a classics gal.
00:36:34
Speaker
Okay.
00:36:35
Speaker
Okay.
00:36:35
Speaker
You like modern stuff.
00:36:37
Speaker
Yeah.
00:36:38
Speaker
Well, I mean, you mentioned even with your historical fiction that you're interested in, you like when it has a sort of modern twist to it or like it speaks to something that we relate to.
00:36:48
Speaker
You know, when like you're watching a period drama and everybody has the same strange sort of flattened pan style.
00:36:56
Speaker
european accent and everyone and i feel like there is a literary form of that and it's a lot of historical fiction where everyone is very like flattened and i think i just i like the i like the you know the sharpness of contemporary fiction so i if it has an historical setting and if someone can bring that sharpness to a historical setting i'm over the moon
00:37:19
Speaker
Oh, so something like, have you seen The Great?
00:37:22
Speaker
Yes.
00:37:22
Speaker
Oh my God.
00:37:22
Speaker
Something like that.
00:37:23
Speaker
Brilliant.
00:37:24
Speaker
I think it is.
00:37:26
Speaker
I mean, yeah, that's like the epitome.
00:37:27
Speaker
But yeah, I love that.
00:37:28
Speaker
I love that, you know, I mean, he's a truly appalling person, but in such a whimsical way, like whimsical, terrible people.
00:37:36
Speaker
That's yeah.
00:37:37
Speaker
Perfect.
00:37:38
Speaker
Or like I'm working on a book at the moment, which I'm extremely excited about, which is a
00:37:43
Speaker
It's set in the 30s in Hollywood and sort of a murder situation.
00:37:50
Speaker
And it's kind of, you know, all movie stars in the studio covering things up and the depression is happening sort of outside.
00:37:56
Speaker
But these people are so real, you know.
00:37:59
Speaker
And I think you kind of get that escapism of being in 1930s Hollywood, but ultimately you're relating to these people the same way you would if it was, you know, people in London right now.
00:38:13
Speaker
Yes, exactly.
Historical Fiction Preferences
00:38:14
Speaker
Yeah.
00:38:14
Speaker
Yeah.
00:38:14
Speaker
So the almost like this, and like you were saying with, with genre stuff before, it's almost like this, the setting is the settings, the setting, but it's, if the characters are very relatable and they go through kind of struggles that we, we all kind of go through, it's something like, I don't know if you watched the last of us.
00:38:28
Speaker
Yeah.
00:38:29
Speaker
Yeah, exactly.
00:38:29
Speaker
Where it's like, it's kind of pitched as this is a zombie show.
00:38:33
Speaker
It's not really about zombies.
00:38:34
Speaker
It's about people and just kind of surviving and relationships and stuff.
00:38:39
Speaker
Yeah.
00:38:39
Speaker
I think if you saw, like, if you ran most of my pitches through like some sort of
00:38:46
Speaker
Yeah, if you gave me a chatbot.
00:38:48
Speaker
I think it would be like, this is a this, but it's not really about this.
00:38:52
Speaker
Like it's, you know, I love where there is a hook and a difference and a place that's something that takes you to some sort of extreme.
00:38:58
Speaker
Because realistically, after what, two years where we all were trapped at home, I think we're done with like super...
00:39:07
Speaker
sedentary navel gazing for a while you know we want to see things and experience things in our fiction whether that's zombies or whether it's another time and place um but we still want that emotional realism you know yeah yeah yeah that's exactly how i pitch um ted lasso yeah to people i'm like yeah so it's about this guy that becomes a football manager but it's it's not about football i'm telling you it's not about football at all
00:39:33
Speaker
I am so obsessed with Ted Lasso.
00:39:36
Speaker
I was at my boyfriend's parents' place for Easter and was like, we spent like way too long trying to set up Apple TV for them because like you have to watch the show.
00:39:45
Speaker
You'll have it so much.
00:39:46
Speaker
Like I'm like physically getting involved in their setup just to spread the Ted Lasso gospel.
00:39:51
Speaker
Amazing.
00:39:52
Speaker
Well, I better wrap it up there.
00:39:53
Speaker
But thank you so much, Kate, for coming on and chatting with me and telling us all about your journey in publishing and your experiences as a literary agent.
00:40:01
Speaker
It's been really great chatting with you.
00:40:03
Speaker
Thank you so much for having me.
00:40:04
Speaker
And for anyone listening to keep up with what Kate is doing, you can follow her on Twitter at Kate E. Evans.
00:40:11
Speaker
And if you are thinking about submitting to Kate or any of the agents over at Peters, Fraser and Dunlop, go to the website.
00:40:18
Speaker
You can read all about them and you can go through all of the submission guidelines.
00:40:23
Speaker
To make sure you don't miss the episode of this podcast, follow along on Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook.
00:40:27
Speaker
You can support the show on Patreon and for some more silly bookish shenanigans, check out my other podcasts, The Chosen Ones and Other Tropes.
00:40:34
Speaker
Thanks again to Kate and thanks to everyone listening.
00:40:36
Speaker
We'll catch you on the next episode.