Well, here are my holiday tips to make the season bright while still finding plenty of time to get lost in a good book or three.

• With bunch of sparkly gift bags and colorful tissue, you can wrap gifts in a snap and get back to reading.
• Pick up refrigerator cookie dough so the baking can be done in a jiffy and you can get back to reading.
• Grab the kids and head to your favorite local bookstore for their holiday storytime. While they listen to How the Grinch Stole Christmas, you can finish your shopping because books are the perfect classy gift for any name on your list. If you’re unsure about the bookworm on your list, a bookstore giftcard means they can get the next book in their favorite series, no guessing needed!
• If you’re shipping gifts, go to the post office at a very busy time. Plenty of time in line to read! (You’ve got the Kindle app on your phone, right? All set!)
• Holiday guests coming to stay with you? Splurge on an hour or two of maid service to get the house ready while you sit back with your feet up and read.
• Holiday guests coming to stay for way too long? Dig up your Starbucks gift card from last year’s Secret Santa exchange and sneak out to read in peace for a couple hours.

What are your tips and tricks for getting through the holiday season and your To Read stack at the same time? Any favorite ways you incorporate books into the merry time of year?

And wishing you all very happy holidays!

Some of my favorites are mapped here, including Betsy, Tacy, and Tib’s version of Milwaukee plus the author’s childhood home in nearby Mankato, Minnesota and, closer to the DGLM office, Lorimer Street where a tree grew in Brooklyn (Williamsburg to be exact, and a very different version thereof!). But some other favorites are missing from this piece, such as the Victoria and Albert Museum in London that Pauline, Petrova, and Posy walked to on wet days in Ballet Shoes. And, as the authors smartly point out, some childhood favorites can never be visited, like Narnia or Hogwarts. What wouldn’t I give to visit the Berenstain Bears’ treehouse!!

Funnily enough, I don’t think I’ve ever actually trekked to any of the altars I worshipped at as a childhood bookworm. And I wonder if it’s ever really worth it to see the places in real life that once lived so vividly in your imagination—wouldn’t some of the sheen be rubbed off when you view it with your own two experienced worldly adult eyes? Even if it’s not a place you go to physically. I’ve been very much enjoying this series on What Children’s Literature Teaches Us About Money over at The Billfold. The Little House on the Prairie world seems slightly less appealing once you reach adulthood and realize the real-world implications of twisting straw to burn for warmth and, oh yeah, Pa’s all-controlling patriarchy. And I loathed Marilla for refusing Anne her much-longed-for puffed-sleeves as sheer spite because the pragmatic view of fabric costs was somehow lost on me. On the other hand, when I first moved to NYC and was a starving, exhausted bookseller, I took heart in Claudia and Jamie’s example of thrift and ingenuity in The Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler.

So I’m not sure, in the end, if I am for or against making your childhood favorites come to life. I’ll think about it while I’m re-reading the works of Montgomery, Streatfeild, and Lovelace this long weekend.

What children’s book site would you most want to visit? Any great awakenings of a scene in a kids’ book that seemed totally different when you read it as an adult?

Recently I’ve done a bunch of query critiques for conferences and also did an interview on using Twitter in the query process, so I have queries on the brain! And I figured this was the perfect time to see what kinds of questions aspiring authors on Twitter are dying to have answered. I’m glad I did, as the questions I got back are smart and interesting, and a couple are even new to me! So thanks to all those who sent questions.

If you query a new literary agent at a reputable agency but find little about her online, any query tips to personalize your letter?

I suggest phrasing it in a way that reflects your research on the agency and your understanding of the benefits of working with a newer agent—new agents are eager to find great talent for their lists and often have more time for debuts than more experienced agents with deep lists. “I read you’re newly building your list at Tony the Tiger Literary Agency and hope that your agency’s expertise in cookbooks alongside your enthusiasm for debuts will be the perfect combination for my 68,000 book club novel, A FROSTED FLAKE LOVE STORY.

Should you start the query letter by explaining who you are or what your story is about?

My preference is for your personal details/bio to come after the story pitch. I like the query to open with the reason you’re querying me and the key info about your project: word count, category, title, comps. Then the story pitch, followed by your writing credits, associations, conferences, and any life or career experience that informed this book.

 If an agent wants trigger warnings, what’s the best way to incorporate into the query?

A good query rule-of-thumb is to keep things short and simple, so I suggest including the trigger warning in your opening, alongside your personalization to the agent and your word count, category, and comps. Perhaps something like:

“My 78,000-word psychological thriller THE GREEN LIGHT will appeal to fans of Amy Gentry and Rena Olsen. Please be aware, my manuscript includes a graphic depiction of child abuse.”

 Where do you usually stop reading in a manuscript? If you make it 75% would you finish?

It varies from manuscript to manuscript how far I get before I realize it’s not going to work for me. If I request your full after reading your query and 25 pages, that means I’m hooked on your concept and drawn in by your writing, so as I’m reading I’m hoping that that potential holds up all the way through! If the story starts to fall apart in a way that I don’t have a vision to fix, if I can’t buy in to the character’s choices, if I find my attention wandering or realize I’m just not enjoying the read, I’ll feel sad, but I’ll probably move on to the next MS. Sometimes that’s page 40, sometimes it’s page 125; once I know it’s a No, I’m not going to waste both of our time just for the sake of finishing. On the other hand, if I’m reading and editors are coming to mind who would like it, or I find myself wanting to keep reading when I get off the subway, or I get excited about how to fix plot issues, then I read looking for reasons to say Yes and position the book for success!

If you have a burning question about querying, pipe up in the comments and perhaps I’ll do another FAQ soon! And for more query advice, check out my Writer’s Bone interview here, and keep an eye on the #querytip hashtag on Twitter.

Lauren put together this fabulous collage of our field trip, which you’ve already seen if you follow her on Twitter (and while you’re at it, follow me too!) .

Agents are almost as proud of the books they’ve worked on as the authors themselves are! In my bookseller days, my favorite part of the job was suggesting books I loved to regular customers and hearing what they thought on their next trip to the bookstore. And being an agent is like that, only better, because you get to be an even bigger part of getting books you love into customers’ hands. It makes wandering through a bookstore all the more satisfying.

DGLM client Roy Peter Clark did this with Michelle Obama’s speech at the opening night of the DNC. Clark identifies eight lessons from the First Lady’s speech that writers of any kind can benefit from. Strategies like “Use first person, second person and third person to create specific effects” and “Express your best thought in a short sentence.” These are especially useful if you’re working on a piece of writing meant to prove a point or win someone’s allegiance…for example, a query letter!

So next time you tune into a political speech, pay attention to not just what the speaker says, but how they say it! Find some inspiration for your own work (just be careful you take inspiration only, no fair hacking the actual words of the poor hard-working caffeine-addicted speechwriters!). And don’t forget to VOTE!

What tip in Roy Peter Clark’s list do you find most useful? Let us know in the comments if you’ve seen anything else in the presidential conventions that you want to apply to your query letter!

How we feel seeing all of our amazing clients' #AgentsDay tweets. WE are the lucky ones! pic.twitter.com/9AnE2b5Y5E

— DGLM (@DGLM) June 27, 2016

Browse through the hashtag and watch for a familiar name…and don’t forget to follow all our agents on Twitter while you’re over there!

If you’re still querying, #AgentsDay is also a helpful resource for finding agents to follow – many happy authors tagged their agents in their tweets, so click on over to their Twitter profile to start getting to know their lists and personality.

There are a lot of benefits to following a bunch of agents on Twitter! For one, it helps you jumpstart your agent research, which is an important part of the query process. Agents often tweet about new releases from their lists or genres they’re particularly eager to see, so you can narrow down the best match for your manuscript. Sending materials to an agent who doesn’t represent your category wastes your time and theirs! An agent’s Twitter feed is also a good sneak peek of what an agent’s personality is like; if you find someone who seems like the perfect fit for you, you can put extra time and energy into crafting the perfect personalized query to catch their attention, or even find out about opportunities to meet them in person at conferences or workshops. And a lot of agents tweet editing tips and query feedback, from general dos and don’ts to specific feedback on (anonymous) queries as they go through their inbox.

So get to following! We won’t even be mad if you follow agents other than #TeamDGLM. (Just remember: when it comes time to query an agent or follow-up with them, keep it professional and do it through email! )

Who are your favorite agents to follow on Twitter? What’s the best writing/querying tip you’ve gotten on Twitter?

Now, this is a common side-effect of working in publishing – you hear so much buzz that by the time you actually read a book, your chances of coming into it without expectations are practically nil. And it’s also a side-effect of agenting – our brains are trained to look for flaws and pick apart ways to improve, and it can be really difficult to turn that engine off for pleasure reading.

But I was most intrigued to compare these books – let’s call them Red Book and Blue Book to protect the innocent – to books I read and did love. Red Book came out from the same publisher in the same season as a title in the same category – we’ll call it Green Book – that I devoured and have been recommending non-stop! To me, Red Book was tired and unoriginal, Green Book was twisty and unforgettable; yet Red Book has been tremendously outperforming Green Book in both buzz and sales! And coming from the same publisher, with similar marketing campaigns going into publication. Grrrrrrr, I say to myself, but it’s not fair! Green Book is so much better than Red Book!

I had similar feelings about Blue Book, the editor of which had passed on a manuscript I submitted, Yellow Book. I liked Blue Book fine…but Yellow Book is so much better! Yellow Book would appeal to the same readers now buying Blue Book in droves, and is strong in places that Blue Book is flawed. Ugh, wtf, editor!

So you see, agents are not immune to rejection and confusion. As Miriam recently discussed, the “I’m just not loving it” excuse is as valid as it is frustrating. Miriam described the feeling when you don’t like a bestseller: “I always wonder what’s wrong with me as a reader and then, because I’m judgy and have the power of my convictions, what’s wrong with all the other readers.” I too am judgy, with an unshakeable faith in my own taste, so a case like Red Book and Green Book where there are so many similarities makes me think on the X Factor in publishing. You never know what unseeable details of timing and taste are working for or against the story elements and marketing muscle to make one book a bestseller and banish another to obscurity.

So what’s the takeaway? Embrace the lack of control! Just kidding. I love control. And what you CAN control is being as loud as possible for the books you DO love, especially if you see them missing from Best Book of the Whatever lists! Talk about books you love on Twitter and Facebook, leave a copy in an airport, suggest them to friends in book groups and coworkers with free time.

Don’t waste your energy worrying about books you don’t like –keep yelling (or whispering, if you’re in a library) about the ones you can’t forget.

That “oh no! I was going to write about that,” reaction is so common in publishing. Whether you’re a writer toiling away in the query trenches or a seasoned author brainstorming ideas for a new series, I’m sure you’ve felt that sinking feeling when you see a new book come out with a premise or setting similar to yours. You’ve been working so hard for months, or even years, on an idea you love and you worry that there’s no room left for it now. It even happens for agents and editors when we see a book announced and worry it will affect the momentum for one you’ve been working so hard on. Even if a book is not very much like yours at all, you might feel nervous, competitive, even jealous or angry (yes, it happens!) when you see another writer get a great book deal, a lot of buzzy press, or an award.

That’s a normal feeling and it’s okay to feel that way for up to five minutes. Then you gotta shake it off and go back to your work. Because that’s all you really have a hand in, right? Publishing often can seem like a lot of luck and a lot of flukes, but as my client Rena Olsen discussed in a smart set of tweets yesterday, you’ll never succeed to any extent if you aren’t working extremely hard.

I’ve had several people (mostly friends of friends) come to me lately for advice on getting published, which I’m always happy to give.

— Rena Olsen (@originallyrena) May 2, 2016

The “secret” is a hell of a lot of hard work and perseverance (stubbornness) mixed with a pinch of oppositional mindset.

— Rena Olsen (@originallyrena) May 2, 2016

And someone else’s success does not get in the way of yours!  I love the way agent Carly Watters put it in her own very smart set of tweets this morning:

Being happy for other writers’ success doesn’t mean there’ll be less happiness to go around for you. Kindness costs zero & means everything.

— Carly Watters (@carlywatters) May 3, 2016

After all, there are only seven stories under the sun, and Shakespeare wrote them all already. Change up your angle if you must, or get your keyboard smoking after a new idea, but don’t give up and don’t get jealous. Just get writing!

1. Seuss’s ABCs (proud to say this is my 11-month-old-nephew’s current fave)
2. Go Dog Go by P.D. Eastman
3. Richard Scarry’s Busytown (probably where my big-city dreams first took root)
4. The Little Engine that Could by Watty Piper (a pen name for Arnold Platt of the publisher Platt & Munk!)
5. Make Way for Ducklings by Robert McCloskey
6. Meet Kirsten by Janet Shaw (the first book that broke my heart)
7. Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingalls Wilder (the first book I remember reading on my own!)
8. Ramona Quimby, Age 8 by Beverly Cleary (the author’s 100th birthday was last week so my book club is reading this one this month…life comes full circle)
9. Betsy-Tacy Go Downtown by Maud Hart Lovelace(the whole series is a fave, but this is the first I read and, as book lover’s bonus, centers on Betsy’s own writing, her Uncle Keith who is an author, and a theatrical production of Uncle Tom’s Cabin!)
10. A Little Princess by Frances Hodgson Burnett(I yearned for the glamor of being orphaned and indentured, in a freezing attic with bread crusts to eat.)
11. Ballet Shoes by Noel Streatfeild
12. Little Women by Louisa May Alcott (the second book that broke my heart. RIP Beth, it’s an injustice that you died and bratty Amy married Laurie.)
13. Emily of New Moon (while I of course adore the Anne series, I gotta give the nod to L.M’s slightly less famous trilogy…)
14. I Capture the Castle by Dodie Smith
15. Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte
16. The Great Gatsby (I know, me and everyone else in America. But I just love it so and will gladly read any/all Fitzgerald fanfiction you throw my way. #FitzgeraldForever)
17. Lolita (come for the scandal, stay for Nabakov’s incredible prose…in his second language, no less)
18. East of Eden by John Steinbeck (vastly more fun than Grapes of Wrath, if you don’t mind the page count.)
19. The End of the Affair by Graham Greene
20. Paris Trout by Pete Dexter (To Kill A Mockingbird…but better!)
21. Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace (I know, I know! Snobby post-college me loved it and post-30 me defiantly still does)
22. Middlesex by Jeffrey Eugenides
23. The Secret History by Donna Tartt (I’ll pause here to let Miriam yell at me about how much she hates The Goldfinch)
24. Let the Great World Spin by Colum McCann (the first book I read after moving to NYC and now one of my lifetime faves)
25. A Novel Bookstore by Laurence Cosse (a book lover’s bookstore book…need I say more?)
26. Claire Marvel by John Burnham Schwartz
27. The Round House by Louise Erdrich (suspense, coming-of-age, and marginalized communities all in one amazingly powerful literary novel!)
28. My Education by Susan Choi
29. An Untamed State by Roxane Gay (warning: a brutal, beautiful, unforgettable novel)
30. The Magicians series by Lev Grossman (a lot of fun in its own right and for its nods to other fantasy classics)
31. Just Mercy by Bryan Stevenson
32. …??? Leaving this one blank! What will be the next book I love and recommend and re-read?

This book-list-as-memoir was a lot of fun…and I think you can see the exact moment where I left the Midwest and started exploring literature outside the classics. Looking forward to a lot more exploration in the next 32 years! Share your favorites in the comments to make sure I’m not missing out! 

And thanks to Kemi for this perfect birthday card: 

But did you ever wonder what we, the agents, get out of it?

Hmmmm. Good question. 

After all, we’re giving up our time – our precious reading time! often our precious weekends! – to travel across the country and mingle with strangers! Well, I can only speak for myself, but I love getting out of NYC to see a different part of the country and meet editors and agents who might be based outside New York or whose paths I haven’t crossed yet. Most of all, though, I love meeting writers who are passionate about their stories and willing to spend their time and money to get better at telling them. As an agent, I’m always hungry for my next amazing project, and a conference offers me a veritable buffet of talent and hard work. Every project might not be to my taste, but I have pretty good odds of finding one or two or ten that I will be dying to sign up. The inspiration refill alone is well-worth a weekend of hotel coffee.

Candid shot of me, post-hotel coffee,
preparing to meet writers and hear pitches!

I always want to make sure, though, that I’m offering something valuable to the attendees who chose to meet me or attend my workshop or panel during their busy conference time! So I found this Tumblr post How to Panel Like a Lit Champ to be very detailed and helpful. I will for sure be bookmarking it to re-read next time I’m preparing for a talk or panel. And the final piece of advice applies to all of us, no matter what part of the industry we’re in, querying writer or autograph signer, editorial assistant or high-powered agent: “It doesn’t matter if you are the most famous or the least famous in the room / on the panel, be nice. Stay classy.”

Be nice. Stay classy. 

Now I want to hear from you. What do you consider most valuable when you’re attending a panel? Pet peeves or top tips from your conference experiences?