98. Julie Lin, The Kidneys and Chamber Music
The 92 Report
Show Notes: Julie Lin was a medical student at Columbia's College of Physicians and Surgeons when she met her future husband. It was the first day of medical school and they met while attending a class where they were both serious amateur classical musicians. Julie talks about their shared love of music and how they planned to have a family quartet. The All-state Orchestra Model Julie shares her story of starting an orchestra at medical school, which initially had a traditional weekly rehearsal and concert. However, they found that the show rate was low as exam time approached, leading...
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97. Dennis Crowley, Medical Device M&A Executive
The 92 Report
Show Notes: Dennis Crowley started working for Tyco International in 1996 and spent five years in Europe, spending half his time in Paris and two and a half years in Brussels. This experience was enjoyable as it allowed him to work, sightsee, and travel around Europe. During his time in Europe, he had the opportunity to visit every country in Europe, including Spain, Italy, the UK, and France. He moved back to Florida, then lived in New England for 25 years before settling just south of Boston. Dennis worked in various divisions at Tyco until 2007, where he worked in their healthcare...
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96. Natalia Tsarkova, Media Entrepreneur and Filmmaker
The 92 Report
Show Notes: Title: Media Entrepreneur and Filmmaker Show notes: Natalia Tsarkova, a transfer student from Latvia, was the first student from the former Soviet bloc to apply to an American college. She was thrown into a completely different world and roles, but knew she wanted to create more contexts for others to transform their lives like she didher life. Growing up in Latvia, she watched pirated MTV videos and credits seeing Billy Jean for the first time for inspiring her to work in the media space. In 1993, she met a professor at the MIT Media Lab, who recognized her mixed...
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95. William Cheng, Hospitalist and Singer
The 92 Report
William Cheng has been working in the Silicon Valley area since 2000. He graduated from Harvard as a bio concentrator and later attended UCLA's David Geffen School of Medicine. He completed residency training in internal medicine at Santa Clara Valley Medical Center, a county hospital affiliated with Stanford Hospital System. He then joined the Palo Alto Medical Foundation as a hospitalist, focusing on acutely ill patients. Working as a Hospitalist William's understanding of the world has changed over the two decades as a hospitalist. He now understands the importance of non-hard science...
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94. Jeanne Simpson, Actor/Dancer/Choreographer/Director/Teacher
The 92 Report
Jeanne Simpson moved to New York after graduating. She started doing day jobs in New York City to make ends meet while attending free dance classes, which allowed her to continue her training without having to pay for grad school. She eventually joined the American Isadora Dance Company, a modern company. Beginning a Career in the Performing Arts Jeanne began her acting career at HB Studios, where she was given a scholarship and studied under Austin Pendleton, a talented teacher who taught the advanced Acting Program at HB. She worked with other amazing actors and learned to choreograph scenes...
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93. Joshua Brandon Holden, Math Professor and Author of The Mathematics of Secrets
The 92 Report
Joshua Brandon Holden, the author of The Mathematics of Secrets, Cryptography from Caesar Ciphers to Digital Encryption, graduated with a degree in pure math and went on to teach at the University of Massachusetts and Duke. He discovered that he was spending most of his time on teaching, so he sought jobs where they would reward teaching. He then worked at the Rose Hulman Institute of Technology, where he did both teaching and research. Common Misconceptions about Cryptography Joshua discusses common misconceptions about cryptography and its connection to the internet. He explains that...
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92. Mark Jacobstein, Accidental Entrepreneur
The 92 Report
Mark Jacobstein resides in Stanford, California with his wife, two children, and his mother in law. Mark's career has primarily focused on entrepreneurial technology, primarily in health tech, biotech, molecular diagnostics, and digital health arenas. After Cambridge, he worked with Scott Murphy, a close friend and business partner. He moved to California in 2003 to start a technology company and has been there ever since. He lives on the Stanford campus, which allows his children to grow up on a college campus. Founding a Fantasy Sports Business Mark shares his journey from writing...
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91. Andreas Stavropoulos, Entering the Third Act
The 92 Report
Andreas Stavropoulos, a venture capitalist and entrepreneur, came to the United States from Greece at 18 and has been in the United States ever since. His big moves include marrying his high school sweetheart, arranging their lives around graduate school, medical school, business school, and moving to California. He is now 55-years-old and is excited about the third act of his life, where he can choose where to spend his time more than he used to. A Career as a Venture Capitalist Andreas started his career as a venture capitalist in 1999 and has been doing so for over two and a half years. He...
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90. Shannon Frison, Marine and Judge
The 92 Report
Show Notes: Shannon Frison joined the United States Marine Corps during her time in law school. She spent her second year at officer candidate school and became commissioned as an officer. After law school, she returned to Massachusetts, worked for a year at the TAs office, took the bar, and went on active duty with the Marine Corps. After serving at Marine Corps Air Station, New River, North Carolina, she worked for a litigation firm called Dwyer and Clora before opening a law firm. In 2009, she applied for the bench in Massachusetts and was appointed to the Boston Municipal Court. She then...
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89. Anastasia Fernands, Patent Litigator
The 92 Report
Show Notes: Anastasia Fernands has been practicing law since graduating from NYU. She started practicing in Boston at Hutchins, Wheeler and Dittmar, which was the oldest continuously running firm in Boston at the time. Anastasia has since moved to New York and now practices at Quinn Emanuel. Anastasia’s career primarily focuses on intellectual property litigation, particularly patent litigation since the mid to late 90s. At that time there were two schools of thought on patent litigation: technical people who understood technology and those who were litigators by trade. There was a...
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Lauren Galit began her career as a magazine editor for about a decade before transitioning into editing and agency work. She started with Gentleman's Quarterly, she worked for advertisers, and later worked for Mode magazine, a plus size women's magazine. She eventually landed her last job at Good Housekeeping.
Lauren was a deputy editor at a magazine, where she was responsible for managing the entire content and was in charge of every word that went into the magazine. She worked with a team of writers, editors, and editors and was able to bring her ideas to life. However, Her passion for connecting authors to audiences and helping them craft their voices led her to switch from magazines to books. She realized that going longer form was a better way to nurture these relationships and nurture the writers’ voices. She went to an agency where she took a major pay and title cut and became an assistant.
Working as a Literary Agent
Lauren’s journey from magazines to books has been a journey of connecting authors to audiences and helping them craft their voices. She has learned to adapt her approach to different publications and agencies, focusing on building relationships and fostering a supportive environment for authors.
Agency work involves generating book ideas, seeking out authors, and working with them to shape their proposals and sell the books to publishers. The agent works with the author to execute the book, executing contracts, shepherding covers, production schedules, and timelines. Lauren started working for John Boswell Associates, a company known for creating 365 Ways to Cook Chicken, and later worked on other projects such as What Not to Wear. The success of this book led her to start her own agency in 2006 and has since worked on various projects in categories such as parenting, diet, exercise, and fitness.
What a Literary Agency Does
As an agent, Lauren used to work with authors to shape and create their proposals, ensuring that they were well-researched and well-written. I also helped them navigate the publication process, including negotiating deals and addressing issues with the editor. The role of the editor in publishing houses, particularly for nonfiction books, is crucial, as the author may have a vision of what the book should be, and the editor may have a different version of what will appeal to the market.
The agency provides services based on the category and interventionist approach. For nonfiction, the agency shapes a proposal, which includes a table of contents, advice, tips, and anecdotes. The proposal, along with marketing and publicity sections, goes to the publisher to entice the publisher to buy the book. In fiction, the book is sold on a full manuscript, while in nonfiction, the book is sold on a proposal.
Lauren explains the business side of the agreement between agent and author, the services provided, percentage of the deal, and what the publishing house covers.
The Role of the Editor and Relationship with the Author
Lauren explains that the agent, editor and author often have a phone call to discuss the concept, and if there are conflicts, the editor expects the author to deliver a different version of the book. There are various options for rewrites, and if they cannot come to terms, the contract can be dissolved.
Lauren has represented the authors of many books around exercise, diet, and fitness, including books about eating fruits and vegetables, exercising, and getting fit. She has shifted her focus to children's literature and middle grade literature for the last decade. She explains the importance of developing a hook and offers a few examples to illustrate how the hook works.
Lauren discusses her experiences in the middle grade and YA fiction space, focusing on magical realism and contemporary books with hints of magic. She highlights the importance of casting a lens on children's emotional lives and making them more consequential.
Exploring What Editors Want
Lauren also discusses approaching publishers and the Rolodex process, which involves researching what editors are looking for and aligning interests appropriately. She suggests that there is a need for more middle grade fiction, as dystopian fiction is being burned out. Lauren also discusses the gender imbalance in middle grade, with boys reading children's books up until a certain age. They often switch to genre fiction, mysteries, adventure novels, and fantasy, but not YA books. She explains why editors don't want to invest too heavily in YA books with male protagonists.
Lauren's advice for other authors in the middle grade and YA fiction space is to focus on matching interests and aligning interests appropriately, and to be patient with the process.
The Landscape of the Book Industry
Lauren explains how the book industry works and how it has been broken down into imprints, with each house having different rules. Lauren touches on the decline of children's imprints, such as Razorbill, which was decommissioned and merged into a single imprint. This has led to a significant downturn in the children's market, with the famous imprint Ink Yard at HarperCollins being discontinued. As a result, the number of outlets and opportunities for book deals decreases.
The shift in the book industry is driven by specialization, specialization, and the need for a diverse range of genres and formats. The book industry is a complex and evolving landscape, with authors often being upset about their intellectual property being trained by AI. This can lead to a lack of understanding of what people know or think about book publishing.
Lauren talks about the role of publishing houses in the future, the importance of an agent, and offers insight on advances for writers. For both fiction and nonfiction, there may be apps that can help authors create books for themselves, such as AI tools that can write books for specific topics or provide personalized advice. However, Lauren states that AI is flawed in its current state, as it is repetitive, clunky, and introduces falsehoods.
Influential Courses or Professors at Harvard
Lauren mentions Marjorie Garber as an influential professor.
Timestamps:
04:13 Bringing out an author's own voice
09:39 How Lauren started her own publishing company
16:03 The role of the editor at the publishing house
22:17 How Lauren got into parenting books
27:34 How to approach publishers for manuscripts
32:56 Boys and girls and YA?
37:08 Selling books with fewer and fewer big buyers.
41:23 The importance of having an editor who loves your book
45:47 Advice for aspiring writers
Links:
Website: LKGAgency
CONTACT:
X (Formerly Twitter): https://twitter.com/LKGagency