In this profession, we all want an agent. Someone to be our advocate, who will champion us and sell our work for oodles of money. Finding an agent isn’t easy, and finding the right agent for you is even harder. Thats because not every agent does every thing. Some don’t like to read and offer opinions or revisions to their clients. Some are very editorial. Some are only comfortable with specific genres, some just want a good story, no matter what genre.
Laura Bradford has been in the publishing arena for fourteen years. She’s been an editor, a writer and bookseller. Now she’s a literary agent. In fact, she’s the Bradford Literary Agency. And she’s our guest blogger today.
How dark is too dark?
by Laura Bradford
One of my authors gave me the idea for this blog topic when she asked me to read a chunk of her latest work-in-progress with the question, is this too dark? In my work I have to always be mindful of marketability but really I have a pretty high tolerance for darkness and I have been known to like some intensely dark material. Like alienatingly dark. Give me a character who commits a despicable act and then make me love them. Give me a character that is morally gray and make me sympathize with their choices. I even know where this deep love of mine came from.
Like most everyone in this business I grew up an avid reader. When I was a kid, I got a $5 allowance every week (or was it every month? Dang, that part of my memory is awfully foggy) and I would go straight to the bookstore and spend it. Back then you could buy two kids or YA books for $5…in my case usually Nancy Drew or something elevating like Sweet Valley High. Anyhoo, one week when I was 11, I was at the bookstore and I found a book that totally changed everything for me—btw, thank you Waldenbooks, Southland Mall, Hayward, California for your badly mis-shelved young adult section. Because there amongst the Sweet Valley High books and the Nancy Drew Files was an Anne Stuart romantic adventure trilogy. It promised romance, it promised adventure and danger and intrigue. With spies. It looked…titillating. I bought the first book and started reading it while I waited for my mom to pick me up. Some emergency had happened and she was late that day—this was before cell phones so pretty much I was stuck sitting there until she showed up. I read that entire book while I waited as if a whole other universe had opened up for me and it totally had. I lapped up the other two books in the series as quickly as the first.
At the time I didn’t know that these were my first genuine adult romance novels but moreover, these were also my first what I would call “ballsy” reads. It is funny how much you can get formed by your early reading life, but seriously, like a baby duck I imprinted on those Anne Stuart books like you don’t even know. Also, to this day, if I ever run into Anne Stuart at a conference, I am incapable of not gushing all over her like a crazy fangirl. Makes no difference that I have been involved in publishing for a decade—underneath it all we’re all just book lovers at our cores. I think she has probably heard my story about how her Maggie Bennett books were my first romances about six times now but to her credit she never told me to get lost and leave her alone. These books have been out of print for a very, very long time now so hopefully you will forgive me the slight spoiler. The first book in the trilogy is completely a romance: boy meets girl, they fall in love (as bullets fly and they are on the run for their lives, around the world and back) and they end up together, happily ever after. The second two books in the trilogy have a vastly different, much darker tone and unfortunately, when book two opens, our hero from book one has been gunned down in the street and our heroine is a grieving widow. In Romancelandia, this is a pretty monumental sin. In book two, we learn that hero number two is guilty of committing an act that is completely unforgivable and the darkness continues on into book three. From soup to nuts, collectively the trilogy was an exercise in ballsy writing, risk taking, defying convention and being unafraid to explore some dark spaces. Of course at 11 I didn’t know there were romance rules. I had no clue that Stuart had taken a huge risk alienating her readers. I just knew that it spoke to me. And moved me. And thoroughly compelled me like nothing else ever had. She is still a ballsy writer today and I love the thrill of opening up one of her books hoping that as I read and she is throwing the writerly punches, she doesn’t pull a single one. Anyone out there read her Night Fall or Moonrise? Dude. There are no words. Talk about dark. Maybe I should call this blog, In Praise of Not Pulling Punches. Her Ice books embody these qualities, too and I love them.
I think that through exploring darkness in characters, you often end up exposing their layers. A layered character is certainly a richer, more compelling character to me. No one is all good or all bad…I like ‘em complicated and messy. I like it when good characters do bad things. I like it when bad characters do good things. So back to my author who had asked me to look at her scene with a question about whether or not it was too dark–if it is important, it is a scene in which the hero and heroine (who have not yet fallen for each other) get into a rather serious scuffle. I ask, what would happen if he was cruel…what would happen if he didn’t pull HIS punch? What would that reveal about his character? And would you still be able to make me love him? As a reader, I want to see all that flawed humanity. To use a more contemporary example than my nostalgia-laden references to OOP Anne Stuart books, has anyone read Heartsick by Chelsea Cain? It has this quality in spades and it is awesome on the complicated, fabulously layered character front. So. Now that I have rambled on about story elements that melt my personal butter for a while (thanks for listening), I will throw it open to anyone who wants to ask me Agent-y questions. I’ll stick around today and check the comments. Thanks for having me, GenReality!
About the Bradford Literary Agency:
At the Bradford Literary Agency, we specialize in all types of romance (including category), romantica/erotica, women’s fiction, mystery, thrillers and young adult. We also represent non-fiction and other fiction genres. All queries sent to us will be considered with the exception of poetry, screenplays and short stories.
We do not charge reading fees for evaluating your material.
We are an editorial-focused agency and prefer to work closely with our authors in helping to build strong, sustainable careers. We believe the best author-agent relationships extend beyond making sales; in order to best serve our clients’ needs, we must also be a partner, an advisor, a careful listener, a troubleshooter and an advocate.
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What a great story! I think I need to read those early Anne Stuart’s. I’ve read a great by her over the years; she’s one of my favorite authors.
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Hi, Laura. Interesting post.
I may melt your personal butter yet, lol.
~~Raine Weaver
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Great blog! I enjoyed the story as to how you discovered Anne Stuart…but I was intrigued by how you don’t mind exploring dark avenues!
With that said, I hope you’ll enjoy WITCHY WOMAN, when it gets there!!
Thanks!
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Great post, Laura. I agee. Anne Stuart grabbed me around the throat and wouldn’t let go from the first time I read her. I love her risk taking work.
A question: I believe you mostly rep romance (mine included), so do you come up against resistence or hesitency from the editors you work with when submitting dark and dangerous work? I’m not talking about vampires, shape shifter, etc, which we’ve all become comfortable with, but the true dark in real life, the kind Anne tackles?
Vonna/Vella
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Hi Vonna,
It depends. Whenever you are venturing beyond what is considered straight-up-the-middle mainstream (and I don’t mean general mainstream fiction, rather the tried and true themes of whatever genre you write), you are taking the risk that you could push away readers rather than pull them in. If I know I am pitching something pretty daring, or polarizing, I go into it expecting (and I prepare the author to expect) that some editors will HATE it. But I also expect that some editors will LOVE it. That kind of thing tends not to inspire a lukewarm reaction. It is great if you can please everybody but really, how often does that happen? Taste is very subjective, even within the boundaries of what is marketable and there are plenty of editors out there that share my opinion on darkness and intensity and the need to keep things new. It is just a matter of putting said dark and intense work in front of the editors that really value those qualities.
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Laura, thank you for loving dark and signing me, when my own book scared me to death. Another agent rejected me with this line:’The evil sexiness of this dark,twisted tale drew me in.’ Too bad it can’t be used as a cover quote.
Thanks for all you’ve done, and yay for Anne Stuart!
Here’s my question: Can an agent ever have ‘too many’ clients?
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Sure. Everyone has a different capacity and unless you are really in touch with your personal capacity, it can be easy to overshoot. The truth is that even with a fixed number of clients, the workload associated with that group can wildly fluctuate for varying reasons. If I have 10 authors (for example) and all ten are happily under contract and none of them are sending me anything new to pitch and they are all established authors without any need (or desire)for editorial input, I frankly would have very little to do with my time. But if all ten were brand new debut authors, all ready to pitch first projects and we are going over each full ms with a fine tooth comb making sure they are as ready as they can possibly be to pitch, my workload would be enormous. Newer authors generally have more questions, more concerns than folks that are accustomed to the process. Newer authors (new to me or new to publication) generally require more time and labor than established authors. Then once that author is under contract, the primary editorial contact is the editor, not me. And hopefully, the author will be happy with their new editor and publisher and the process will run smoothly which further reduces my workload. So the trick, really, is to have a well-balanced list with a mix of newer and established authors, a mix of authors under contract and ready to pitch new material. That way, the natural fluctuations of everyone’s careers stay manageable. And even with the best intentions and planning, stuff will happen like seven authors sending me full mss for editorial input in the same week, all with time-sensitive deadlines, LOL. But that is a matter of circumstance rather than a problem with the overall size of the list.
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Laura,
This is an excellent subject. I write inspy / sweet romance, and it’s tough to decide when my writing gets too edgy for the market. The trend seems to be leaning toward more edgy, less preachy.
Do you have any thoughts regarding this genre?
Thanks for your honesty and for this discussion. It’s great to meet you!
~Ashley
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Unfortunately, I don’t really handle inspirational, which is a fairly specialized market. It is my understanding that there are a set of CBA (Christian Booksellers Association) guidelines with regards to what is acceptable content and most inspirational imprints more or less adhere to it so that their books can be carried not only in the Borders and Books-A-Millions of the world but also the speciallized Christian bookstores. Now it is a huge market and it has been growing and flourishing and I know that there are plenty of folks that read inspirationals because they prefer a sweeter read, not necessarily because they are looking Christian read. I really couldn’t comment on recent trends in this area, however. It seems to me that if CBA retailers compose a large segment of where inspirationals are sold, it might pose a serious financial issue for a publisher to publish a book that contains a theme that is verboten according to CBA guidelines, especially if it means that book would then lose those distribution venues.
With secular publishing, it isn’t really black and white with regards to distribution. If a publisher publishes a book with a hero that is an assassin (let’s say) who it turns out brutally murdered his mother and spent his teenage years as a prostitute on the streets, it is possible some people won’t LIKE that character, or they’ll find the story too dark. It is possible that Borders will hear that pitch from the publisher’s sales team and decide to only order 2000 copies instead of 7000 copies but even a dark, edgy theme in secular fiction won’t necessarily mean that automatically 1700 retailers won’t carry it because of content, the way it might with CBA retailers and an inspirational that violated the specified guidelines.
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that’s a great answer, Laura!
Thanks so much for your take on things. Ultimately it does come down to distributors, book stores, and actual print runs.
Have a great afternoon!
Ashley
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Thanks for the post! Any tips for authors on how to keep those punches flying?
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I think it is important to always throw those what if questions at your characters. Sometimes they just want to keep zigging on you and you have to make them zag now and then. If your heroine is a mild mannered social worker looking for love, WHAT IF when she was 15 she concealed a pregancy from her family and friends, secretly gave birth in her basement and threw the baby away? You might find out that what if turns your character into a detestable person. Or that what if might reveal some really compelling layers in that character and turn the story in an entirely new, fresh direction. WHAT IF she is hiding an addiction to meth? I don’t advocate adding drama for drama’s sake because that can sometimes read as being really obviously glopped on, but if you ask your characters some questions and allow for a whole universe of darkness for answers, you might discover some really awesome depth. At the end of the day, it never hurts to just ask.
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Book one of paranormal series becomes darker as the book unfolds. The second and third are dark from the get go. The villain is creepy from the beginning yet the reader knows what started it. The heroine does not. And the hero, let’s just say, the villain has some really weird moments with him. It pushes the envelope, but doesn’t go too far.
The best compliment I received on the villain was when a beta reader told me that the villain scared her but she still felt bad for him.
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I went to your website to look around and wanted to let you know the formatting on Recent Deals pages seems to be messed up.
I write YA fantasy with romantic subplots. Is that something you’re interested in seeing? When people say YA lately it’s nearly synonymous with fantasy; do you require romance? I see you rep Ann Aguirre, who is (at least here) shelved in the SFF aisle. When subbing my last book I had trouble because everyone wanted YA, but didn’t take adult fantasy, so I never knew if I should submit to them.
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Oooh. I’ll have to go looking for that old Ann Stuart adventure trilogy. I love authors who break rules.
Great post, Laura!!
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Thanks for coming by, Laura.
Question: Do you consider the long term career goals of your client when you shop their work? What if a client just wants to sell, and doesn’t care for planning the future?
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Long term goals are important. So are short term goals. Ideally, any sale you make will serve both sets, but of course that doesn’t always happen. If the long term goal is to become a solid mid-lister in the genre of romantic suspense with 2 single titles and at least 2 mass market anthologies each year and the short term goal is to be able to pay the mortgage in 3 months because you are out of savings and you basically need a sale yesterday at this point, then that is a tough spot to be in. Paying the mortgage is no less a worthy goal than those plans for midlist RS. So let’s say we have two options. Your current publisher wants you to write another futuristic BDSM menage erotic romance because a slot opened up for next year and it is yours if you want it. Now you have been wanting to get out of erom, you have an idea for a killer RS and you need to write a full ms so it can be pitched. If you decide to take the erom slot, it will be six months before you can get back to the RS. On the other hand, you won’t be homeless while you are writing it. Obviously you are the one that has the say on what direction you decide to go…my job is to present the options and advise. But I would never slam an author for favoring the short term goal over the long term goal. My preference is that there is a plan and a long term goal whether or not in the short term we are willing to, or able to serve it.
It is tough for an agent when an author doesn’t really have a focused direction. I do have authors come to me and tell me they have a YA and an epic fantasy and a cookbook and a poetry collection and a couple of romances and can I help them sell their work. I get that people have varied interests–I know I certainly do, but publishers, especially in the areas of genre fiction aren’t interested in just buying books 1 at a time (generally) or letting their authors skip around the genres and write one of these and one of those without any care for building readership. So when I do encounter an author who writes in multiple genres, who is multiply talented in those genres, we usually pick one type of book to focus on first with the understanding that they might need to write 3 or 4 of those before it makes sense to make a jump to something else. And then some people have the capacity for multiple contracts and that has a whole other set of considerations.
Certainly sometimes an author simply wants to be a working author and doesn’t really aspire to a specific status. They just want to keep writing and keep selling and keep paying their bills on their writers income. I’d say that IS a long term goal. As long as that author is prepared to work in concert with the people that are buying their work and paying them (e.g. you don’t really have much interest in writing books about serial killers, but you are capable and they are “in” and publisher x will pay you for them) it can be workable. I do think it can be boggy territory though. I’m not really an agent who throws a bunch of stuff at the wall to see what sticks, so I don’t advocate that methodology when it comes to selling my authors’ work. Beyond that, if the author’s writing interests are REALLY far flung, it can be difficult to serve their needs if they want to venture into territory that is outside the agent’s sphere of knowledge.
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Great post Laura!
I have a question in regards to your topic, Have you ever come across something so dark and twisted, that even though you loved it, you knew it was a no sale? What do you do in that instance if that were the case…or is there nothing taboo?
(I have to say as I read your post I can hear your voice in my head and it kinda makes me laugh!)
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You aren’t the first person to tell me they could hear me in their head when they read that blog entry. It was possibly because of the section where I said, Dude!
In answer to your question… the answer is both no, never and yes, all the time. The truth is, when dealling with dark themes and darkness in characters, the devil is in the details and in how that darkness is balanced and mitigated. As far as I am concerned, you can get reallyreallyreallyreallyreallyreally dark and dance jigs in taboo-land as long as you can make me care about the characters and the story and feel compelled to keep reading. I defy you to name a dark element or theme that hasn’t already been done in fiction. Incest? Rape? I have seen those themes in Young Adult. Murder? Suicide? Starvation? Done, done and done. Now admittedly some genres can be more forgiving than others when it comes to darkness, so something that would normal for a horror novel might be horrifying in a romance. But if you mitigate the circumstances, create the right reason for a character to do something horrible and make me continue to care for them, then there is some real power there. And if I can still be convinced to care about that character and that story, well I venture to say that so can an editor, a publisher and a reader picking up the book in a store to buy. So that is why I say no, nothing is too taboo for me to consider selling.
As for why I ALSO say, yes, it happens all the time that I encounter material that is too taboo to consider selling, it is about whether that darkness has balance in the story. Let’s say for example I read two submissions back to back both with protagonists that have say…killed someone in their past by setting them on fire. If treated right, one could be totally gripping, heart wrenching, explore the very depths of desperation, make me mourn for that character’s damaged soul, and totally understand and accept why they did what they did. And the other…could just totally be gross. And gratuitous. And not reveal one thing about the character other than they were detestable then and detestable now.
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Great post! Thanks for sharing.
-Candy Havens
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God those Maggie Bennett books are awesome. I’m so lucky to have a friend who introduced me to them or I may have never known about those early books.
I love dark books. I love that big time, round the bend, Donner Party dark stuff!