Erik Talkin Is the Book Angel
Melinda Palacio -- July 8, 2005
When a writer's life seems housed in a dark and lonely place, the book angel comes to the rescue. Forget about everything writers, agents and publishers say about the book publishing business. Erik Talkin has a new approach to finding writers an agent and, ultimately, a publishing contract.
Talkin's experience as a writer, artist, graphic designer, marketer, television and film producer, and public relations director, make him the perfect candidate for his newest venture as the Book Angel.
His role as a the Book Angel began with the dissatisfaction he felt in commissioning other professionals to market his own work. Talkin found success in publishing his children's series, the Master Detectives, when he relied on his background as an artist and graphic designer. "The visual is very important in literature," he says, "so much more than it ever was. People need a hook."
But it's his "one-sheet" that caught the attention of three publishers and seven agents who praised the writer for his innovative approach.
The one-sheet, colored on one side and black and white on the other, is a printed "trailer" to a piece of writing. The heavy weight glossy goes against the "rules" that tell potential writers to avoid flashy, eye-catching tricks to gain the attention of publishers. However, Talkin believes if he can sell the work to agent, the agent will be confident the work will sell to a readership. He's used to mixing story and the visual medium. "I find it easy to look at someone's work and say this is who it will appeal to," said the 43-year-old writer. "The publishing world is changing. With retailers like Amazon, we'll need the Book Angel even more."
Talkin lived in England for 29 years where he founded Mighty Pen Productions, a marketing and production company and then later Talkin Pictures. London's also the site where Talkin had four plays produced and where two of his films, "Hope Machine' starring Parker Posey and ‘The Gallery' starring Helena Bonham Carter, were selected for the London Film Festival.
Although his marketing talents could dress up any written material, Talkin says he won't represent a manuscript. that's not well-crafted--he's prepared to offer his clients a professional line edit. "I enjoy the challenge of taking someone's idea and boiling it down," says Talkin, "the intent of the book must be true."
Be it memoir, science fiction or a mainstream novel, Talkin does the thinking for agents and writers who may not know how to market their work. Talkin attributes his success and those of his clients to the one-sheet's ability to move a manuscript beyond the eternal slush piles of agents and publishers.
"They instantly latched onto it because they could understand how the idea would work with the publisher and the readership. Because ultimately you're trying to always boil everything down so that somebody who doesn't care about your book or have any interest can just pick up a single sheet of paper and say, ‘yeah, I want to know more about this book'."
The Book Angel may be a godsend for writers who haven't a clue as to how to market or sell their masterpiece; however, the service comes with a price.
His sliding scale depends on how much work the book angel needs to perform. In his two-tier pricing system, the first stage runs about $1800 and includes identification of the market, creation of the one-sheet and query letter, and sending a packet to the right people. There are additional costs for the second stage which includes handling queries from agents and publishers and offering advice on the negotiation of contracts.
Karin Finell, author of Goodbye to the Mermaids, said Talkin was very helpful in getting agents to pay attention to her submission. "Ultimately it depends on the material itself," said Finell, "Erik is very good at what he does." The Book Angel helped Finell sign a contract with a New York agent.
For more information on the Book Angel contact Erik Talkin at 805-637-9268 or ETalkin@mac.com.