Agent Interview: Carrie Howland of Empire Literary!

In the spring of 2014 I entered Pitch Madness and happily made it to the team round. Carrie Howland, one of the participating agents, made the one full request I received. Less than two weeks later she emailed to tell me how much she was enjoying the manuscript and said she’d be in touch again when she finished. About a week after that she was my agent. 

I would have been turning emotional cartwheels if practically anyone had made an offer of representation, but I felt a connection with Carrie right away, and it’s only gotten stronger in the time we’ve worked together. I know how hard she works. I know she’s going to challenge me to reach levels I likely wouldn’t have tried to reach on my own. And I know what a good person she is.

After spending more than a decade at the agency where she got her start, Carrie recently made the move to Empire Literary. I thought this transition would be a perfect chance for her to check in with the fine people of the middle grade writing community and share some thoughts. Welcome to our interview!

After being with the same agency for over a decade, joining Empire Literary is a big move for you. What are the most exciting things about this change?

Carrie: I loved my time at Donadio & Olson, it was a wonderful place to grow my list as an agent, but I’m so excited about the forward, out-of-the-box thinking that Empire Literary was built on. Andrea Barzvi, who founded Empire, is an incredible agent with an amazing track record for launching careers. I’ve only been working with her for about two months now, but each day I’m more in awe of her expertise, and the care she has for each of our authors. Not just her own, but every author at the agency. Empire Literary is a fantastic team of people who truly love what we do, care about our authors, and work tirelessly to bring great books into the world.

Is there any such thing as a typical work day for an agent? If not, what would you be doing during your closest approximation of a typical work day?

Carrie: There’s really no typical day. I’m sure everyone says that, but it’s true! I think one misconception is that we spend a lot of our day reading. Not the case for me. Don’t get me wrong, I spend dozens of hours a week reading, but that tends to happen in the mornings, evenings, and on the weekends. I like to get lost in a manuscript and that’s often hard to do at our busy offices. While in the office, I’m typically pitching books, meeting with editors, talking to authors, negotiating contracts, and doing all the things that go into managing the careers of my amazing clients. I’d say we agents never really stop working. Our breakfasts and lunches are often working meals, with editors, book scouts, clients, etc. After work we’re often at our clients’ readings, meeting them or editors for dinner or drinks, and attending other publishing events. On weekends, if we’re not reading manuscripts, we may be attending conferences, or other publishing festivals, book fairs, etc. I think our schedules really show our passion for our work. We truly live and breathe publishing, so we have to love it. It also might help people to know that we have so much thrown at us on any given day, that if we haven’t quite gotten back to you about your query, it’s definitely not personal! We’ll respond to you—we love reading new work and finding new talent. We’re just also doing eleven other things at any given moment. I can’t tell you how much I appreciate the patience of querying writers.

What qualities in a query letter or a manuscript submission tend to get your attention?

Carrie: I love a personal connection. Show me that you want ME to represent you. That you aren’t just throwing spaghetti at a wall to see what sticks. If you’re querying me because you love one of my author’s books, that’s great! Tell me about it. Are you emailing because your book takes place in Michigan and you know I’m obsessed with my home state? Perfect! I would also love to see people perfect their hooks. That opening line or two should captivate me. This elevator pitch is so important. Really work on those two lines, your comparative titles, etc. We as agents get so many queries, the more you can grab my attention from the first line, the better your chances of rising above all those submissions.

Are there any projects or ideas, specific to middle grade or young adult, you'd like to see showing up in your submission inbox?

Carrie: I am always most drawn to contemporary fiction, and if it’s literary, even better! My background is in poetry, so beautiful language will always speak to me. I’m also really looking for compelling, edge-of-your-seat stories. I’d love a great YA thriller. And I’m always on the hunt for my next big scare, so a great middle grade ghost story (like yours, Tom!) or a good mystery is always on my wish list. As I so often say, I love books set in the Midwest, where I’m from. I also volunteer for a dog rescue, so I do love any books that showcase a great cause…and animals. Always animals.

What do you feel people should people keep in mind when writing for a middle grade or young adult audience? 

Carrie: Voice. I can’t stress this enough. There is no better BS detector than a kid. Our readers will be the first to identify an inauthentic voice. This means really getting to know your audience. If you’re writing Middle Grade, that’s vastly different than Young Adult, and it’s your job as the writer to know the difference. I see so many queries that are listed as one when they’re really closer to the other. And still more that simply aren’t the right voice for kids at all. My dear friend, and incredibly talented editor, Sara Sargent at Harper Collins recently talked about the importance of knowing your audience, and that might mean getting down with Snapchat, even if you think all those filters are silly. I couldn’t agree with this more. Your voice, writing, and characters have to ring true. Spend as much time as possible reading other children’s books, especially your contemporaries, spend time on social media (just not ALL your time), watch some TV that your kids or your friends’ kids like, and best of all, spend time with kids! Don’t know any? Volunteer! There are so many great organizations that allow us to give back by working with kids (I volunteer with a local public school once a week). Find one of those and you’ll be doing a great thing, while getting to know your audience better. It’s a win for everyone.

One important thing about you that I don't think a typical bio would convey is just how involved you are with volunteering. What organizations or causes do you currently work with or support?

Carrie: Thanks for asking about this, Tom! I have been volunteering with dog rescue, really my entire life, but in the past decade have fostered somewhere around fifty dogs who were pulled from high kill shelters, puppy mills, etc. in and around New York City. I am also the proud mom of two of my own rescues: Scout (a lab/whippet mix) and Zooey (my seventeen year old Pomeranian who I rescued at the young age of eleven). I am also the proud daughter of an Army veteran and spend a lot of time advocating for our military men and women. Through an amazing organization called Soldiers Angels, I “adopt” deployed military and send them cards and packages. Right now I have two amazing adopted women, both Army. I’m also a member of Delta Gamma, through which I’ve been able to spend a great deal of time with our philanthropy, Service for Sight. Additionally, I’m a member of the New York Junior League, through which I volunteer with a committee called Project Muse. Each week, I help teach art to a class of thirty-six (yes, all one in class!) amazing third graders. We do a lesson on a particular artist and then a project so the kids can learn that artist’s technique. I can’t tell you how incredible these kids are or how happy I am to spend time with them each week.

Do you have any upcoming events or conference appearances you'd like to mention? 

Carrie: You can find me at SCBWI’s New York Conference in February 2017, and the SCBWI Golden Gate Conference in March 2017. I try to keep my personal webpage fairly up-to-date with my conference appearances, so I hope you’ll check there from time-to-time!

Carrie Howland, Literary Agent

Empire Literary

Twitter: @ECarrieHowland

And now for some random lightning round questions. What was the last album you listened to, straight through from beginning to end?

Carrie: Leonard Cohen’s Songs from a Room.

How do you take your coffee?

Carrie: In an IV drip. With almond milk and Splenda.

What's the best show you've watched/streamed in the past year that wasn't Gilmore Girls?

Carrie: There are shows other than Gilmore Girls?? I would have to say The Night Of. I thought it was one of the most compelling new shows I’ve seen in years. That could just be because I haven’t watched Stranger Things yet…

What candle (or candles) are you burning these days?

Carrie: I’m alternating between Yankee Candle’s Mountain Lodge and their brand new Candied Pecans (have you tried this yet?). I like anything that smells like food or…air.

Are there any favorite places you absolutely have to visit whenever you're back in Michigan?

Carrie: I always have at least one meal at the Yin Hai Chinese Restaurant in Marshall, Michigan. I worked there when I was in High School and the amazing family who owns it still welcomes me back like one of their kids. They even catered my high school graduation open house. Best way to have the most popular open house in town? Serve delicious eggrolls. There’s also a little bar/restaurant in Albion, Michigan, where I went to college, called Charlie’s. They make something called a College Burger that’s the stuff of dreams. They also have something called sour cream and chive fries which everyone should experience at least once in their life. I’m realizing now that all my favorite places are food-related. No big surprise there…

Caught in the Contest Hype

It's that time of year again, where writerly folks are all abuzz about PitchWars. I mean sure it's exciting, if you get picked you get a mentor, some awesome manuscript notes, and access to an amazing list of agents reading your submission. It sounds like a dream come true, a match made in heaven, the stars aligning but wait...

Yes I said BUT

and this is a HUGE ENORMOUS BUT,

If that's all you're focused on, you're missing the point of pitchwars and writing contests in general. Let's be honest--and not to belittle PitchWars and other writing contests because I think they have great value to them--you can do everything PitchWars does for you on your own.

1) You can find an awesome beta reader (or several in fact) to help you shine up your manuscript.

2) You can edit and get additional feedback.

3) And you can query most if not all of the agents in contests and more on top of that.

So what do you need PitchWars and other contests for if you can do all this stuff on your own?

Networking - Writing is lonely. It's really easy to get lost and feel isolated, like you're the only one who has gone through this. But you aren't. Many others have. And contests are filled with mentors, hopefuls, and other industry people that are great to meet and interact with. Who knows, you might find your next CP match, an awesome beta reader, or some amazing fellow nerds like yourself. So get out there and talk to folks.

Editing tips - Contests almost always share tips and talk about ways to shine up your manuscripts. You can learn a lot of common mistakes to look for and make your manuscript stand out even more. I've picked up a ton of editing tips that I now use on all my work. So use this time to learn and grow as a writer.

Feedback - In many contests you will get direct feedback on a query, pitch, and/or opening pages. Use that to help hone in your work and make it pop from the first words. If you hook a reader right away, odds are agents will want to see more too. And if the contest doesn't directly offer feedback go back to the networking and find some new people to swap with to get that feedback.

Industry Wisdom - Many contests have writers that are further along in the writing process. Use them as a resource to learn about what comes next. What's it like to have an agent? go on sub? use a publicist? how do royalties work? etc. There's a whole huge writing world out there with tons of previous lessons learned, listen to the advice and gain a valuable perspective on the industry.

Reading material - Looking for new books to add to your to read pile? Looking to explore more in a genre? Need some research material? Contests are a great way to find new reading material. Whether it's the contest hosts/mentors' books, the books the participating agents are repping, or suggestions you get from fellow participants, contests are a great way to find tons of great reading material.

So the next time you find yourself biting your nails over a contest and freaking out about whether or not you'll get picked, take a step back. Look at the larger view of the contest. Get to know the participants, learn some new tips and tricks, and just have fun. Forget about who gets picked and who doesn't. Utilize all the opportunities that are right in front of you. And when you do, you'll be a winner whether you're picked or not.

So Your Writing Has Been Critiqued -- Now What?

Recently there's been a flurry of hashtag activity on Twitter centered around the Pitch Wars writing contest. I was lucky enough to participate in Pitch Wars a couple of years back (shout out to Brent Taylor!). A number of the contributors here at MG Minded are mentors in this most recent round, but I'm not one of them. I'd be perfectly willing to be one if ever called upon, since Brenda Drake, Pitch Wars, and especially Pitch Madness are all big parts of why I have an agent today. (Brenda probably has a waiting list of enough potential mentors to get her through Winter of 2027 though, so it's safe to say she's got it covered.)

I think I'd be fairly qualified to act as a mentor or even just offer critiques to other writers, with the advanced education degree and the English minor and the decades of instructional experience, along with my own reading and writing background. But even if I were to put all of that on a little laminated business card to proclaim my level of assumed expertise as any kind of mentor or critique partner, it wouldn't mean all that much. With whatever background I have, all I could hope to offer anyone would be an opinion. Hopefully something of an informed opinion, but an opinion all the same, and one that wouldn't necessarily be any more or less valid than anyone else's. In the end, that's all critiquing is.

There are very few, if any, absolutes when it comes to evaluating art. You could ask five different critique partners to read your work and have them come back with five drastically different takes, then you could query fifty different agents with your revised manuscript and have forty-nine of them pass for different reasons. But as we all know it only takes one, and if you get that one yes, then YAY! Someday you and your agent will find yourselves out on submission, patiently waiting for what could easily result in seventeen different editors passing for seventeen reasons that have nothing to do with each other.

All of that subjectivity is important to remember when you enter a contest like Pitch Wars, or even as you search for a compatible critique partner. Contest mentors and critique partners want to help you realize the full potential of your manuscript. In doing so, they'll point out the strengths of your writing along with things they think could be improved, even if sometimes you don't like hearing it. I can think of times I've received feedback and had the knee-jerk reaction of, "But wait, NO, you missed the point! I know you said, 'Do this differently in this part,' but that's already exactly what I was doing! How can you not see that?!" Only later did it occur to me that if someone else didn't understand what I was trying to do, I hadn't gotten the job done yet.

If someone tells you something about your manuscript and you don't necessarily agree, it's still a good idea to at least give some serious thought to what they had to say, even if you don't end up taking their advice. But if you keep hearing feedback from different readers mentioning the same improvements to be made, you probably want to give your work another look, even if it means venturing into the "kill your darlings" territory and exploring things about your manuscript you hadn't thought about before.

Ultimately it's your work, and it's up to you to decide how to prepare it for the contest you're entering or the agents or editors on your query list. But if you're fortunate enough to make the cut for something like Pitch Wars, or you find critique partners or Beta readers willing to look at your writing and offer their opinion, take in what they have to say with an open mind.

Outside of a (thankfully) select few, these people are going to be in your corner. They are investing themselves and their time in your work, because they want to see your writing become the best version of itself that it can. The smartest thing you can do is take advantage of that.

A MG Pitch Wars learning experience - 2 things I've realized AGAIN

If you're reading this, you probably know all about Pitch Wars and what a  fantabulous of an experience it is for the mentees. But let me tell you something. As a mentor, I'm learning more about my writing and MG in general than I ever thought was capable. Who would have thought, that Pitch Wars is helping me, just as much as it is probably helping my experience.

When I chose my mentee, I based it solely on writing I know I would be able to help to the best of my ability. Primarily, it was writing I could connect with, and writing I knew could be developed to a point where agents would want to snatch it up and show it off to the world. A month into edits, and I'm finally ready to send her the editorial letter and my notes that I took as much time as possible with. I wanted to treat her book as if it were my own. In a way, I felt like I adopted it. And for those of you reading this, get ready world, because Andrea Pelleschi is going to take you by storm with her creative MG brilliance! (follow her on twitter btw if you haven't already - @AndreaPelleschi)

Ultimately Pitch Wars got me thinking about my own writing, and how it's been in an never ending state of evolution since I first wrote words on a page. So what exactly did I learn? Well..it's like going back to my roots, and I'm boldly going where no writer has gone before. BACK TO SQUARE ONE.

Strap in - it's going to be a bumpy ride.

First of all, after looking at all the entries into the competition, there is a definite key to originality. I've been in development of two new manuscripts right now, and one I'm absolutely shelving after fully realizing that while I love the story, the originality just isn't there. It's one thing to think of a unique concept, but it's another where you just taking a concept already done over and over and over again and just putting a twist to it.

A twist can only go so far. Of course, we'll all borrow from other works, but we need to make it our priority to separate ourselves from them as far as possible. That was one issue I did see with the entrants. It's one thing to compare yourself to a work, but it's another when I feel like I'm reading something I just read a few months ago with different character names and macguffins.

So take a look at your MS. Is it REALLY that different from the rest out there? If not, get back in there and "make it so" - see what I did there?

YES YOU CAN!

Another thing I learned? Do NOT forget your voice. You can have the greatest concept in the world, and your writing technique can be stellar, but without that voice, a MG novel is just going to fall flat. I turned down a few entrants just because their voice wasn't their yet. Voice is something that takes a LONG time to work on. I'm talking months upon months. And it isn't a very natural thing to develop. It sort of just hits you one day.

Hell, even with the MS I'm working on now, the voice needs a lot of work. I'm trying to develop it from CN which is on submission. I feel like it would be awkward if I use the same voice in one book as I did another. The characters are very different, and the voices NEED to be different as well.

Take your time, let that voice flow from you, and be natural. The only advice I can offer is to just try writing without thinking. You might find your voice coming out. Edit afterwards. Don't worry about what's on the page. Just write the first thing that comes to your mind.

Finding your voice ....it's seriously as hard as this...

These may seem like two very self explanatory things, but I'm telling you it gets lost in the creative process. We get so self absorbed with our own stories that we sometimes forget the important key things in developing a story that would connect with readers. And isn't that what it's all about? Forming that connection? 

I don't know about you, but I'm back to the drawing board. I will put my MS on the back burner for awhile, and create something new yet again. Need to focus on those important bits...are you with me!???!?!?!?! Of course you are...so now let's play with some cats.

The Perfectly Painless Pitch Practice game!

With all the Twitter pitch contests coming up, ready to test your ability to boil your story down to 140 characters or less, I figured I'd share something with you all.

Something that'll change your life.

And the way you pitch.

Step right up, ladies and gentlemen! Step right up and experience the one and only PPPPG!

*For the full effect, imagine I said that in a creepy carnival game operator's voice.*

Beetlejuice may not have been the ideal pain-free example, but I wasn't lying when I said my game is perfectly painless. And it's really fun, too! The best part, though, is that it will definitely help you hone your pitch. 

Here's how it works:

Take a sheet of paper and make 2 columns. Each column will have it's own heading. The headings will look like this:

1. Column 1: just pick a random person, group of people, or place. This can be very specific (like Bruce Willis, The U.S. Navy, or Waffle House) or generic (a Chihuahua, people, or a lemonade stand).
2. Column 2: the more specific you can get here, the funnier the outcome. Sure, you can say "goes to work," but why not turn that blah into an ah! by writing "races her coworkers to the factory on a jet-powered pogo stick?" 

The next step is to fill the columns. If you're a whip-cracking taskmaster, you can set a time limit. Say, one minute for each column. If you're more like me, then just go for 6 items under each heading. You'll need a minimum of 3 actions and 2 characters to create one complete pitch. So if you want to create more than one, go for multiplies of  those numbers. If you've forgotten what multiples are, then I'd like to direct you to

Okay, so after you've created your list, here's what you do. Simply fill in the blanks below with the items in your list. If you worked with another person or a group, this becomes less like homework and more like a party game. Because these will get crazy. 

Crazy FUN, that is. 

You may need to add in a small word here and there to make it really work, but that should be fairly easy to do. 

At this point, you may be thinking, "How is this gonna help me with my pitch?"

Well, it's simple practice. It's taking all of these disconnected elements and plugging them in where they go to find the story within a bunch of random lines. And if you can do that with the items you came up with, then creating a pitch for your own story will be a piece of cake.

Just for fun, I included a bunch of pitches that my wife and I came up with while playing this game. I think some of these need to be outlined and written. Because they are AMAZEBALLS.

When the US government passes a law to legalize mullets, Cary Elwes must impregnate the last women on Earth in order to become the King of the Owls.

When 10,000 Mitt Romney clones catch the T-Virus, the world’s oldest rapper must win a hotdog eating contest in order to stop the devil from getting his own cooking show.

When children all over the world begin blogging, the British must hire Christian Grey as the new Kindergarten teacher in order to learn a new language in 6 weeks.

When butt fat is discovered as a cure for cancer, a couple in desperate need of counseling must sail to Sandwich Islands in order to keep the robots out for good.

When a tribe of pygmies runs for Congress, zombie miners must punch a hole in the sun in order to defeat Dr. Seuss.

When Wal-Mart files chapter 11, a pirate with a fear of wood and water must grow mustaches of golden fleece in order to save the internet.

When our nation’s farms begin growing bellybuttons instead of crops, an a capella group must forcefeed Jason Statham an entire box of Lucky Charms in order to find Miley Cyrus's lost sandal.

When Furbies become sentient, an adorable child with a lisp must find Waldo in order to bring the lost puppy back home.

Happy pitching!