When Agents Say No: Overcoming Setbacks

Lisa Ellison [0:00]
Well, hello, Jessica. Welcome to the Writing Your Resilience podcast. It is such a joy to see you again.

Jessica [0:06]
Oh my gosh, Lisa. I’m so excited to be here, and to see you too. It’s been too long.

Lisa Ellison [0:12]
It absolutely has. And so, if people are listening and they’re like, “Well, what does that mean?” Jessica and I worked together in Camp Structure. I got a chance to read her beautiful writing. She is an absolutely talented writer, and so it was such a privilege to work with her. I loved getting to see how she works, how she thinks, and how she approaches memoir.

Jessica [0:35]
Thanks, Lisa. Well, I learned so much in Camp Structure. So, thank you.

Lisa Ellison [0:40]
You’re very welcome. So, you came today with a powerful and important question that I know many listeners are going to be interested in. Would you like to share that question with all of us?

Jessica [0:53]
Sure. My question is about agent feedback, specifically dealing with especially discouraging agent feedback. And so, I’ll give you some context for the question. In early 2020, I had an agent reach out to me about an essay of mine that had been published in Best American Travel Writing. And she is the type of agent that really likes to work with writers kind of early in their process, before the book has been written. She likes to read through early pages and then work with the author to figure out, like, what the story is, what the structure is, and then they work together to put together a proposal that she then sells. And then, you know, you have an advance, and you write the book.

At the time, I didn’t have a project that I felt ready to do that with. So, we just agreed that we would be in touch, and I would reach out when I did have a project. And then I tried working on a couple of different projects, one of which I worked with Lisa on, and I just realized those projects related to what she had reached out to me about, but they were not things that I thought I could write. So, I started working on a different project after our conversation. And so, I kind of got to the point where I was like, I think I know what the story might be and what the structure might be. So, I reached out to her, and she said, send me 50 pages. And so, I did, and then she sent back her feedback in this kind of long email, and the email said, “One, nobody is buying a book about COVID. Two, nobody’s buying books about early parenthood, becoming a parent. And if anyone does buy that book, they’re just not going to support it,” which I think means they’re not going to really market it, right? And then, so her concluding paragraph was like, “I just don’t think that this is a good first project for you.”

And so, I’ve been sitting with that feedback for, like, six months now. And I know that I’ve tried to write—like, this is my third memoir that I’ve tried to write, and the other two have been abandoned. And I also know that I’m a perfectionist, and so I tend to kind of just, if I get negative feedback, feel like the whole thing is terrible, nothing salvageable, like, start over again, or just, like, throw it away. And so, I’m not quite sure how to work with or take her feedback, you know, yeah…

Lisa Ellison [3:12]
I’m so glad you brought this. And first, congratulations on having an agent reach out to you. That does not happen to everyone, and especially when it comes to agents who have more of an editorial bent, where they’re interested in developing a project. That means they believe in you. So, this agent believes in you and your talent and your ability to write. So, I want you to hold on to that as the number one thing. Another thing that tells me this agent respects you, and they believe in you, is the fact that they didn’t just request pages, they read those pages, and then they took the time to give you a long email with this feedback. I know it’s not the feedback that you wanted to hear, but you could have gotten someone that wrote two sentences, “Sorry, it’s not for me.” I mean, there are a lot of other ways this could have gone. So even though it wasn’t the feedback that you wanted, I want you to hear that these are all good things, and it speaks to your talent and to the strength of these pages, even if it’s not the project for that person.

Jessica [4:27]
Thank you, Lisa. I feel like I’ve been kind of so focused on what she said that all of that got lost in the shuffle. So, thank you for drawing that out.

Lisa Ellison [4:37]
Oh my gosh. It is so easy for all of us to lose sight of that, especially when our hopes and dreams are right on the surface, and we’re like, “Oh my gosh, I’m so close, it feels like a guarantee.” And then we find out that, you know, we’re not taking that stuff forward, right? Yeah, that’s hard for everybody. So, the feelings you have, I’m glad that you are owning them and making space for them, but I also want you to make space for this other stuff that shows your talent and all of the hard work you’ve put into this and your commitment to your craft, which I know is great because we’re going to put a couple of essays that you’ve written in the show notes so people can read your beautiful work, because I don’t want them to just hear me talk about it. I want them to have a chance to experience everything that you do, Jessica, because it truly is gorgeous. So, let’s just sit with that for a second.

Jessica [5:32]
Thank you. I’m someone who, and probably many people can relate to this, does not take praise very well. So, thank you, Lisa, that was very high praise.

Lisa Ellison [5:41]
You are very welcome, and it is very well deserved, and I’m glad that I can give it to you today. So, I want to unpack the feedback that you received, and, first, for anyone who’s listening and thinking, “Oh my gosh, you have to have an agent in order to publish,” that’s not true. Though, there are advantages to having agents. Okay, so I’m not saying that there aren’t advantages, but there are many ways that you can publish your work. So that’s number one.

The first thing I want people to know, is that agents are mostly interested in submitting work to the Big Five, which may be the big four at this point, because I know there are so many conglomerations. But they’re interested in the major publishers because those publishers are going to give the biggest advances. After all, an agent doesn’t get paid unless something sells, and they generally get about 15% of what the author gets. So, we’re going to say 10% for the sake of math. If you get $15,000 as an advance, and they were to get 10%, which we’ve already established as 15, they will get $1,500. Okay, so you see how that math works. So, they’re interested in getting the biggest advance they can. Another reason why they want to get a big advance is because when a publisher gives someone a larger advance, they’re more likely to market it. That doesn’t mean they’re going to market it well, but, you know, the larger advances are motivating factors for the publisher to put money behind this book to make sure it’s successful. That also means, though, that there is a lot of onus on the author to make sure that that book sells. So that money is a loan against your sales. And there are a lot of expectations. And for people who get really big advances, that can be amazing in the beginning, but if you don’t earn out, or you don’t have the kind of sales that they’re hoping for, that can affect your future ability to publish. So as the author, thinking about a career as a writer, having a big advance out of the gate is not necessarily in your best interest in terms of the longevity of your career because there are plenty of people who got the big advance, who wrote the book, but had mediocre sales. They never publish anything again, right? So, I’m just trying to give you a little bit of context as to what agents are thinking about.

They’re looking at the marketability, who they know, right? So, one thing that can happen in terms of rejections is that you come with a beautiful project, and either they don’t see your author platform or the demand being high enough to sell enough books to be able to earn out on an advance or earn out enough on an advance to have more longevity in your career. Or maybe it’s not in their area of interest. Like, maybe they hate kids, right? I mean, seriously, yes, someone might hate kids, hate parenting, or maybe they’ve had an issue with infertility. I mean, there could be all kinds of stories that can be going on as to why they would not want to work on a specific topic or the relationships they have with the editors at the different publishing houses. They don’t have the kind of relationship with a person who’s looking for that kind of book because agents are usually talking to the publishers and ask them, “What are you looking for? What are you interested in?” And so, they have a sense of what that is.

So, a no might not have anything to do with your project or what you are working on. It may have to do with all these business factors which are outside of the realm of the art, right? And so, it’s so hard when you get that feedback. And I’m speaking from experience, it’s so hard to compartmentalize that, or to have the distance to say, “Okay, it’s a business,” because this is your heart, this is your work, especially in memoir. Yeah, but these are the things that you want to think about big picture in terms of why someone might say no, or they might say no to a specific book.

And so now I want to talk about the specific pieces of feedback that you got so we can help you unpack. And as we’re talking about this, here’s what I want you to do, Jessica. I want you to just sit there and listen, okay? And I want you to see where does this hit you in your body, because my goal is for you to have some information that helps you digest this feedback and then helps you get back on your feet in terms of figuring out what you want to do with this project, which I’m going to say, do not scrap it. So, I’m already going to say that: do not scrap it, but really, just to get a sense of where you want to go with that.

So, number one, are we ready for COVID stories? I don’t know the answer to that question. What I think about is 9/11, you know, and there were so many people who wrote so many novels, memoirs, all kinds of essays, things that were important for them to process the experience of going through 9/11, especially if they were in the areas where the attacks happened. But it took a long time for everybody else to be able to consume that. And a personal example that I can say is difficult for me is that I live in Charlottesville, Virginia. The Unite the Right rally was here, and all of that happened less than a mile from my home. And I happened to be at a meditation for peace at the time when this was happening and then ended up on the downtown mall soon after Heather Heyer was killed. And so, I was in the middle of all that, and it felt like a war zone, and it was traumatizing. I mean, anytime I hear helicopters, they can take me back to that place. And so there have been several different documentaries that have been produced about that. And I think there was something that came out, gosh, maybe six months ago. Someone that I know in upstate New York, where I’m from, contacted me and said, “Hey, there’s a show about Charlottesville on, you need to watch it.” And back, I think, a year after all of this happened, there was this big documentary, and we have a big film festival, and many of us went to see this documentary. People that were just trying to understand and see what happened. And we all had this collective freezing and gasp, like you could feel it in the room, how hard it was for everyone to be there, because we—this was a lived experience, right? And so, when this friend of mine from upstate New York told me that this show was on, I think I watched about two minutes, and then I was like, yeah, no, right? So, I don’t know the answer in terms of the COVID piece, but I think that’s something to pay attention to and really look at. Are books and essays about COVID coming out that are directly talking about the experience of COVID, or is COVID in the background? Like, what’s going on there? Just be curious about that and see what other feedback you get.

The other thing is, you know, no one wants a book about early parenthood, and even if they do, they’re not going to support it. I don’t think that’s true, and this is the reason why. Stephanie Foo—I don’t know if you’re familiar with her work or not. She wrote What My Bones Know, which is a book about living with complex PTSD. She’s in the process of writing about new parenthood. So, she’s someone you may want to follow, just to see how she’s framing it. And she’s framing it as, how do you become a parent when you have complex PTSD and you were not parented, right? So, she has this really powerful essential question that has yet to be answered. So, when it comes to a space that is —what I’m going to call a common space, you know, COVID is a common experience we all had. Obviously, our experiences in COVID were different, but we all were there. And many people are parents, so it’s a common experience. You want to look at what has already been written, and what can you say in your book that’s different. A book that I think of is Ta-Nehisi Coates’ book Between the World and Me, you know, that was about parenting, and that was really about the talk that Black parents have to have with their children to keep them safe. It was really an examination of how Black bodies are seen in the United States, and what is that like for me as a Black man, and what I say to my Black son? So that was a very specific question within the realm of parenthood. And how many pages have you written thus far?

Jessica [14:59]
So, I guess, if you include all the things that are kind of drafty, it is about 50,000 to 55,000 words. Okay, I’m not committed to keeping all of them.

Lisa Ellison [15:10]
But you’ve got a good amount. And that’s almost a book. Here’s what I would say: the first few drafts of all memoirs are about what happened to me. That’s the essential question your book is asking and answering: what happened to me? Right? What was this like for me? And that is an important part of the process, and so I want you to continue to do that work, because it’s going to heal you. Even if this book is never published, it’s going to do important work inside you. And especially finishing the draft, getting past this one part is going to prepare you for whatever is supposed to be published, whether it is this book or something else, because what you want to do is really get clear about what happened to you. That’s the first level of the book. And then once that’s clear and grounded, then you begin to look at, “Okay, what else is in this space?” Is this a parenthood space? Is this an illness space? Is it something else? And you look at all the questions people have asked through their books, and then you say, “What can I ask?” And the very best way to do that is to engage with an audience so that you have a clear sense of what their questions are, because “what happened to me” is your question. It’s your question for you, but the question you’re eventually going to have is for someone else. And I think Stephanie Foo is a pretty savvy writer. I mean, she’s worked on This American Life and Snap Judgment, and she has produced stories for a really long time. So, I think the concept of thinking about what’s the question that everyone needs to have answered is pretty rote for her. So, I think she was able to come up with one in a way that’s clearer and easier than someone who’s a debut, right? The rest of us must wrestle, right?

Jessica [17:05]
Yeah.

Lisa Ellison [17:07]
Yeah.

Jessica [17:10]
All helpful. A lot to sit with, for sure. I do like what you said, though, about kind of the necessity of working through the draft, if just for myself. Right, to, you know, our resilience as writers, and the reminder that any work that you do in this book, even if the book is never published, it’s still really important work to do. And of course, also kind of the broader question as well, of, what is the broader question kind of running through this? Which, for sure, I think I have thoughts on that but may still be too close to the material to really have a sense of what it is. So that is also helpful.

Lisa Ellison [17:47]
And it may be, for whatever reason, the first essay that this agent read, she could see maybe the counterintuitive argument. She could see the essential question that might fit into a zeitgeist. So, an example that I would give is Tia Levings’ book, which just came out, A Well-Trained Wife: My Escape from Christian Patriarchy. Very clear question: how does Christian patriarchy impact us? How did it impact me and my relationship with others? And it fits within a zeitgeist, because books about cults and seeing Christianity as a cult is a hot topic. So sometimes, you’ve written something that fits within a zeitgeist, and it becomes very clear for an agent to say, “Oh, I know how that will be marketable.” Other times, it’s not as easy. But that doesn’t mean that a project doesn’t have merit, right? So, I would say, continue to believe in this, knowing that you are learning the skills it’s going to take you where you want to go.

There are many paths to publication, and there are a lot of writers who are having a lot of success in the small press market. I know several writers and my clients who are getting their books published in the small press market. And, you know, when you think about what is a good first project for someone, okay? And I think that this agent might actually have your best interest at heart in saying that, even though it wasn’t what you wanted to hear, in the sense that sometimes, from a marketability standpoint, from an “I can sell this to the Big Five,” having other books out might create some traction and interest in you as an author, that might make your memoir more marketable. So having narrative nonfiction books, research books—depends on what your interest is. For some people, that is the way in. Courtney Maum, who is someone that I just interviewed, who’s going to be at the beginning of the season, her episode will have aired in September. She’s written books in all kinds of genres, and the work that she did in these other genres created interest in her as an author, her platform, which she says on the podcast is writing, right? So, she had these books, and these books are her platform, and that gave a market for her to write her memoir. So sometimes an agent might be thinking in that way, like get some other writing together, get some other books under your belt to create that interest. But not everybody wants to do that.

Jessica [20:42]
I mean, I think I could see where she was going with that. And when I look at other people who have published memoirs about early parenthood, oftentimes it is not their first book that comes out, but I think I was kind of hesitating on abandoning this project, to start something brand new from scratch, because I was like, wait a minute, that sounds a little familiar, Jessica, but I do see what your point is. And I can also see where just the process of memoir writing, because time can be your friend in a way, you know, to get the perspective that you need. I could see where in 10 years, her comment makes sense in the scale of, you know, how I look back on how this all unfolds. I just was having a hard time thinking through how to move through the next year of it, right? So.

Lisa Ellison [21:28]
Right, yeah. And so, take some time to figure that out and decide: do I want to build the kind of platform through writing that would make a memoir more marketable? Or do I want my memoir to be the foundation upon which I write other books? Because there are plenty of people who also do that. So, Allison Hong Merrill wrote Ninety-Nine Fire Hoops. And so, this memoir, which she published through She Writes Press, has done very, very well. It’s won lots of awards. So, she published this through a hybrid press, and because she put her all into marketing it into getting awards and all these other things, now she does have an agent, and she does have other publications, and so it has opened doors for her. So, I think there are several different ways that you can do this, and there can be some wisdom to publishing with a small press, building that backlist, getting yourself out there, and then figuring out what is the next project. So those are viable options as well as self-publishing, right? You know, that’s, I think, been a dirty word for a long time. But it’s changing. I mean, do you have some hills to climb if you’re going to self-publish? Yes. However, you can also get all the rewards if you’re willing to do the work. Denise Massar, she just wrote a book about adoption, and she was trying forever to get her book published. And, you know, she had an agent. They shopped it. Had the heartbreaking experience of everyone saying no, and then she was wondering, do I want to scrap this? And then she had a health issue in the middle, and this is not a secret. I will actually add the Jane Friedman blog post that she wrote specifically about this to the show notes, so, you know, I’m not speaking out of turn, but she got really clear about what was important to her, and what was important was finishing this project, you know, emotionally and tangibly, and holding her book in her hand, and she was willing to take that step. Ingrid Clayton is another person who did that. And Ingrid, she decided that she was going to self-publish her book after what was it? She queried 99 agents. She sold over 11,000 copies of her book. It’s probably more than that at this point. She sold a lot of her self-published book, right? So, she sold a lot. Now she has an agent, and she sold this other project that is going to be coming out. So, there are lots of ways to do this, and so I want you to take your power back. Because I think when we get rejections like this, it can feel so disempowering, yeah, but you have options, right?

Jessica [24:35]
Yeah, thank you, Lisa. I mean, I think I’m used to kind of the feedback from other writers, but you can kind of gauge it. But when it’s from an agent who’s, experienced and, you know, talking about the industry, that makes you feel like it’s like a capital I industry, and there’s all these secrets, and you know nothing about it. It can feel like it carries different weight, which, I mean, I’m sure it carries a different kind of weight. But it doesn’t mean, like you said, that there aren’t many paths, or also that there’s not many ways to go forward from it.

Lisa Ellison [25:05]
Absolutely. And the reality is, one person said this to you, right? And I think Brett Anthony Johnston, who is an award-winning novelist, I was at a conference once, and he read all the rejections that he had gotten on his book. And one was like, “It reveals too much.” And the next one was, “It reveals not enough.” So, I mean, what you want to pay attention to when you’re querying anyone is to look more at the trend versus individual responses, because the trend will tell you if there truly is an issue. You know, if 10 people or 20 people say, “Yeah, parenting is not a good fit right now, nobody’s taking COVID,” then you have to say, okay, maybe it’s not the time, or maybe I don’t have the question right. But if you just have one bit of information, that could very well be just that person’s opinion. So, what do you want to take away from this conversation?

Jessica [26:08]
I want to take away from this conversation… You know, I think it was helpful to think about the layers to finding an essential question. And that, I think hearing the many examples of the different types of essential questions that you have seen out there for this topic is one that I will kind of sit with as I continue working on it. I guess one of the things I’m taking away is that I will continue working on it. Yes. Thank you, Lisa, for this. Yeah, you know, the thought of one opinion, for sure, is a helpful one. And I think the reminder that, you know, oftentimes, like, I can get really tunnel-visioned into, like, either the negative part of the feedback or the kind of single path that seems to be apparent. And so really remembering that it’s a wide number of paths that are available and those paths are still unwritten. You know, mixing metaphors, but you know that part of it is not yet defined, so there’s still plenty of ways to go forward with this.

Lisa Ellison [27:15]
And so I always like to end with three lightning-round questions. What is the best piece of writing advice you’ve received?

Jessica [27:24]
I don’t think she meant this as advice, but I take it as advice. So, Sue Grafton is, was a really prolific mystery writer, and she said for her that, for her, writer’s block boils down to either she needs to do more research, or she took a wrong turn in the plot. And for me, that was helpful, because I think writer’s block feels like something that happens to you, and you just have no control over how to get around it or when it’s going to lift. And she reminded me that your own work contains great data points, and you can mine your own experience for patterns, and not just patterns of what tends to block you, but like, how do you get yourself out of it? And so, I really loved her comments for that. I guess I don’t know if it’s advice, but yeah,

Lisa Ellison [28:04]
I love that. So that is some great advice on writer’s block, and getting rejections can be one of the things that causes writer’s block.

Jessica [28:21]
True.

Lisa Ellison [28:21]
So how are you holding space for yourself and how are you nurturing your resilience as you sit with this feedback?

Jessica [28:21]
Kind of in line with being too tunnel-visioned on, you know, certain kinds of negative feedback, I often tend to forget about my own accomplishments, or, you know, times when I have picked myself up from difficult times in the past. And so, my husband is actually a really great reminder. He’ll be like, “Well, I don’t think you’re a terrible writer because Best American Travel Writing doesn’t think that of you, right?” But, also, for me, kind of intentionally going back through what I have done before, I have a file that I’ve kept of every nice thing any person has ever said about this project. And so, it’s helpful to read that sometimes. So those are some of the things I’m doing.

Lisa Ellison [28:59]
Well, I’d like you to go and read those things, and then I want you to handwrite the top five or ten things that people have said, and I want you to have them in your writing space, and I want you to read them every day.

Jessica [29:19]
Oh my goodness. That… Okay. That really hit there. So, yes, homework. Absolutely yes.

Lisa Ellison [29:24]
Homework is great. And I have that file too. And there are times when I have to open it up. You have to really fill your cup, because this is an industry that can drain it out very quickly. So, fill your cup. That’s the one most important thing you can do. And if people want to connect with you, want to learn more about your writing or just say hi, what are the best ways for people to connect with you?

Jessica [29:49]
I have a website, jessicayen.com. That’s a good way to find me right now.

Lisa Ellison [29:56]
Wonderful. Well, that will be in the show notes, and I am going to be emailing you to get a couple of your essays so that we can also put them in there, because, again, you are a gorgeous writer. I have enjoyed every piece of writing that you have ever shared with me, and I know that your success is on the way. It’s a matter of time and just continuing to do the work.

Jessica [30:19]
Thank you for those kind words, Lisa, and thank you really for everything that you are doing for all of us memoirists trying to find our way through our pages. So, thank you.

Lisa Ellison [30:30]
You are very welcome and thank you for being on the podcast today.

Jessica [30:30]
Thanks for having me.