Status: Ronnie Ann and the Herman Agency are closed to submissions.
Hi Ronnie Ann! Thanks so much for joining us.
Hi Ronnie Ann! Thanks so much for joining us.
About Ronnie:
BIO: Ronnie Ann Herman was born in New York
City, attended the Ethical Culture/Fieldston Schools pre-K -12 grade, the
University of Wisconsin, Madison and graduated from the University of California
at Berkeley where majored majored in English, French and Italian and received
her BA. Ronnie taught high school English and French in California before moving
to Paris, France. There she taught English as a second language and translated
French into English. On returning to the States, Ronnie apprenticed herself
with a design studio, Antler and Baldwin, and a year later became the sole
member of the art depart at Prentice Hall's small children's book division. 2
years later Ronnie was the Art Director at Random House where she worked for 9
years and then moved to Grosset & Dunlap, then a division of Putnam books,
and now part of Penguin Random House, worked
at Prentice Hall where she worked for 9 years. Ronnie is the author of 12
children’s books and one of her books was on the NY Times best-seller list. Ronnie
started the Herman Agency 16 years ago, in 2000 where she works with
remarkably talented authors, artists and author/artist for the children's book
market. Ronnie and the Agency are affiliated with the following
organizations: SCBWI, Authors' Guild, Graphic Artists' Guild, U.S.
Association of Accredited Business.
1. Tell us how you
became an agent, how long you’ve been one, and what you’ve been doing as an
agent.
A long story, as you can see from my long bio above,
but briefly over the 20 years I work in publishing houses in New York,
publishing had increasingly become quite corporate and both of my daughters had from
graduated college, my husband left his jobs in adult publishing and was writing
at home, so I felt I could take some risk and leave my 9-7 job. Agenting was a
natural choice and I was blessed to have so many of the talented, wonderful artists I had worked with over the years ask if they could join the Herman
Agency. And here I am, 16 years later still representing fabulous talent--artists,
authors and author artists.
I have been trying to cut back the number of people that I
represent and have it down now to a small group of amazing people. The Herman
Agency is definitely a boutique agency and will remain as such. My daughter, Katia,
has joined the agency and is representing middle grade and YA authors.
About the Agency:
2. Share a bit about your agency and what it offers to its
authors.
I work with authors and artists whom I care a great deal
about and whom I want to see succeed in this very competitive field. I
encourage my artists to try their hands at writing and a great many of them
have succeeded beautifully. I love editing and art directing my clients/ work
when they as me to or when I feel like putting on my art director's or editor's
hat. I tell them they are free to ignore my suggestions, after all it is their
work, not mine, but almost all of the time they tend to welcome my input.
What She’s Looking
For:
3. What age groups do you represent—picture books, MG,
and/or YA? What genres do you represent and what are you looking for in
submissions for these genres?
I ADORE all picture books and highly illustrated
middle grade books. My daughter is representing middle grade and YA books and
is open for submissions. We are not the right agency for Sci-fi and paranormal
works. Strong voices and excellent writing styles are a must.
4. Is there anything
you would be especially excited to seeing in the genres you are interested in?
I prefer author/artist works at this point. but if
you have an amazing portfolio or manuscuript, feel free to send it to me. I am
being HIGHLY selective as I have no desire to have a large agency again.
What She Isn’t
Looking For:
5. What types of submissions are you not interested in?
Anything that feels familiar or that has a strong
lesson or moral. Fiction picture book that are longer than 700 words.
Agent Philosophy:
6. What is your philosophy as an agent both in terms of the
authors you want to work with and the books you want to represent?
I want authors and artists who have more than one
book in them and who are adaptable. Publishing is a corrobative procedure.
Authors and artists need to be able to make work well with their editors and
art directors and work well in a team environment. They also need to be
professional and meet their deadlines. Artists need to be consistent--their
characters and style need to be consistent through their book and be good at
keeping details accurate throughout. For instance, the characters need to be
the same size and have the same look throughout the work and if there is a tree
to the left of the house, that tree can't suddenly move to the right. Having
been an art director for so many years, I know how frustrating these things are
for the art department and editorial team.
Editorial Agent:
7. Are you an editorial agent? If so, what is your process
like when you’re working with your authors before submitting to editors?
I almost always have some comments and sometimes
have thoughts on restructuring the work. I believe we need to get the
manuscript, and art, as right as possible.
Query Methods and
Submission Guidelines: (Always verify before submitting)
8. How should authors query you and what do you want to see
with the query letter?
Full picture books manuscripts: fiction, NO LONGER than 700,
I actually prefer 500 or less. Remember that the ideal audience for fiction
picture books is 2-5 year-olds. Non-fiction picture books can be up to 1000
words. Non-fiction books need to have voice and move along smoothly. They are
not text books! Read the best selling non-fiction picture books to see how they
are constructed.
Middle grade: Full manuscript of highly illustrated books by
author/artists should include around 6 spreads of tight sketches and 2 sample
pieces if book is to be full color. Full manuscripts of authors only.
Midddle grade and YA novels go to
katia.hermanagencyinc@gmail.com: Query letter with first 20 pages as an
attachment--PDF or Word files.
9. Do you have any
specific dislikes in query letters or the first pages submitted to you?
The first manuscript pages of middle grade and YA
novels need to be compelling. If you don't grab your young audience by page 20,
that is a problem.
Response Time:
10. What’s your response time to queries and requests for
more pages of a manuscript?
3 months
Self-Published and
Small Press Authors:
11. Are you open to
representing authors who have self-published or been published by smaller
presses? What advice do you have for them if they want to try to find an agent
to represent them?
Prefer not to as publisher prefer not to publish
them, but if they are spectacular, I would consider them.
12. With all the changes in publishing—self-publishing,
hybrid authors, more small publishers—do you see the role of agents changing at
all? Why?
Agents are here to guide their clients in the right
direction and help them negotiate fair agreements with their publishers. The
road to self-publishing is wide open and great. I wouldn't dismiss it since
the marketing of you books will still be mostly on responsibility with a
traditional publisher anyway. But distributing you self-published book and
getting it noticed, is even more difficult than publishing your work through a
main stream publisher.
Clients:
13. Who are some of the authors you represent?
Please check out my website: www.HermanAgencyInc.com
Interviews and Guest
Posts:
14. Please share the links to any interviews and guest posts
you think would be helpful to writers interested in querying you.
Links and Contact
Info:
15. Please share how writers should contact you to submit a
query and your links on the Web.
www.HermanAgencyInc.com, ronnie@hermanagencyinc.com,
katia.hermanagencyinc@gmail.com
Update on 2/16/2023
Additional Advice:
16. Is there any other advice you’d like to share with
aspiring authors that we haven’t covered?
Thanks for sharing all your advice, Ronnie Ann.
Ronnie Ann is generously offering a query critique
to one lucky winner. She would do critique for a picture book manuscript or illustrations and Katia Herman would critique a middle grade or YA query lettr. To enter, all you need to do is be a follower (just click
the follower button if you're not a follower) and leave a comment through May
28th.
If your e-mail is not on your Google
Profile, you must leave it in the comments to enter either contest.
If you do not want to enter the contest, that's okay. Just let me know in the
comments.
If you mention this contest on Twitter, Facebook,
or your blog, mention this in the comments and I'll give you an extra entry.
This is an international giveaway.
Profile Details:
Last updated: 2/16/2023
Agent Contacted For Review? Yes
Last Reviewed By Agent? 5/11/2016
Profile Details:
Last updated: 2/16/2023
Agent Contacted For Review? Yes
Last Reviewed By Agent? 5/11/2016
Have any experience with this agent? See something
that needs updating? Please leave a comment or e-mail me at
natalieiaguirre7@gmail.com
Note: These agent profiles and interviews
presently focus on agents who accept children's fiction. Please take the time
to verify anything you might use here before querying an agent. The information
found here is subject to change.
