I was going to talk about Agency (No, not like a literary agency - like a character's personal agency) today, but in light of recent events, I've changed my mind. Today I'd like to talk about Etiquette when you are looking for an agent. A writer wrote a blog recently that got the attention of most of publishing Twitter, and for good reason. I'm not going to talk about the offensive post, but wanted to address some of the issues the writer took with agents. The writer lamented that agents don't like to read books, and that they were so often fresh-faced women just out of college. The writer didn't understand why writers are asked not to call agents, and why they aren't allowed to bring written work to a conference. This, of course, got me thinking about the number of people who have expressed these confusions to me over the years. What's the point of an agent? They're just snobby gatekeepers. They don't even like to read, as evidenced by the fact that they rejected my book.