The specific question at a late day panel on the Tuesday of the London Book Fair was not about whether literary agents matter, but about their future. Hosted in the Author Lounge, and filled with a crowd of what looked to be predominantly self-published authors, panelist-agents Andrew Lownie (who has an eponymous firm), and Hellie Ogden (who just joined Janklow & Nesbit in the U.K.) discussed what they see as the new role of today's book agents.

Lownie, who began his career as a bookseller before becoming an agent and running Curtis Brown for a number of years, launched his own agency in 1998. Lownie's list is predominantly nonfiction and, recently, he launched an imprint at the agency called Thistle (which is similar to self-publishing units at a variety of U.S. agencies). The imprint, he said, can be used to publish books "quickly" and also a place to publish out-of-print backlist books by his authors. Given, Lownie said, that publishers have become "more cautious than ever" about taking on projects, agents need to be able to look at projects and be able to take them to market in a different route. While he recognized that it is harder than it's ever been for agents to sell a book, he thinks digital publishing "has opened up huge opportunity."

Ogden, who worked in the foreign rights department at Penguin before becoming an agent, concurred. She largely represents commercial fiction and spoke about how now, more than ever, many authors need guidance in how to handle their entire catalog of work. She said that Janklow is very focused on paying attention to its authors' backlists, as well as being evangelists for its authors' frontlist titles. As publishers do less and less in the way of marketing and publicity for titles, Ogden said it now falls to agents to be the ones to "keep on them" about the books they are publishing. It's agents now, she said, who often need to think about innovative marketing plans, and ways to break out a book.
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