Exclusive Submission

[President Pumpkin]

Hi everyone,
I have a question regarding exclusive submissions. I just received a request for one today from an agent that I'd like to work with. Problem is, two other agents are considering the manuscript, perhaps a third (I don't know. He's had it for close to a month now...) I definitely don't want to withdraw my manuscript from the others, so I'll just have to pass on this opportunity, which is too bad. I'm reading a book by one of her clients now, and I feel an affinity.

I guess I'm just wondering if anyone has encountered this type of request before. How did you deal with it? What happened?

Thanks for your help!

[Viddiest]

Hi President Pumpkin,

This happened to me before (not the book I am currently querying). I wrote back and said that I had already sent it to a few agents and she responded that she would not be interested then. I do find agents asking for exclusive submissions in this day and age a little suss.

[jcwrites]

Tell the agent who wants an exclusive that you've already submitted it to others but if you get an offer of representation, you'll give him/her a chance to respond.

[President Pumpkin]

Hi JC and Viddiest,

Thanks for your thoughts. It definitely helps to get some feedback on this issue since I've never encountered it before.

[Tabris]

I would always write back with the requested material and state that I couldn't offer an exclusive because other agents already had the material, but if I received an offer, I would notify them immediately. Then I asked how they would prefer to proceed. I never got a rejection based on the fact that other agents thought the material was good enough to request. ;-)