The Literary Agent – with Jonny Geller
Start Date
Package
The Literary Agent – with Jonny Geller
Get the inside track on what a literary agent does, how to get one, and how a good agent can help you build a career as an author.
Tutor
Jonny GellerLength
4 weeksLocation
OnlineWriting Goal
Edit & pitchFrom pitching your first novel to shaping your career, a good literary agent is the writer’s creative and business partner. Join Curtis Brown’s Jonny Geller – one of the best-known agents working today – to explore the role of the agent in the author’s professional life, and how to go about getting one.
Jonny Geller decodes the role of a literary agent in a very easy to understand way. He brought a sense of magic to writing a book.
Former The Literary Agent – with Jonny Geller student
Drawing on over 30 years of agenting experience, Jonny shares what literary agents are looking for, how they read, how they find new talent and what good literary agents do to ensure their clients’ books are published well. You’ll learn what you can do to help your agent-submission stand apart from the ‘slush pile’ – from making your opening pages shine to writing an attention-grabbing pitch and ensuring you get your work in front of the right eyes.
The author–agent partnership is dynamic and potentially career-long: Jonny looks behind the scenes at the journey taken by the author and agent together, from the pitch to the published book, from dealing with rejection to becoming a bestseller, from writing that difficult second novel to finding the best trajectory over the long term.
Whether you’re a writer looking for advice on how to pitch your work, an author who wants a better understanding of what a literary agent can do for them, or if you’re simply interested in learning more about literary agenting and publishing, this is the course for you.
Jonny is Chair of CBC and has been closely involved with our courses since their inception in 2011, as a frequent masterclass speaker on our flagship Writing Your Novel courses – sharing his experience of working with numerous bestselling and award-winning authors. Now, he is drawing on his lively and candid CBC speaker sessions to demystify the publishing industry and empower you to approach agents with confidence.
Tutor
Jonny Geller
Jonny Geller joined Curtis Brown in 1993 as an assistant after a short career as an actor. He became a literary agent in 1995 after discovering a novel on the unsolicited pile which went on to sell rights around the world. After taking part in a Management Buyout in 2001, he became CEO of the Agency in 2012 and is now CEO of The Curtis Brown Group, the parent company of Curtis Brown agency and its seven subsidiaries.
Jonny represents a wide range of globally significant writers. Novelists, memoirists, Journalists, former Prime Ministers, thought leaders, business people, actors, musicians and screenwriters. Jonny has previously been awarded Literary Agent of the Year and has been listed on The Bookseller’s 150 every year since its inception. He has also been named one of GQ's 100 Most Connected Men in Britain and the Evening Standard’s 1000 Most Influential People in London. A regular speaker at conferences and events, Jonny hosted a Tedx Talk in 2016 on ‘What Makes a Bestseller’. He is the author of two books.
His fiction clients include: Monica Ali, William Boyd, Tracy Chevalier, Susanna Clarke, Jane Fallon, Lisa Jewell, Ruth Jones, David Nicholls, David Mitchell, Elif Shafak and the Literary Estates of John le Carré and Ian Fleming.
His nonfiction clients include: Bono, Gordon Brown, Alastair Campbell, Jonathan Freedland, Anthony Hopkins, Nigella Lawson, Ben Macintyre, Nelson Mandela Foundation, Arnold Schwarzenegger, Matthew Syed and Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe among others.
What does this course give you?
- Video modules: Work through four modules of exclusive teaching videos from Jonny, covering topics that shed light on the process of working with a literary agent including how to master the elevator pitch, how to polish up your novel to send to literary agents, and what literary agents are really looking for.
- Writing tasks: Weekly tasks will help you research agencies and individual agents, perfect your submission to literary agents, make your opening page shine and hone your pitch letter.
- Resources & notes: You’ll get comprehensive teaching notes to accompany the videos, plus additional resources to go deeper into the topics being explored.
- Professional feedback: An expert CBC editor (with significant experience working at a literary agency or publishing house) will give brief written feedback to each student on one writing task during the course, with several students receiving feedback in each week. Students are also given the option to purchase additional end-of-course feedback from our expert editors.
- Student forum: Find your writing community in our private student forum. Upload your completed writing tasks, give and receive peer-to-peer feedback, and discuss the week’s topics with your group (maximum of 30 students) and the CBC team.
COURSE SCHEDULE & DELIVERY
Follow the course at your own pace. Our online courses are designed for flexible study – you can take part at times to suit you and from wherever in the world you are. To get the best out of it, we recommend spending four to six hours on the coursework each week, and to be actively working on your pitch package across the four weeks.
Week 1
How does an agent work with writers?Week 2
What are agents looking for?Week 3
The pitchWeek 4
The author's career
PITCH PACKAGE FEEDBACK
Students will be given the option to purchase feedback on their final task (their pitch package) from a CBC editor, all of which have experience working in publishing.
- CBC report: For an additional fee of £155, you can obtain a detailed 500-word report on your work (the opening 2,000 words of your novel, one-page synopsis and agent letter) from one of our CBC editors.
- CBC report + tutorial: For an additional fee of £260, you can obtain a 500-word report from one of our CBC editors and have a 30-minute video or telephone tutorial with them to discuss your work.
Please note, Jonny will not be interacting with students in this course or providing individual feedback. Jonny’s advice comes via the exclusive pre-recorded teaching videos and accompanying teaching notes. Participation in the course does not constitute a submission of work to Jonny Geller or the Curtis Brown literary agency. If you wish to send your work to the Curtis Brown literary agency, you can do so by following the directions on the individual agent pages in the Curtis Brown website.
RELATED COURSES
This course would pair brilliantly with our other courses focused on editing your work and preparing your submission to literary agents, including our bestselling six-week online Edit & Pitch Your Novel course and more in-depth Edit & Pitch Your Novel – Advanced course, as well as our one-day Zoom courses: The Rewrite Doctor, Pitching Your Novel and Writing Your Synopsis – Masterclass.
