a service of Simcomserv Australia

Agency for Literary Review offers unpublished authors and first-time writers the opportunity to have their work assessed for free.

Free Advice and Assistance for the Novice Writer

Agency for Literary Review

Typescript Assessments

Getting it Published

Wow!  So you have finally finished that story you’ve been working on like forever.  That’s great.  No, really, I’m thrilled that you have finally gotten around to finishing it.   Is it any good?    So tell me, what are you planning on doing with it?  I’ll try not to laugh. 

Do you have any idea just how many people around the world are busy writing and hoping to find a publisher?  Actually, neither do I but you can bet there are more stories being written than any publisher has hopes of selling.  

Publishers have to make a profit and they aren’t going to do that unless they are able to sell sufficient copies of a book to pay for its cost.  That is one of the reasons why any football player can write/collaborate on a book telling you how wonderful he is and get it published.  

Most of the hard work has already been done.  People know who the footballer is, hence the publisher already has a target market.  All the publisher has to do is hope he can break even before the footballer becomes yesterday’s news or today’s bad boy. 

You're Not a Celebrity

You, on the other hand, are an unknown quantity.  He, the publisher, just to reach the break-even point, is going to have to promote you as well as your book.  That costs money.  

Of course it will be a lot easier for the publisher with your second book because you will already have a following: all those people that read (and liked) your first one. 

You do have more than one book in you, don’t you?  You aren’t just a flash in the pan?  Because if you only have one book to sell, or aren’t likely to produce another (good) one, then no publisher in his right mind is going to be interested in taking the chance that your first and only novel will be a best-seller.  

The odds are it won’t.  In terms of economics, the publisher is better off and at far less risk if he just ignores you.  You might be able to make him wish he had taken you seriously, but I doubt it.  

Remember the adage that you have to kiss a lot of toads before you find a prince?  That applies to finding a story worth the printing costs as well.  Publishers aren’t gamblers.

Vanity Publishers

That’s why there are vanity publishers.  Just in case you don’t know what a vanity publisher is, that is a company that will gladly put your book in print, but you have to pay for it.  Then you will also have to promote it and arrange to sell it.  And most booksellers are part of a chain and they aren’t interested in giving shelf space to an unknown.  Your local bookstore manager is probably not allowed to accept your book for sale, even on consignment. 

The biggest problem you are likely to have at the moment (in terms of getting your book published) is trying to find out if it is worth publishing.  Yes, I am aware that your mom and dad and brother and three maiden aunts and your nephew and your best friend from work have all told you that your book is lovely.  In fact, they all may even have told you that it is really lovely.  So why are you still in doubt?  Could it be because a total stranger who couldn’t care less about sparing your feelings hasn’t read it and passed judgment?  

Are you still reading or have you gone back to select the next item from the Google list?  If you are still here, then you might as well keep reading.

Assessing Your Typescript

Let’s examine the situation.  You have likely visited every publishing site on the web that you can find.  You have probably discovered that almost all those that you have heard of don’t want to hear from you. 

Those that politely offer to accept unsolicited submissions (but they really are just being polite) will tell you they don’t want it sent over the web.  No, they want you to mail several chapters double-spaced on single-sided A4 paper. 

They will also make a point about telling you that the pages must be loose and not bound.  If you wonder why that should be, then you might wonder where their office scratch pads come from. 

You will also discover that printing out fifty or more pages on your little inkjet printer is a costly exercise.  Then you also have to pay for postage and if you want to make your own scratch pads, then you will have to include the means to get those pages back to you. 

Hopefully, you will add up all the costs involved and decide to forget about it.  Or at least that is what the publishers hope will happen.

Still, there is the chance the publisher may fall in love with your book (based on three chapters and a synopsis) and you might be tempted to put your toe in the water.  What guarantee do you have that the publisher will even bother to read your typescript?  None, to the best of my knowledge. 

In fact, there is reliable comment to suggest that almost all submissions just go straight from the mail desk to the bin.  Why? 

It costs upwards of $120 per day to employ someone just to read the submissions and decide whether it is worth asking to see the whole typescript.  That just isn’t practical.

Any office junior is not likely to have the moxie or the experience to pass such judgments.  That means a publisher is going to have to pay a senior salary to dredge through mountains of drivel in the hopes of finding a literary gem.  That is not profitable. 

Let someone else, say the publishers, sort out the drivel and present us with the gems.  And that is why there are literary agents.  They represent the writer and they push the gems under the noses of the publishers.

Literary Agents

Literary Agents come in several guises.  Some are simply lobbyists and others are opportunists.  They could read your work and think that some day they may even be able to get some publisher to look at it. 

For example, if you happened to write a thriller last year about some terrorist plot to fill the hollow handles of baggage trolleys with Semtex and plant them back in the airport check-in on a busy holiday weekend, and something like that actually happened this year, then you can bet the literary agent will be hotfooting around to visit his contacts at the publishers with your typescript clutched in his fist. 

Other agents don’t want any additional clients unless they are already published.  They have a pretty full stable and each of their horses is churning out more each year, more even than the publishers can handle. 

Some agents used to work for publishers and retain many of their old contacts and hopefully can bend a few arms.  Here again, they probably have a restricted genre (not all publishers, for instance, deal in science fantasy or children’s books) and they are pretty selective in what they are looking for and the quality of that material. 

Many agents want to promote and assist writers.  They offer to critique the work and make suggestions (usually to do with joining writer’s workshops or taking a course in journalism) but you have to pay for their services. 

Since many of those find more profit in critiquing than in haranguing publishing houses, you might find you need to continue spending money and more money to get your book to a point where it just might be saleable.  No guarantee, of course. 

If you think this might be a little less than honest, remember that an agent can’t just turn up with a stack of paper full of spelling errors and syntax atrocities and a poorly written plot.  It has to be ready for print.  Otherwise somebody has to pay to have it made ready for print. 

Is your plot so good, your style so readable that a publisher is willing to pay to have it rewritten to correct all the errors that you should have corrected (or not made in the first instance)?

There are many very serious (successful) literary agents out there and you should be trying your hardest to get associated with one (or more) of them.  They, on the other hand, are probably trying not to get noticed by you.  Check them out.  Check out their credentials.  If they look like someone you want to be associated with, then do your best to get them to look at your writing.

Then there are the scam artists.  How good are you at picking those?  Generally you don’t find out until a lot of money has changed hands…from yours to theirs.  So just what are you supposed to do?  Although I dislike cliché, there really is no point in flogging a dead horse or trying to make it stand on its own. 

If your book isn’t worth the computer disk it’s written on then you are better off doing a total rewrite, starting another book or learning how to paint with watercolours.  But first you have to find out if it was all a waste of time (well actually, it wasn’t…it never is) and that is where Agency for Literary Review comes in. 

How Can We Help? 

Agency for Literary Review is not a publisher.  We are not literary agents.  We cannot help you get published.  We cannot assist you with your writing skills.  We cannot put you in touch with anybody that can do any of those things.  We do not belong to any guild or association (that would be of interest to you in your quest) and offer no credibility. 

That doesn’t mean you don’t need us.  What we can do, and do very ably, is read what you have written and give you our comments.  And we will give it to you straight down the barrel. 

If we think you are boring or pretentious we will tell you so.  We will even tell you what page we were at when we made that decision.  If we think you wouldn’t know a plot from a toothpaste commercial then we will tell you. 

We will tell you about it if you attempt to present facts that aren’t, indeed, facts.   If your fiction slips into fantasy or if your command of the language is so poor that it becomes a chore just trying to figure out what you are talking about, then we will tell you. 

If, on the other hand, your work is (in our opinion) commercially viable, then we will gladly tell you that as well.  We will not mince words (we don’t care if you hate us) and if it is bad you will be told, and if it is good you will be told, and you will be told just how good we think it is. 

How does that help you?  You will have received an honest opinion from a complete stranger.  Our association from that point on is virtually at an end.  We won’t try to string you along any further. 

If you want us to explain what we meant (good or bad) and give you some examples (where we can) then we will do that as well.  The rest is up to you.  If we tell you not to give up your day job, then we mean it.  If we tell you that you should continue to push for some publisher to have a look at it, then you should persevere with it.  It’s that simple.  So how will we tell you about it?

 Reporting Method. 

We will submit a report summary that details point by point what we thought of the story.  Each point is graded out of ten.  For example, if we thought the story was boring then we would state it was boring and give it a number corresponding to just how ho-hum we think it is. 

The same goes for things like confusing, trite and erratic.  The list varies depending on the story style and story type so there is little point in trying to list even a typical summary here (you would have to have read the same book to understand it). 

Our report will be compiled to reflect your story and how we viewed it.  It’s a little more informative than it sounds.  The target value in each category that we define your story by, is set for a median of five.  If we say, for example, that we thought your story was ‘exciting’, then anything less than a five means it is less than exciting.  In other words, our rating is a positive or negative value and this will apply even if our category (like boring) is a negative in itself.  So you are getting a rating, not a score.  

Because the categories listed are applicable to your story (tailored, if you like) then you can see by the rating in which direction your story can be improved.  Correcting just one of the faults (although that’s not a fair word to use) can impact upon the other ratings as well. 

For example, if we suggest that characterisation is poor (meaning we cannot see the person and you should have described him better so we would recognise him if we passed him in the street) then if you correct that deficiency (again, not a fair word) then you will also automatically make the story less boring.

Do you get the idea? 

A further full report explaining each summary item will be included as a separate document.  It is not enough for us to tell you that your story is boring, we need to explain why, and in full detail.  We will do our very best to give you a multi-paged report card. 

If it is still not sufficient for you, then contact us again with your queries and we will respond as best we can.  We want you to be satisfied that we have done our best.  By the way, there is no point in arguing with us.  We are entitled to our opinion, and that is what you asked for…and what you get. 

And we promise and guarantee that we will actually read your story from word one to where is says ‘The End’.  Well, let me modify that a bit.  If it becomes just too impossible to muddle through with it, we will tell you where we all gave up and waved the white flag. 

How Valuable Is Our Report? 

For our report to have any value at all, you must read it.  Then it is up to you.  Why did you request a report from us?  What did you hope it would accomplish?  None of that will have changed.  You need to take the report and put it to whatever use you originally envisioned. 

Our report is not a critique.  It is our opinion only.  If we tell you that we thought your story stank like an exotic cheese, that is our opinion and someone with more artistic credentials may give you rave reviews.  We didn’t because in our opinion it stank and we thought you should know.  On the other hand, just because we liked it does not mean it is saleable or should be published. 

How valid is our opinion?  Truthfully, we have read some books that got the full treatment and we thought they were so so.  We have read other books that were panned and we thoroughly enjoyed them.  It really is in the eye of the beholder. 

It is no good saying that Agency for Literary Review gave it the thumbs up.  That is not a recommendation.  Nor should you throw it in the waste bin because we didn’t like it.  Never throw away anything you have written.  

If you were a cabinetmaker and someone said that your cabinets were not up to snuff, you wouldn’t consign them to the fireplace, would you?  You would (wisely) put them on display, keep them dusted and polished, and wait for someone to buy them.  Your stories are the same.  They are your stock-in-trade.  Keep them on display, dust them off from time to time and give them a bit of polish as well.  Some day, someone will recognise their true value and make an offer to buy them. 

If we tell you your writing is terrible, and you disagree, should you attempt to sell it anyway?  Damn right!  Sell it on the Internet.  Sell it on eBay.  Sell it on the street corner.  Sell it at the weekend local markets.  Sell it to any publisher who might be willing to take a chance.  Take it to a vanity publisher and flog the books yourself, one by one.  Just don’t give it away. 

Many people are so discouraged by not being ‘discovered’ that they do silly things like putting their story on a blog.  Or giving it away as a free e-book or letting it run for free in some local newsletter.  They hope that just maybe someone will read it and say, “Hey, that isn’t half-bad.  Maybe we should talk to the author about a publishing deal”.  It could happen.  After all, a couple of movie stars were discovered working in a coffee shop.  The rest went to Drama College and auditioned, auditioned, auditioned. 

Don’t stop writing.  Even if others agree with us that your work violates the Geneva Convention, don’t stop writing.  The more you write the easier it becomes to express yourself in your writing. 

Remember, your writing is not going to get worse.  No more than swimming fifty laps every day will make you a worse swimmer.  You will improve.  You will handle plots better.  You will handle dialogue better.  You will get better at your research.  You will learn more words to use as tools in your writing.  You will learn and acquire better and more effective work routines.  And, eventually, you will have a large amount of stock to put on display.  It will sell. 

Okay, What’s Next?

Is this going to cost you any money?  Yep!  Of course it will.  If you submit even a small novel, for example, it is going to take us many hours to read it.  Notes must be made and then passed on for someone else to have a look at, if necessary.  When everyone who is going to have a look at it, has had a look at it, then the report must be written and agreed upon.  That all takes time…and (I hate this) time is money. 

How long will it take us?  I haven’t any idea.  Consider the workload, the volume, the traffic on our website and you can guess it will be a couple of weeks…probably.  What we will do is let you know what is happening as it progresses and give you an estimate. 

Will it be some unreasonable time before we get around to it?  Nope.  We do want to actually read your submission though.  So we aren’t just going to look at it and then look at the clock and say, “Holy cow.  We’ve already spent too much time on this thing”. 

If we are so backlogged that we can’t get around to handling your masterpiece within a couple of days of receipt, then we will tell you before you submit it.  We do intend to be honest and forthright and fair. 

So Now What Happens? 

I suppose the first thing  to tell you is how much money we want for this service.  At the moment that amount is $100.  That is the total amount and for that you get all of our services.  We will not ask you for any additional funding or payment.  It is a one-time payment and covers everything we have described (the rest of our services wouldn't be of interest to you anyway). 

If you are still reading, then the next stage is for you to contact us with the details we request on our reply form page, or simply email us via the hyperlinks you can find on this page.  We will reply to you via email and ask you a bunch more questions (that are used only to set up a file with your name on it) and then go to the next stage, which is getting your typescript to us.  

When we have your typescript and payment details have been arranged, we will get to work.   

Are there any safeguards?  Well I’m not sure what you want to be guarded from.  Your email address will be safe with us and, in theory, we will only be replying to your emails.  We shouldn’t have to have any other direct contact with you. 

All of your details will be incinerated automatically 3 months after our report has been issued to you.  All of your details are automatically encrypted on file in case our server is compromised in any way (but that should never happen).  Your typescript will stay on file for the same three-month period and will be incinerated with the rest of your details.  So if you happen to have a computer crash, we can come to your rescue within that period and give you back your story. 

No one can steal your story.  Intellectual property-right laws apply in every country.  If you wrote it, you own it.  Even when you sell it, you only sell the rights of publication, and that is spelled out in whatever contract you sign with the publisher. 

Maybe you don’t want us hanging on to your details for any longer than our dealing with your report.  No problem.  I’m sure our secretary can figure out how to send them to the incinerator immediately. The secretary is the only one with access to those files. 

Lets Save Some Time. 

    If you are writing technical journals then we can’t help you. We are hard pressed getting our laser printer to work. 

    If you have written an entire book of poetry then we can’t help you.  Does the word Philistine explain anything?  We are culture cretins and incapable of understanding the vagaries of the muse.  Should I have put that to rhyme?

    f you have written a book that in any way promotes hate or religion we probably are not interested in reading about it.

    If you have an anthology of short stories and each story doesn’t have a beginning and an ending then you are probably wasting your time and your money talking to us.

    If you are submitting a book full of jokes, we have probably heard most of them too many times (and written quite a few of them ourselves). 

    f you have written a play or a screenplay, to be honest, we aren’t capable of evaluating it.  We simply aren’t credentialed in that area.

    If it is a children's book and designed for the Mother Goose set, you are better advised to read it to some kids yourself, or let them read it if they are old enough.  If it is directed to an older market, we will look at it, but kids are the best critics when it comes to kid stuff. 

    If your story is mostly an autobiography (therefore basically a one time thing) then you aren’t likely to benefit from us reading about you.  Still, we can probably tell you how much you sold yourself and your exploits but so can your family…and they know you.

    If your story is written in a language other than English...need I say more?  It has happened.

Just about anything else we are prepared to tackle, and will let you know if we have prior reservations or misgivings about your typescript.

A final word before you contact us.

If you are not a graduate of journalism then can we advise you to look into such things?  Your local community college may offer some courses that can help you.  There are bound to be writers' workshops or even a book club in your area.  All of these can offer support and ideas and people willing to wade through your typescript for free. 

There are many online writers’ forums and many of these can warn you off approaching certain, well, less reputable publishers or agents as well as helping your style and your technique.  Have a look around. 

If you wanted to be a painter, you would certainly take some art classes, wouldn’t you?   Give it some thought.

We are only one source of help and all that we promise is to read it, evaluate it and tell you what we think.  Actually, that isn’t a bad thing to have on hand, come to think of it.

Taking The Plunge 

The first thing to do is to contact us by filling in the form, or by direct email from any of the contact points on these pages.  The form page is accessed by clicking on the hyperlink in the above sentence or by reading further down to the Form Page link.  If you hate forms and would rather email us directly, then please do so (go to the email button on the top of the page) but make the Subject heading Agency for Literary Review so our spam handler (yes, we get them too) doesn't ignore you.

The purpose of this initial contact is simply to let us prepare to handle your file so it doesn't get lost.  If we think we can help you then we will send you an ID for future correspondence.

That ID will refer any correspondence from you directly to Agency for Literary Review without getting lost within a system.  We really are not as big as that sounds (nor as pretentious) and we assure you that you will be getting very personalised service.

We will accept your typescript in any electronic form in which you care to send it.  However, we do prefer to receive it as a Microsoft e-Book or PDF document.  This makes for easier reading without the distraction of the proofing tools found in word processors.

Microsoft Reader is a free download tool from Microsoft Corporation, and with a couple of key-clicks will reproduce your masterpiece as an electronic book.  You can even install the MS READER on the Microsoft Word Toolbar.

PDF documents are produced in that format by Adobe Systems Incorporated, and though Adobe Reader is a free download, you will need to be a subscriber to create such documents.

This link will take you to a Microsoft Download page and you can obtain a free copy of Microsoft Reader:

http://www.microsoft.com/reader/downloads/pc.asp

Contact Us

This link will take you to a form page that will make initial contact simple, indeed. 

Payment Method

The world has truly become Marshall Mcluhan's global village and we receive a surprising number of requests from around the planet.  To facilitate international payments, we have opted to use PayPal as our preferred payment method.

If you are reluctant to use this method or have had an unsatisfactory experience with them, please contact us directly with your concerns and other arrangements will be made. 

That's all there is.

Note to Simcomserv clients:  You have not been re-directed to a new site.  This is the same service option normally provided directly to you by us in the past.  This service option has become so popular we decided to run it as a stand-alone service with a new look and feel.  Nothing else has changed.