Interview with Agent Kathleen Rushall of Waterside Productions

So today I bring you, guys, another interview with an agent! And I’m really happy to say that my last interview generated at least three requests, since these people met the last agent through Love YA.  Woot!  (I could do this every day, you know?)

Our guest today is Kathleen Rushall! *applauds*

Kathleen is pioneering the children’s and young adult literature list at Waterside Productions, Inc. She looks forward to garnering fresh voices, strong narratives, and whimsical tales in all areas of young adult literature.

UPDATE: Kathleen recently joined the Marsal Lyon Literary Agency. And she still is looking for YA, MG, and select picture books!

 1. How did you become an agent, and when did you start building your own client list?

 First of all – thank you so much for offering to interview me for Love YA. I’m so excited to appear here, where YA fans unite!

I began building my own client list this year, but becoming an agent feels like it’s been a lifelong progression. I’ve always had a passion for young adult literature and wanted to work with books. Basically, I knew I needed a career that would justify lurking in the teen section of Barnes & Noble at any age! My interest in YA literature led me to SDSU’s outstanding children’s literature program, where I earned my master’s in English with a specialization in children’s literature. 

While I was in the program for the MA, I interned at the Sandra Dijkstra Literary Agency, which whet my appetite and introduced me to the world of publishing. My experience with Waterside Productions has given me a stellar introduction to the world of nonfiction books, and has also allowed me to stick with my passion for YA and MG.  So, I’m going to be representing both. I will be focusing on YA, MG and select picture books and nonfiction titles.

And I’m so happy to have you here, on Love YA, too! Thanks so much for doing this!

2. What genres are you looking for right now?  Would you rather represent a commercial book like Twilight or a more literary one, like The Book Thief—or both?

Great question about literary vs. commercial! The truth is that I appreciate and am looking for both commercial and literary works. The world needs each of them. While I’m open to all young adult and middle grade fiction, I’m particularly interested in historical fiction, science fiction, edgy or dark mystery, magical realism (a la Alice Hoffman), and fantasy (I’m a big fan of Tamora Pierce). I’d love to find a well researched, captivating historical fiction that effortlessly transports the reader back in time, without having the setting detract from character development and plot. Two of my favorite historical fiction authors are Jennifer Donnelly and Diana Gabaldon. Donnelly’s The Tea Rose trilogy is phenomenal in its seamless presentation of 19^th century life in London – you really feel like you are there, or that the author lived this firsthand. Gabaldon’s Outlander series does the same thing for 18^th century Scotland, and while both of these examples are adult fiction – they have elements that I want to see in a YA book.  I recently read Alexandra Monir’s Timeless and I thought that was a vivid representation of the 1920’s with a fun plot.

I like edgy books of different ranges, and I like strong voices with subtle humor. Topics of particular interest to me include reincarnation, the occult, the supernatural (not in a zombie or vampire context, more psychic, or witchy, or fey), ghosts (a scary ghost story? yes, please), and psychology. I recently read and loved Kim Harrington’s Clarity – this is a great example of tying in the occult to everyday life, and a subtle use of humor and edge. I’m also interested in multicultural or boy POV middle grade and young adult fiction.

Of all elements, I’d say I’m most drawn to character complexity and development. 

For nonfiction, I’m interested in parenting, cooking, crafts, business, alternative medicine, women’s interest, humor, pop-culture, and some how-to.

3. What type of manuscript you definitely wouldn’t represent?

I’m not interested in science, technology, nature, religion, politics, or overtly spiritual self-help.

4.  Could you tell us about Waterside Productions, Inc. and your role as a full time agent there?

Certainly! Waterside Productions has been an agency since 1982. We were the first agency to represent a For Dummies book, which took off to be the Dummies series, running a gamut of nonfiction topics. We have also worked with Eckhart Tolle, Neale Donald Walsch, Thom Hartmann, Victor Villasenor, and many other established spiritual, self-help, and business icons.

5.  Are you an editorial agent and a career builder agent, too?

Yes to both questions. Agenting is a partnership, and like any good relationship, we should have give and take. I want to be involved in the little things (from brainstorming to edits) and work toward the big things (long term career) with each of my authors. Finding new voices and helping to enhance, clarify, and present them to the world is important to me.  

 Now some questions about querying:

6. What’s the best way to query you?

The best way to query me is via email. For fiction, please send your query letter and up to 50 pages of sample material (as a Word or PDF attachment). For nonfiction, please send your query letter and an attachment of your proposal or two sample chapters (as a Word or PDF file). We have nonfiction proposal guidelines on our website, which can be found here http://www.waterside.com/agency/proposal-guide/

I can be reached at kathleen@waterside.com  

UPDATE: Stay tuned for Kathleen's new info to appear here soon: http://www.marsallyonliteraryagency.com/index.asp

7. How often does a query intrigue you enough to take a peek at the sample pages? And how often do those pages make you ask for more?

Hmmm, there isn’t really a typical answer for this. But I can say that I try to take a peek at sample pages for anything that even mildly sparks my interest.

8. Now this is something I loved to hear from agents when I was querying. Nowadays, how long (approximately) do you take to read a query and then a full?  Are you the no-answer-means-no type of agent?

Ay, again, the timing on this can really vary and can be related to outside factors, like my current workload. I try not to have queries for any longer than 4 weeks without giving an answer. And I can say that if the submission is addressed and personalized to me, I always answer.

Last question before the fast five: 

9. Can you tell us why writers would be thrilled to have you as their agent?

Because any project I offer to represent, I am thrilled to have as my author. I have the passion and, as a new agent, the time to devote to each project so that it receives the attention it deserves.

And now for fun:

Guilty pleasure?   Vampire Diaries and Gossip Girl. Also, I can’t say no to a cheese plate.

Dream vacation?  Anywhere in Ireland, Scotland, England, or Wales.

Your wish for 2011?  I really want a second dog - I love my Aussie.

Random fact about you that we probably don’t know?  I’m an astrology enthusiast!

Cookies or coffee?  After living in Seattle, coffee is the love of my life. I have cookies on the side, though.

Thank you Ms. Rushall for your answers and for your enthusiasm! And if you guys enjoyed “meeting” her, you can always follow her on Twitter (@KatRushall) to learn more about her.

I’m Stylish. What?

I’m a professional food spiller, and yet some people out there think I’m stylish?

Duh—that’s not it.  They think my BLOG is stylish!  Oh.  Still… *rubs eyes in disbelief*

Anyway, the amazing people who gave me the Stylish Award are:

Leah Petersen, who created the awesome 5MinuteFiction contests, and her sci-fi novel, Fighting Gravity, is coming in 2012 from Dragon Moon Press.

Catlin Darrel, a lovely YA writer, who loves sharks, and looks like one of my best friends from college.

Cambria Dillon, my awesome new cyberspace friend, who’s repped by Vickie Motter of the Andrea Hurst Literary Management.

So Leah, Catlin and Cambria, thank you VERY much! You’ve made my day.  =D And now, when my hubby says I’m not stylish because of how clumsy I'm eating, I’ll prove him WRONG!

As part of the award, I’m supposed to reveal seven things about myself and follow these rules:

1: Thank and link back to the person who gave you this award.
2: Share seven things about yourself.
3: Award 5-10 recently discovered great bloggers.

4: Contact these bloggers and tell them about the award.

So here are Seven Things about Moi:

1) I’ve married my husband 3 times.  One of those weddings was in India.

2) I hate to share cookies, and I'll come up with silly pretexts to trick my mind into thinking that it’s good not to share them. Like, “I’m doing the other person a favor, b/c cookies aren’t nourishing.” 

3) I’m a very overprotective mom, and maybe that’s one of the reasons I’ve breastfed my kids up to when they were 2(+) years old.

4) Some of you already know this, but here it goes again: I was born in Peru, and at the age of 8 my parents dragged me to Chile, escaping from terrorism.  Usually, bombs exploded near our house, and there were lots of robberies, etc. Hard times.

5) I’m a really forgetful person. In fact, I was going to say something else here and I forgot. No kidding!

6) When I was little I either wanted to be a primatologist or an astronaut.

7) I LOVE the YA community.  I love my peeps, my CPs, my friends, my followers.  And I’m so happy to be writing this now!

Since I recently discovered all my agency sistah’s blogs, I’m passing this Stylish Award to the 5 of them!  Go Wolf Pack Go!

(In alphabetical order—yeah they are all so cool that I couldn’t decide who to put first!)

1) Tawna Fenske.  She’s so funny that her tweets and her blog make me laugh even when I’m cranky. How cool is that?

2) Linda Grimes. She is so imaginative that she even makes up hilarious meanings for blog verification words.  And she’s so sweet she brightens my day!

3) Kimberly Sabatini:  She’s like my twin sister in the Wolf Pack—we were almost “born” the same day.  And she’s been so supportive and awesome that I <3 her for that! (Also, I love her *grins*)

4) Kasie West: She’s really cool and sweet, and when I comment silly things on her blog, she doesn’t think I’m crazy. (Or at least she doesn’t say so!) And I couldn’t be happier that she joined The Pack!

5) Kiersten White: She’s like my big sister.  Opening up the path so I can follow her steps.  And, since we’re talking about blogs, her posts are really helpful for us writers and I wanted to THANK her for that! =)

You guys don’t have to do anything about the award, but I just wanted to send you my <3

Recommended: WITHER by Lauren DeStefano

So I was really happy ECSTATIC to get my hands on this ARC.  Wither so far has been one of the best books I've read this year.  

Now, I'm NOT gonna tell you what this book is about--you can find it yourselves on its Amazon page! And you can read the reviews there, too. But of course you already knew that! Duh! :P

So why am I here babbling about it?
Because I think that, for us (aspiring) authors, there's a lot to learn from the line-by-line writing. For me, the cadence was beautiful and the sentences were mostly great.  DeStephano knew how to convey everything she wanted in a scene, using interesting details (and I mean this, because sometimes too many details bore me to death).  She also knew how to flesh out the characters in a way that kept you hooked, without bogging down the pace.

If you choose to read this one, I'd recommend to pay attention to those things, the way the sentences flow, the way things are described and make you feel you're really there, talking to the MCs.

So.  Do you have any novel you'd like to recommend?  I mean, that will help us hone our writing skills as we pay attention to how pros do it? ;)

5 Minute Fiction Blog Tour: Week 2 – WINNER!

Let's get to the point. (I know you'll all be skimming down until you find out who won, right?)

So.  WE HAVE A WINNER!!!

SQUEEEE!!

A round of applause for....

*drumroll*

...Corinne O'Flynn, who had 24 votes at 9 a.m. EST.

And here's the entry! CONGRATULATIONS!

2) Corinne O’Flynn

I never got to say goodbye. I'll never get over that. My brother would certainly never forgive me. I could see in his eyes that he didn't want to hear my excuses, not today. Never again.

I woke up five minutes late, just five. But that translated into two hours late when I missed the express train and had to take the local. I imagine they tried to delay for me. But time waits for no one.

Five minutes late. I knew they all thought I was just lazy. I knew my hair was still a mess. I grabbed a glance in the side-view mirror in one of the parked cars and saw mascara caked under my eyes from sleeping on my face. I licked my fingers and tried to wipe my eyes clean. Maybe they would see my eyes and assume it was from tears.

I walked up to the grave site through a sea of the mourners as they were filing out past me. Nobody met my gaze. Each person shook hands with my brother and whispered small words as they stepped on to the the emotional safety of the freshly cut lawn.

My mother always joked that I'd be late for my own funeral. I don't think any of us could have imagined that I'd ever miss hers.

***

THANKS so much for participating, y'all! This was a wonderful experience for me, and I'm even starting to feel all mushy inside! *clears throat*

A special thanks to Leah and all the other hosts for making this awesome tour happen! And don’t forget to continue following the 5 Minute Fiction Blog Tour at the following locations:

March 22: Richard Wood, @rbwood (<<host of the awesomesaucian The Word Count podcast!)

March 29: JM Frey, @scifrey (<<she's a science fiction writer and fanthropologist living in Toronto. Her freakingfablulous book TRIPTYCH is available from Dragon Moon Press: http://bit.ly/hORLkN!)

April 5: Sam Adamson, @FutureNostalgic (<<one of the authors involved in the holycrapamazing The Splintered Lands collaborative writing project!)

5 Minute Fiction Blog Tour: Week 2 – FINALISTS!

Holy Cow! This was amazing, wasn't it? I had so much fun reading all the INCREDIBLE entries.  And I almost feel sorry for our awesome judge, Shelley Waters, since she had to pick ONLY five entries.  Well, but she did it! She picked them already!

I'll paste them below and you can vote for your favorite in the poll at the end of this post. Voting will be opened until tomorrow at 9:00 a.m EST.  Have fun deciding which one you love! ;)

Aaaaand congratu-freaking-lations to our 5 finalists!!!
They are:

1) Leah Petersen, @LeahPetersen

2) Corinne O’Flynn, @CorinneOFlynn

3) María Cope.

4) Chris Blanchard, @blanchardauthor

5) Nicole Wolverton, @nicolewolverton


And their fabulous entries are here:


1) Leah Petersen

It was a lazy summer day when Megan threw a bikini, a change of clothes, and a pack of cigarettes in the knapsack and walked out of the house, slamming the door behind her.

She though, with satisfaction, only just tinged with regret, the pictures left behind, of Steve and warm winter nights by the fire. The clothes in the drawer that still smelled like him. Left behind the broken dreams and broken promises.

She threw the knapsack into the car and stopped to light a cigarette as she took in one last, long look at the house. The beautiful lighter had been a present from Steven. So after she lit the cig, she tossed the shiny, still-lit gift onto the porch.

The gas-soaked wood burst into flames.

She got in the car, put the top down, and drove away.


2) Corinne O’Flynn

I never got to say goodbye. I'll never get over that. My brother would certainly never forgive me. I could see in his eyes that he didn't want to hear my excuses, not today. Never again.

I woke up five minutes late, just five. But that translated into two hours late when I missed the express train and had to take the local. I imagine they tried to delay for me. But time waits for no one.

Five minutes late. I knew they all thought I was just lazy. I knew my hair was still a mess. I grabbed a glance in the side-view mirror in one of the parked cars and saw mascara caked under my eyes from sleeping on my face. I licked my fingers and tried to wipe my eyes clean. Maybe they would see my eyes and assume it was from tears.

I walked up to the grave site through a sea of the mourners as they were filing out past me. Nobody met my gaze. Each person shook hands with my brother and whispered small words as they stepped on to the the emotional safety of the freshly cut lawn.

My mother always joked that I'd be late for my own funeral. I don't think any of us could have imagined that I'd ever miss hers.


3) María Cope

I fell up the stairs. I mean, really, who does that? Oh yeah, me after a few glasses of Tennessee Tea. No one told me Tennesseeans put alcohol in their tea. So much for southern hospitality. So I fell. Going up. But when your mom is spitting her conservative communist manifesto (i.e. grounding me for throwing up in the fish tank), what’s a girl to do except, well, run away?

I slammed the door to my room and blasted extra emo, emo music and wrote in my journal about the struggle of life. That is, until the smell of dinner wafted up the stairs, underneath my door, snuggling its delicious aroma inside my nostrils. I was too lazy to peel myself off the bed. My stomach snarled in defiance. Grudgingly, I sauntered down the stairs, into the dining room.

“You have to pay for those fish,” Mom said for the gazillionth time, “although your father found it hilarious, I did not. You’re paying for the cleanup, too, and the money is coming out of your allowance.”

See what I mean? I had to climb on a chair to get my head in that fish tank. I should be highly praised for my lack of laziness, but nooooo. SO unfair!

“Mo-ooommmm,” I replied with a mouthful of meatloaf, “it’s not my fault! It was the tank or your Persian rug!”

So maybe I came in the house wearing one shoe and mismatched socks. Okay and maybe, just MAYBE, I might have, er, accidentally urinatedintheplasticplant in the foyer. But it’s plastic. It’s not like I killed it or anything. The fish, however, I did kind of bump off. See, I was thirsty and decided to pull a chair over to the fish tank. I mean, have you seen all the water in a fish tank? There’s like, gallons!

So I dunked my head in the tank and drank a little water. NOT a good idea, as the water immediately came back up and into the fish tank. Bye-bye little fish. “Sweetie,” the momster said cautiously, as if I were a tad bit slow, "you’re twenty-five. You will begin taking responsibility for your actions starting now.”


4) Chris Blanchard

“Are you really going to just sit there and do nothing?” Gail screamed.

“I don’t see why not,” John replied. “I’m comfortable.”

“Do you know what is going on out there?” Gail asked.

John propped himself up on the couch with one elbow and peered out the window.

“Looks like a giant robot is rampaging around the city. Again.”

“Exactly,” Gail said. “And don’t you think you ought to be doing something about it?”

John took a deep breath and sighed. “You know, it’s at times like these that I really hate my dad. Imagine leaving this kind of responsibility to me.”

He clicked off the TV and stared at Gail, who was putting her hands on her fists and grinding her teeth. He smiled slightly. She was sexy when she did that.

“Okay, okay,” he said, pushing up self off the couch and stretching as he stood. “Let’s get to the secret lair and change into costume. Hopefully, this robot will be as easy to beat as those aliens were last week. I can get back in time for Robot Chicken.”

“I swear,” Gail said, pushing the button on the bookshelf that opened the secret tunnel. “You are the LAZIEST super-hero in the world!”


5) Nicole Wolverton

Two drops of blood chased each other down the iron in slow motion – a lazy dance – the second catching up the first and then speeding along to reach the fabric of my pants, pressed tightly against the beam. Drip drip drip. The piece of metal glowed green and bronze in the path of sunlight peeking through a hole in the . . . whatever you called the mess: pile, destruction, clusterfuck.

How long I lay here, well, I didn’t know. I’d been sitting on the subway, the sound of the rails below thwuping rhythmically, the screech of the rails cutting through the car. A woman had sat down next to me at the station prior; she had smelled spicy, as though she dipped her body in cinnamon. I’d thought about saying hello, and I was about to when the howling metal twist rose to eardrum-piercing levels. The floor seemed to rise inexplicably, and my body hurtled forward, nothing more than a meat puppet without strings.

The cute cinnamon girl, the car, the sound – it was gone now. Something sharp dug into my back, and I continued to watch the blood drip drip drip down the beam, wondering whose it belonged to. And then I needed to imagine it was only red paint to keep the screams inside my body. The light shifted with each passing moment, highlighting another section of the beam.

And then the face of the cinnamon girl. The shriek in my ears sounded vaguely familiar – it was me. Blood-soaked and gagging at the drip drip drip.


Happy Voting! =)

5 Minute Fiction Blog Tour: Week 2!

So the day is FINALLY here!

Welcome to 5Minute Fiction, guys!  Ready?

Again, thanks so much to Leah Petersen, the founder of this INCREDIBLE contest, for letting me steal her idea do this on my blog. 

And we call it 5 Minute Fiction because you write a nice little piece of fiction in five minutes. Crazy people that we are. Are you new? Get in there and start scrapping!

The Rules

* You get five minutes to write a piece of prose in any style or genre
* You must directly reference today’s prompt: Lazy
 

(Note: The prompt is the word. The picture is for decoration/inspiration.)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

* Post your entry as a comment to this post.

I’ll close the contest at 1:45 p.m. EST. That gives you 5 minutes to write and 10 to accommodate the vagaries of relative time, technology, and the fickle internets. If you are confused or just want to whine, feel free to email me.

At the close of the contest, this week’s guest judge, Shelley Watters (@Shelley_Watters) will nominate five finalists. I’ll put the nominees in a poll at the bottom of the next entry, and at 9:00 a.m. EST tomorrow, I’ll close the poll and declare the winner.

For updates, you can subscribe to my RSS feed, subscribe to my blog via email, or follow me on Twitter!!
 
What’s the prize? Well, nothing, obviously. But we’ll all agree to tweet and/or blog about the winner of today’s contest so their fame and fortune will be assured.

A Few Notes:

* In the interest of time and formatting, it’s best to type straight into the comment box. It’s also smart to do a quick highlight and copy before you hit “post” just in case the internet decide to eat your entry. If your entry doesn’t appear right away, email me. Sometimes comments go into the suspected spam folder and I have to dig them out.

* I reserve the right to remove hate speech or similar but I’m not too picky about the other stuff.

* This is all for fun and self-promotion. So be sure to put your twitter handle at the end of your post and a link to your blog if you have one.

All right, that’s about it! Have fun, y’all, happy writing, and good luck! :)

Oh! And don’t forget to participate in the next three weeks of the blog tour, hosted by the following wonderful writerly folks: (In Claire Legrand words—yeah I totally copy-pasted from her blog, lol!)

March 22: Richard Wood, @rbwood (<<host of the awesomesaucian The Word Count podcast!)

March 29: JM Frey, @scifrey (<<she's a science fiction writer and fanthropologist living in Toronto. Her freakingfablulous book TRIPTYCH is available from Dragon Moon Press: http://bit.ly/hORLkN!)

April 5: Sam Adamson, @FutureNostalgic (<<one of the authors involved in the holycrapamazing The Splintered Lands collaborative writing project!)

Reminder! The 5MinuteFiction Blog Tour, week 2, starts tomorrow!

Mark your calendars and set your watches, you guys!  Because tomorrow, Tuesday 15^th, at 1:30 p.m. EST, the contest begins!  Woot!  

It’ll last until 1:45 p.m. EST, giving you 5 minutes to write and 10 for working out any internet kinks you might have.  Early tomorrow, I’ll post further instructions, and the prompt goes up at 1:30 p.m.

And I have to thank  Leah Petersen, the lovely founder of 5MinuteFiction, for giving me this amazing opportunity to do this contest on my blog! I feel so honored and happy that I bet you can hear me squeeing all the way from your place. Right?

For now, meet the judge:

Shelley Watters is a Young adult writer represented by Mark McVeigh of the McVeigh Agency.  She’s a mom, so friendly and sweet that it’s addictive to talk to her.   And she’s our awesome judge!  *claps*

You can find Shelley on Twitter and on her amazing blog!

So, guys, I can’t wait to see you tomorrow and read your entries! We’ll have so much FUN!  YAY!

Follow Fails and Contests!

Hey friends! Today I'm sharing with you some interesting links about why people don't follow you back on Twitter and don't read your blog.  Also there are some great contests going on out there, and here are the links for them, too.

Enjoy!

Follow Fails:

1) Ten reasons I'm not reading your blog

2) Twitter Follow Fail

Writing Contests:

1) The L Magazine Literary Upstart Contest—Call for entries

2) The Writer 2011 Short-Story Contest—Call for entries

3) Sylvia K Burack Writing Award—Essay contest for 11^th and 12^th graders

4) Also, Authoress (@AuthoressAnon) is throwing a mega contest TODAY because she just reached 2,000 Twitter followers--More details coming up on her blog!
5) Win some AWESOME BOOKS here and here.
6) Win a QUERY CRITIQUE here.
7) Brenda Drake is holding an amazing contest with Agent Natalie Fischer, on her blog. 
8) Don't forget to check WriteOnCon.com for giveaways!
9) Win a copy of LIKE MANDARIN on YA Highway.
10) When I finish my revisions (yes I'm revising. EEK! Wish me luck :P), I'll throw a contest of my own, here, on the blog. So keep your eyes open!

  

And don't forget to come here next Tuesday at 1:30 p.m EST for the 5MinuteFiction Contest!! :D

And just for fun... meet my 2yo!