In a large hall 30 or so agents sat at little tables with a stack of papers: your chosen agent had read your first chapter, a synopsis and a paragraph about you and had filled out a feedback form they would hand to you at the end of the time slot, with a single page of feedback, divided into four categories: Market Appeal, Prose Style, Opening Chapter, Next Steps.
You were only allowed into the room ten minutes before your time slot, then you checked in at the main desk and had your agent pointed out to you on a floor plan, as several were behind the central stairs and thus invisible. This immediately made me (even more) nervous, as I have no sense of direction and only knew what the chosen agent looked like from the snapshot on the agency's website or the agent's Twitter page. It has to be said that John Wordsworth, at Zeno Agency, who describes himself as looking like Robert Ford and feeling like Jesse James (@TheWorrierPoet), looks nothing like his picture, in which his hair is much lighter and there are no heavy framed specs. Killer smile still the same, though.
A bell sounded the one minute warning and those of us whose ten minutes were about to start were allowed to stand up, but not to move. I wondered briefly if my legs would start to shake, when I got to my feet. I felt in need of a strong drink or three.
The first thing John said to me was: `Six adopted kids! I can't even manage with two.' This derailed the `conversation' for a couple of precious minutes, before he launched into a lucid critique of my book. As a therapist I've trained myself to have an almost verbatim, but time-limited, recall of people's words and the first thing I did upon exiting the hall was to rush back to my room and write it all down.
In brief, although he liked my premise, my central character and the mechanics of the opening chapter, he astutely pointed out that:
1) The title was rubbish.
2)There were too many characters in the first couple of pages.
3)People's responses to the action weren't always credible- they appeared to take far too much in their stride (a comment I seem to remember my therapist making about me years ago).
4)My style was a little too frenetic, I needed to be more measured.
5)My dialogue was a bit `info-dumpy.'
His main piece of advice was: work out the crux of each scene and map out the story, figure out exactly what the reader needs to know in each scene and don't give them any more. And then the bell sounded and it was done.
It was time to start over, weaving the magic more carefully:
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