Five essential steps for submitting to literary agents

Lots of people follow Words and Pictures because they are writing and/or illustrating a book and hope to one day find a literary agent.

If you want to be traditionally published, getting an agent is (pretty much) essential, but for many people knowing how to do this, or even where to start can feel overwhelming.

So, today I’m going to share a step by step guide about how exactly to submit to literary agents.

Before you move on to the process of how to actually submit to an agent, you need to do some homework.

You need to be able to answer yes to all of the questions below before you’re ready to submit:

• Do you understand the pros and cons of having an agent and do you still want one?

• Is your work submission ready?

• Is it a good time of year to submit?

• Have you planned how to pitch your manuscript?

• Have you written a query letter?

If you don’t know where to start with the above, don’t panic, I’ve already written several posts about literary agents sharing everything from what they do to how to write a query letter. You can find them all linked below:

Do you really need a literary agent? Discover the pros and cons.

(If you decide not to submit to an agent, we also have a handy list of 26 children’s publishers that accept unsolicited manuscripts.)

Are you actually ready to submit to an agent? How to know and what to do next.

Discover how to find your dream agent. Where to look and which questions to ask.

When is the best time of year to approach an agent plus why publishing is oh so very slow over the summer.

How to write a query letter. Plus we share the one that got us an agent in 2018.

Why you shouldn’t use AI to write your query letter.

You should also consider the elevator pitch, hook and theme of your manuscript before you begin submitting.

Entering, and getting shortlisted for competitions can help you stand out when submitting to an agent. (Do check out our monthly rounds ups for all the opportunities available each month.)

I also just want to mention that no reputable literary agent will ever ask you for money. Agents take a cut when they secure you deals with a publisher.

I feel like I go on about the importance of market research all of the time. So, any guesses for what the very first thing you should do when thinking about submitting to an agent is?

Yup, that’s right, more research.

Our resources post is packed full of helpful links and publishing people here on Substack which can help you learn more about the industry.

But when trying to work out which agents you want to submit to, the Writers & Artists Children’s Yearbook is a really great place to start. It’s updated every year and contains a list of all of the children’s agents in the UK.

It can feel like a LOT when you first start looking at them in a big long list but this is why research is so important.

Start looking at literacy agency websites, paying specific attention to these five things: