Agent Spotlight Series: Amy Elizabeth Bishop

Amy: Just a little under 50, at last count, but all in different stages—some are actively in development, some are on submission, some are under contract, and some are determining what they want to write next. In the early years, I think a lot of my list was figuring out what I could read a lot of, sell effectively, and enjoy working on. So I was trying a lot of different genres and age ranges, and pursuing things that I loved to read for pleasure. These days, I’ve made a sharper demarcation between what I love to read for pleasure and what I rep—for example, I love reading SFF, but my track record has not been amazing when it comes to selling it, which leads me to suspect that it’s maybe not the most viable genre for me. I also love a good Karin Slaughter novel for fun, but I absolutely cannot read dozens of crime fiction queries (the potential for offensive, violent material is…very high). I think my taste is much more defined now – I know what I’m looking for; I know what I’m good at selling; I have a better sense of what’s going to work or not. That being said, though, I always love being surprised by a manuscript. I just took on a hybrid work that admittedly might be a difficult sell—which I told the author—but the writing and message just blew me away. I couldn’t not sign the author up and try with it.

Amy: In the month of January, I #received 293 queries, asked for #8 fulls and #5 partials. I’m confessedly still working on sending rejections.

Amy: As any of my authors can probably tell you, I’m pretty hands-on! If I take a project on, it’s often because I do have a strong vision for the work. It’s not uncommon for me to do three or four passes with a project before sending it out on submission. That being said, I want to note that I really am looking for projects as polished and close to done as possible. My notes are ideally more in the vein of, “You could flesh X out more” or “Can we tease out this character motivation a little more,” versus “The pacing in the middle is dragging” or “You need to cut a POV.” I tell authors that when they’ve taken the manuscript as far as they can themselves and/or with critique partners or beta readers, then that’s likely a good time to submit. But chances are good that submitting a first draft is going to make for a tough querying road.

Amy: If you are a marginalized creator, I cannot talk #DVpit (and recently #DVCon) up enough—it’s headed up by the incredible powerhouse Beth Phelan. I do #DVpit every year and was part of the first #DVCon this year, which was an amazing experience. Pitch Wars is another big pitching event that still attracts a lot of attention in the industry and involves mentorship and revision before agents even see the work. I also always love the Muse & Marketplace conference put on by Boston’s GrubStreet every year, usually in April/May and I’ll be there again this year.  

Amy: Memoir is a big one here—unless you come with a big platform (social media numbers, writing credentials, bylines, etc.), terrific writing, or an extremely fresh story, it’s an area that’s very difficult to sell into these days. (And sometimes, even with all those factors, it might not work.) There’s also been some discussion for a couple of years now that the YA fantasy space has been getting crowded. That all being said—a brilliantly written and told story in a genre that’s “saturated” is still likely to find a home.

Amy: I read Carmen Maria Machado’s In the Dream House recently and was just…totally blown away. It’s the kind of book that I’m left wondering how it worked, but completely convinced that it did. Machado just demonstrates this incredible control over the structure of the book that keeps it moving along and cohesive, even as she plays with form and structure. And she’s just an absolutely brilliant writer.

Amy: That all we do is read all day! My regular work hours are usually spent on e-mail, doing more administrative work (answering e-mails from clients or editors; vetting contracts; putting together submission lists; sending submissions; talking with editors or authors, etc.,) and very rarely do I get to sit down with edits or reading until after I’ve closed my laptop for the day. I would say the majority of us do the bulk of our reading and editing after we’ve shut e-mail down for the night and on the weekends.

Amy: One of the big ones for authors I think, has been increased access. Conferences can often be really expensive with the cost of travel, hotel, and food added onto the conference fees, and I would guess that the remote conference format has opened up this possibility to more authors who might not have been able to travel to the conference for a variety of logistical reasons. I know personally I’ve loved being able to go to my author’s book launch events—usually, unless the client is NY based, I’m not able to go to their launch event, so it’s been fabulous to take part virtually.

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