At which point, the agent will set the date and the rules. If offers are flying fast and high, then s/he may suspect there's enough interest to say 'May the best publisher win.' A pre-empt, or a very high offer from a publishing house to take the project off the table, is generally a good indicator of whether or not an auction could be in the works. There are many factors that go into whether or not an agent takes a project to auction. If you are an author fortunate enough to have several houses interested in buying your project, congratulations! Your agent will go out and gauge the playing field and decide whether or not s/he wants to set a closing date (after which the two of you can consider all the offers that have come in) or to take your project to auction.

This stage of acquisitions is a bit about game-playing, especially when there are multiple players. The process of offering money can vary widely from project to project: sometimes only one house makes an offer, sometimes several houses make an offer, sometimes a house tries to pre-empt the book, etc. (Part III is contracts.) Today I would like to discuss Part II: Offers, and specifically auctions. Part I of a three part saga, the middle part of which is when monies are actually offered. As we all know, acquisitions is complicated, and when I last blogged about the process, I wrote about the editorial board and what goes on in a publishing house when trying to make an offer.

S jae jones