#15:  Joe Konrath has spoken about the gate-keeping mentality of agents.  It’s obvious, of course, why they don’t like eBook self-publishing.  Joining the ranks still propagating the myth of legacy publishers (this myth states that an author needs an agent, editor, publisher, and publicist, although the agent only gets you out of the slushpile and to the publisher, and the publisher rarely helps you with marketing, while all four reduce your royalties to nothing), the author will find many reviewers.  Among these, one will find those who concentrate on “literary fiction” (they generally also refuse to consider anything self-published—I refrain from giving examples, some of them very well known).

This sort of snobbishness is exactly what I was talking about in my blog post “Writing for Readers”—these reviewers comprise the old boys’ club of literature.  Of course, I’m biased too!  I think “literary fiction” is a genre name that is snobbish all by itself since it implies that all other fiction is not literary.

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#8:  Look for my short story “The Bridge” in the October edition of eFiction magazine.  I highly recommend this eZine to every reader…something for everyone!  It is available online for free and as an inexpensive Kindle subscription on Amazon (the latter has a free trial offer).

#9:  The Perseus Books Group has announced a new eBook formatting service.  As I understand it, this service will primarily be offered through agents to authors they are representing, but MAYBE to some indie authors.  Duh!  I’m sure indie authors will rush to use this service.  Whoops!  They still have to find an agent.  Since every agent is wondering what to do in this digital revolution when authors really don’t need them, I suppose this is a bow to that disappearing profession.  Don’t get me wrong—all that agent expertise is very valuable.  However, this is not the place for it!

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To my readers,

This will appear as an occasional feature as part of my blog.  In lieu of a newsletter, I will post things here that are newsworthy, little bulletins about fellow authors or yours truly.  Some of these will be repeated on my Facebook Fan Page, but the FB programmers are really starting to get on my nerves, so this is the first place to check.

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