“How did you find your agent?”
I bought a copy of the Writers’ and Artists’ Yearbook.
I searched for an agent who was looking for high-concept crime.
I found Harry Illingworth, who worked at an agency called DHH Literary Agency. After reading a few interviews he’d given, he seemed the perfect fit.
I sent him the first thirty pages of my book, a synopsis of the story and this cover letter.
“Dear Mr Illingworth,
Hope you’re having a cracking day.
I saw an interview you gave on the Alasdair Stuart blog about the stories you were looking for in 2016 and I’m hoping my book, The Masquerade, scratches a couple of those itches. It’s a crime novel set in the 1930s about a man who must solve an ingenious murder in order to escape a day that keeps repeating over and over again. Every time he wakes up he’s in the body of a different suspect – allowing him to interact with his former and future selves, not all of whom want to help him.
When people ask about the book I tell them it’s Agatha Christie meets Groundhog Day, though anybody who enjoys The First Fifteen Lives of Harry August, David Mitchell novels or an old-fashioned head-scratcher should get a kick out of it.
It’s 100,000 words long and my first novel, though I’ve been a technology and travel journalist since modems were a thing. I’d really like to build a career writing commercially successful genre fiction based around big ideas and I’m hoping you’ll be interested in helping me.
Since finishing The Masquerade, I’ve written a couple of short stories, one of which was longlisted for the BBC Radio 4 Opening Lines competition while the other won the Brighton & Hove Libraries short story prize.
When I’m not scowling at plot holes, I’m hiking, diving, playing with a gizmo or being lost in a foreign country. At least three of these things are usually happening at once.
Anyway, I hope you enjoy the pages,
All the best,
Stu
He liked it, we met for a coffee and now he’s my agent.
* the smallprint. Getting an agent is really hard. They receive hundreds of submissions a month and will probably take on a few clients a year. Make sure your submission is polished to within an inch of its life. Not just those first thirty pages, but the synopsis and cover letter. It’s all important. I sent my submission to five agents, three of whom rejected it flat out. Two wanted the full thing, and one of them - not Harry - requested I strip out many of the sci-fi elements, telling me it wouldn’t be a success otherwise. It’s a tough gig pals. Hang in there.