IMHO: The Self-Publishing Scene Includes Agents All Around

On July’s Hot Sheet bestseller list, I took immediate notice of a top-performing title, Keep It Simple Y’All: Easy Dinners from Your Barefoot Neighbor. The author is Matthew Bounds, someone I hadn’t seen or heard of before—probably because he primarily posts videos to TikTok and Instagram, and I watch precious little video on social media. But the more I dug into his story, the more fascinated I became, so I reached out for an interview. (Read that interview.)

What I couldn’t reveal in my interview was that he was already in negotiations with Clarkson Potter (Penguin Random House) for a two-book deal that would include Keep It Simple Y’All plus a follow-up, Keep It Simple Comfort. Last week the deal announcement was posted at Publishers Marketplace. Bounds told me that two publishers had reached out, and so did some agents. But rather than sign with an agent, he decided to have one review the contract instead.

I started wondering what percentage of self-publishing authors—at least those hitting the bestseller lists—have agents. So I returned to Hot Sheet’s July bestseller list for self-published ebooks and began researching the authors. Whether they’re ranking high or low, the majority of these authors have agents, have done rights deals, and/or have done deals with traditional publishers, often as they continue to self-publish. Of course it’s only logical that an author consistently appearing high in Amazon rankings or elsewhere would hear from agents who can help facilitate rights deals, but I didn’t really appreciate how sizable this business actually is. And clearly publishers have no qualms about picking up previously self-published material and re-releasing it (see my conversation with Bloom Books). Indie authors typically need to partner with traditional publishers to have a major presence in brick-and-mortar bookstores, libraries, and/or mass merchandisers—and increasingly to have a shot at the major bestseller lists. Which reminded me of the USA Today situation.

After the USA Today bestseller list was relaunched in 2023, I conducted an analysis to see if the new version included as many self-published titles as before. The answer was a resounding no. Now that it’s been roughly a year, I decided to revisit the USA Today list and see if that’s changed. It has not. Between June 2024 and August 2024, you’ll find around two to four self-published titles on the 150-title USA Today list, similar to last year’s statistics. HD Carlton typically appears twice every week with her two-book series, Haunting Adeline and Hunting Adeline. Of the three indie authors who consistently appeared every month this summer, each one has an agent and/or has multiple rights deals to their name. Two authors who appeared only once—T.M. Richardson and Deanna Grey—didn’t have agents. Perhaps they are in conversations with agents as I type.

Some literary agents now clearly specialize in working with self-publishing authors. Here are a few notable ones, drawing on deals information from Publishers Marketplace. Not all of their deals involve indie authors (most agencies are technically open to any type of author), but they do feature indie-published books prominently, often in the romance or romantasy genre. Notably, none of these agencies are based in New York.

• Brower Literary (53 reported deals in the last 12 months): has sold rights for Meghan Quinn, Hannah Grace, Ana Huang, Vi Keeland, and Tessa Hale, among others. Sold 17 paperback rights deals in the last 12 months, all of them to Entangled’s Amara and Sourcebooks (usually Bloom Books), plus 16 international rights deals. Fully remote agency.
• Bookcase Literary (42 reported deals in the last 12 months, mostly for romance): has sold rights for Lucy Score, Leia Stone, Claire Kingsley, and Stephanie Archer, among others. This agency started off by specializing in indie authors’ international rights. While it has expanded into other types of clients, rights deals, including paperback deals, still account for most activity reported in Publishers Marketplace. Based in North Hollywood, California.
• Weaver Literary Agency (47 reported deals in the last 12 months): has sold rights for H.D. Carlton, Callie Hart, Kat Singleton, Tate James, and Nicole Fiorina, among others. Similar to Bookcase, this agency mostly facilitates international rights but is open to other types of clients and deals. Based in the Midwest.
• SBR Media (193 reported deals in the last 12 months): has sold rights for C.R. Jane, Ashley Jade, Shain Rose, and R.C. Stephens, among others. At the time of this writing, the agency was the number-one audio rights dealmaker in Publishers Marketplace. Based in Myrtle Beach, South Carolina.
• Two Daisy Media (58 deals in the last 12 months): has sold rights for S.J. Tilly and Sara Cate, among others. Mostly focuses on international rights deals, with a handful of other deals. Based in Coxs Creek, Kentucky.
• Beck Literary Agency (30 deals in the last 12 months): has sold rights for Harper L. Woods, Nicci Harris, Kay Cove, Lucy Smoke, and Luna Mason, among others. Mostly focuses on international rights deals, with a handful of other deals. The eponymous   agent is also a USA Today bestselling author under the name JL Beck; she opened the agency in 2023. Based in Adams, Wisconsin. 

I reached out to a few of the above agents to ask how their businesses started and how they find new clients. Savannah Greenwell from Two Daisy Media said she directly emailed her first clients, whom she had read and enjoyed, to see if they were interested in representation. However, these days, she receives queries from authors looking for representation. “Many [clients] come from seeing the deals I have acquired or from my current clients sharing their experience with them.” As of today, about 10 percent of her clients both self-publish and traditionally publish, but she believes that percentage will increase. “So many indie authors are looking to become hybrid, given how much the publishing world is changing in regards to more and more publishing houses picking up print-only rights.”

Josi Beck at Beck Literary Agency sold foreign rights for herself through a small press that she co-owned for a few years. She wrote me, “I discussed my success in doing this with some author associates that I knew personally and from there began to assist a few that were struggling to trust others with their work.” The first author she signed was Harper L. Woods / Adelaide Forrest; the two had already been colleagues for several years. She said, “It’s important to me to represent authors that I personally respect as well as see a great potential in.” But most of her current clients have approached her via submission or referral; she’s now closed to submissions.

Bottom line: I’ve been around long enough to witness several stages of agent involvement in indie author careers. The first involved “assisting” authors with self-publishing, which rarely worked out well for anyone. Anyone remember Amazon’s White Glove program? (Very little of that occurs today.) Around that time, some agents started demanding a percentage of their clients’ self-publishing earnings, just as they would with a traditional publishing deal. (I don’t know how anyone finds that remotely acceptable or ethical.) However, there were a few early trailblazers, such as Kristin Nelson and Jane Dystel, who facilitated rights deals and traditional deals for self-publishing clients. That has turned out to be a great model and apparently a way for new agents to break into the market as well. As Greenwell notes above, this is possible because publishers have become more open to picking up print-only rights, and it probably also relates to tremendous consumer demand in the romance category.