FAQs

Do you have a question about Agents & Books, instead of for Agents & Books? Great! I have those answers here.

What's Agents & Books all about?

We're about, well, agents and books! Literary agents to be exact and mostly traditionally published books. I think self-publishing is spectacular–I'm just not an expert in it. So here we talk about writing books, editing books, pitching books to agents, what agents do, what they don't do, what it's like to publish a book, what the heck is up with marketing a book and much, much more. Join us, won't you?

How many emails are you going to send me?

As few as possible! All subscribers get the free one on Tuesdays and paid subscribers get our fan-favorite Q&A Thursday.

How much does it cost?

$5 a month or $50 a year. Same price since 2019!

What Do I Get For My Money?

All subscribers, paid or free, are entered into our monthly book giveaways. I pick the books, you pick the genre! (US residents only.)

If you're a monthly subscriber, you'll be entered in a monthly drawing for a Query or First Five Pages Critique! (If you're not in a query/pages critique place, we'll work it out.) If you're a yearly subscriber, you'll get all of the above AND access to our quarterly AMA Zoom session, were you can ask me questions and learn from others' questions! It'll be a good time!

All paid subscribers also have access to our classic Q&A Thursdays, where I answer questions in the newsletter. Have a question? Just fill out this form!

All winners will be notified by the email associated with their subscription.

How do I find that old post I read a few months ago?

We have a fancy new search function! Just click the magnifying glass on the homepage and search like normal! (Or like you used to be able to do on Google.)

Who are you?

Kate McKean is a literary agent at the Howard Morhaim Literary Agency in Brooklyn, New York. She earned her MA in fiction writing at the University of Southern Mississippi. Her work has appeared in Poets & Writers, Electric Literature, Catapult, and her first book, Write Through It: An Insider’s Guide to Publishing and the Creative Life is available from Simon Element. In 2026, Sourcebooks will publish her picture book Pay Attention to Me. She writes the Agents & Books newsletter and you can find her at all the places online as well as katemckean.com.

Weren't you on Substack before?

Yeah, for a long time. It was pretty great over there, too. Until this. So in 2025, I moved to Ghost and I'm glad I did.

How do I cancel my subscription?

I don't know why this is so difficult on Ghost, but here is where they are hiding the Cancel Subscription button. Don't all go cancelling now! But I do understand that we don't need all the newsletters forever. Thanks for reading!

1. Got to the homepage and click on Account.

2. Click Change in the window that pops up.

3. Click Cancel Subscription.

If that doesn't work, email me at kate@katemckean.com and I can take care of it for you. Again, thanks for reading!

Do you have an agent?

I do! It's Michael Bourret at Dystel, Goderich, and Bourret. He's fantastic.

I have another question that's not answered here. What do I do?

Email me! I'm at kate@katemckean.com. But this is NOT NOT NOT NOT NOT where you send a query letter to me. Queries sent to this email address are deleted unread.

Oh, I wanted to query you. That was my question.

I am only accepting queries via Query Manager. You can submit your work here: https://QueryManager.com/katemckean I do not retain queries sent via email to ANY address.