Want to eavesdrop on some agents?

Well, now you can! Two Canadian agents interviewed each other by email over the course of a weekend.  

Here are a couple of interesting excerpts:
“Recently I'm sure you've noticed too how the so-called 'midlist' authors are being cast aside by their publishers. In today's difficult marketplace, publishers want either the sure thing or the completely untried, hoping that either one will become a bestseller. Authors on their third book who haven't yet broken out are in increasingly untenable positions, and there aren't many options in our small marketplace.”

And:
“To pick up on one of your points first, absolutely, securing the best deal for an author is about much more than the advance. It's finding the perfect combination of editor, marketing support, position within a publisher's list and timing of publication, and then trying to round that out with strong financial terms. The chemistry with the right editor is worth a significant amount - it's when you have a few wonderful editors fighting for the same book (and don't we wish that happened more often) that the dollars become more significant. Because if the rest of the publishing house isn't backing up that editor with marketing and sales support, all the editorial passion in the world isn't going to help a book get noticed by readers.”

Read more here.