Today’s guest blogger has had thirty years of experience in the publishing world. Claire Gerus has been Editor-in-Chief of two publishing houses, worked for seven major publishers, including Harlequin, Rodale, Random House, Doubleday, John Wiley, Kensington, and Adams Media, written articles for U.S. and Canadian magazines and newspapers, and taught corporate communications to such clients as IBM, Kelloggs, Mutual of Omaha, and Procter & Gamble.
She is presently working as a literary agent and book development consultant. She is always interested in projects that can change readers’ lives for the better. She is open to assisting authors as an agent, a book developer, or an editor. She is now focusing on nonfiction projects for all ages.
When Lynn asked me to contribute some insights “from an agent’s point of view,” I had to stop and think. What would people want to know? Would they be most interested in how they could write more effective query letters? What the secrets of a successful submission might be? Or whether it’s even worth the time and energy to try to submit a book proposal, whether to an agent or to a publisher, given how tough the market is these days. (more…)
