Agents

From Guidevines, a user-editable wiki for writers

From Guidevines

Literary agents represent authors and assist and negotiate to publishers or producers the sale of their clients' written work. Writers of short fiction, essays, and poetry do not usually require an agent, but novelists, screenwriters, and writers of non-fiction books may find agents beneficial.

Most agents do not even wish to represent short stories, essays, poetry, or children's literature. Therefore, most periodicals that are not written completely "in house" (by the salaried staff) will deal directly with writers. A number of the larger book-publishing houses and conglomerates use agents as a first level of screening, thereby reducing slushpiles: they will not accept manuscripts or even queries from self-selling authors. The only way to approach them is through an agent. Two areas in which some conglomerates break this rules are for romance novels, and almost all of them with distinctive SF imprints still maintain slushpiles. Tor even put pictures on their website to show the size of theirs.

[edit] Cautions About "Agents"

Be cautious and research anyone claiming to be an agent: this is one of the areas where authors get scammed by cheats. In general, distrust:

Anyone who comes looking for you rather than you having to contact them first. If you left a card or partial with them at a convention, you made the first contact. Real agents are like publishers in that they already have too many people clamoring for their attention. They will not send brochures to everyone who subscribes to a writing magazine. Scammers do this all the time.
They guarantee you sales. No one can guarantee a sale, especially before they see the manuscript, least of all of for someone with no track record.
They charge you reading fees or any fees at all before they sign a contract to represent you. Real agents make their money by getting a cut of your advances and royalties. Fake agents pay their rent with reading fees, and may never sell anything to a real publisher. Vanity presses do not count.
Their contract gives them a piece of your income for life even if you quit using them. It is reasonable for an agent to retain income off an item he sold. It is utterly unreasonable for him to get a piece of books sold by you or other agents.
Their contract does not provide any way for you to drop their services. This is called "involuntary servitude." Lincoln freed the slaves: don't sign yourself back in.
The contract of representation is for very short periods, say, under a year. It takes months to sell a book, then usually about two years to see it in print. An agent who won't give it at least a year, more like two, is going to use your anxiety to try to jack more fees out of you in six months. Note that representing you one book at a time is another matter: the agent may think that other books of yours are not that salable, but said agent will represent that book for a year or more.

Preditors and Editors has a page rating agents.

Victoria Strauss maintains the SFWA "Writer Beware" pages on fake agents and agencies, vanity publishers, fake book doctors, book packagers, etc.

Association of Authors' Representatives - organization for agents, with canon of ethics

Agent Query - Searchable Database of agents