At the ring of a bell, the pitches begin. Seated across from each other in folding chairs, agent and author start to talk. The author gets three minutes to convince the agent that his idea is worth representing. The atmosphere is, not surprisingly, hectic. Three minutes feels like no time at all, and the bell seems to ring incessantly. Everyone's talking at once, filling the room with the sounds of conviction. It's a publishers' edition of speed dating.
Meet the Agents Day, a yearly event started by agent Michael Larsen in 2001 and presented by the S.F. chapter of the Women's National Book Association, attracts about 100 aspiring authors to Fort Mason for a rare glimpse of multiple agents in one room at once. Larsen, along with his business partner and wife Elizabeth Pomada, also hosts an almost-monthly get-together for Bay Area agents at his and Pomada's house in Nob Hill. Of the 25 to 30 local agents who work here, around 10 to 20 meet regularly to talk about the biz, share advice, listen to the occasional speaker, and dish about nasty editors.
No one knows exactly how many writers there are in the Bay Area, but everyone seems to agree that the number is huge -- and rising quickly. As Larsen explains, "More people are working on books here than probably anywhere but New York." Most locals have computers, which makes writing and research easier, and with the dot-com bust they've also got more free time; it may be that all those unfulfilled creative types who fell into tech PR are finally writing that novel. Meanwhile, the Bay Area's agent community has also been expanding (three or four people launched agencies in the last year), albeit slowly and steadily (there are about 1,700 agents in the country). The ratio of writer to agent is growing here, and with so many publishers subsumed by huge conglomerates and so many editors overwhelmed by sales quotas, writers need savvy advocates more than ever. It's the Golden Age for Bay Area agents.
Josephine Carlton, a stylish blonde in a black suit with a short skirt, got her first book published without an agent; she's come to Meet the Agents Day for "support." "You need someone in there helping you out, gunning for you," she says. As she describes her latest idea to one of the newer agents, she pushes a copy of her book, Life Messages, across the table, ticking off important points on her well-manicured hands.
Her experience with her first book is a good example of why agents are important. Carlton researched publishers herself, read books on how to get published, and sent her manuscript to nine houses before she got a positive response. What she hadn't anticipated was the complicated nature of negotiating a book contract -- a frightful morass of legalese -- and then the constant calling and following up needed to stay connected to the editor and publicist. As she explains, "It's a lonely world out there," and an unknown, unproven author doesn't have a lot of clout. An agent can navigate those negotiations and make that connection much more easily.
It used to be that since most publishing houses were in New York, people believed that agents had to be in New York, too. But now, with e-mail and a Web site, an agent can work from home and keep in touch with clients and editors from around the country. In the last five to seven years, explains agent Linda Mead (one of the black-clad participants at Meet the Agents Day), "It started to get really clear that you didn't have to have an agent on the East Coast." She continues, "A lot of agents have clients they've never met face to face."
The Bay Area may even have an advantage in representing authors because its agents are so close-knit. New York's agent community is "more cutthroat and defensive," says Elizabeth Pomada. "You couldn't get another agent to say, 'Take this project to such-and-such an editor.' It's business first, friendship second." The agents here help each other out with advice and recommendations. Pomada and Larsen have done a lot to create a more collegial, informed community in the Bay Area through their house parties -- which attract agents from the Peninsula to the Marina, Walnut Creek to Tiburon -- and through Meet the Agents Day.
The event is a perfect example of why agents here have it so good. The setting is gorgeous: Out the conference room's window, the bay shimmers in the wintry sunlight. The writers are copious and focused, because with only three minutes per meeting ("Plenty of time to pitch a work," says Linda Mead), agents don't have to spend a lot of time educating them about how or what to pitch; the agents can simply listen, evaluate, and move on. And after that, they all go out to lunch. Anyone for Elaine's?
